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politics appear frequently in THE CENTURY, surely a student little given to the sentimentalities, has reminded us that "at the beginning of the late war we heard much of its morally regenerative effects, but as the terrible holocaust went on, year after year, far-sighted moralists warned against a fatal drain of Europe's idealistic forces akin to that suffered by the Greek world during the Peloponnesian War, and which might break the thin crust of European civilization built up since the Middle Ages." The relation of suicide to freedom, it seems, takes on a wider aspect than that revealed in the total number of men and women who take their own lives. The suicide of civilization may be brought about by a persistent travesty of freedom on the part of "liberated" peoples who do little more than deck despotism in a new garb.

TWO IDEAS ABOUT RUSSIA

HE would be a brave man indeed who would prophesy anything respecting Russia. Mr. Wells may remind us that prophecy is no longer the trick of the soothsayer, but rather the result of careful reasoning from cause to effect, but there has certainly been more of the soothsayer than of the scientist in the bulk of discussion about Russia. This editorial purposes no prophecy; simply an interpretation of two points of view respecting the attitude of the rest of the world toward soviet Russia. At the moment of writing there are numerous indications that diplomatic recognition of soviet Russia may become a reality before these comments reach the reader, but at this distance it is impossible to write with a conviction of certainty.

It is perhaps unnecessary to go into detail regarding these indications, because they will doubtless either become accomplished fact or the Russian situation will again prove its fertility in surprises before this statement reaches the newsstands. It is necessary, however, as background for an examination of the two points of view to be discussed, to state these items.

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In England, just now, there are persistent rumors that Lloyd George will

propose to the Allied premiers recognition of soviet Russia. These rumors, it is true, run side by side with official and semi-official statements that maintain the drastic disapproval of Bolshevism that has all along informed Allied policy or lack of policy. It is a favorite trick of governments, however, to release rumors in advance of a statement of policy in order to feel out public sentiment, and while this sounding of sentiment is going on, the government maintains its old policy with the accustomed gestures. This may be the case in England.

It seems that by a process of elimination of successive policies toward Russia, the Allies are drifting toward peace with Lenine. At the outset, the Allied governments faced a hopeless puzzle in the determination of a Russian policy. Their liberal, labor, and radical elements were against war on Russia; their conservative elements were against peace with Russia. With their hands tied by these two elements, unable either to make peace or to wage war decisively, the Allied governments muddled along with an indecisive policy, aiding border states against the Bolshevists and abetting Kolchack, Denikin, and Yudenitch. There was much whistling in the dark over this policy, to keep up Allied courage. We were treated to doctored news of fictitious successes of these leaders. But that policy has played out. chack, Denikin, and Yudenitch have been clearly beaten by Lenine, and the Allied governments can no longer wage war against Russia under the euphonious name of a cordon sanitaire; they face the plain alternatives of peace or war. If it is to be war, they face the possibility of hopelessly splitting their own countries over the matter. The Allied premiers know the little enthusiasm, indeed the great antagonism, that any attempt to wage war against Russia on a big scale would evoke.

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If England does not make peace with Lenine, she must fight him in the open. In the event of such a war, England would be obliged to provide against the ultimate possibility of Bolshevist attacks upon her outlying empire, Persia, Afghanistan, Mesopotamia, Egypt, India. The possibilities of such a war

would run so far that England's defensive preparations would be arduous and costly. Lloyd George, unless all signs fail, will not go to the country with any proposal involving war against the Bolshevists now. If the next government in England is a Labor government, which is not at all unlikely, the probability of war against Russia is even more remote. Plainly, the drift is toward peace with soviet Russia as far as England is concerned. England has, from the beginning, played for a weakened and disintegrated Russia. She wants no strong and integrated Russia to become again a thorn in the side of her imperial politics and purposes. Her muddling policy to date has failed, however, to split Russia into fragment states that would never again entertain imperial dreams. A consistent imperial policy in England would now decide for war against the Bolshevists, but Lloyd George, with his eye on the Labor vote, hesitates.

Italy, like England, has all along hoped for a weakened Russia, a disintegrated Russia. Italy wants no bases left for a future Pan-slavic movement that might thrust its way down to the Adriatic. But Italy now shares with England the failure of the Allied lack of policy to bring about a weakened and disintegrated Russia, and also faces the unavoidable alternatives of actual peace or actual war. She is in no position to shoulder the consequences of a decision for war, if her people so desired. The indications are that she will agree with England, if England moves toward

peace.

France, as pointed out in these columns last month, has from the beginning wanted a strong and integrated Russia that would restore the balance of power in Europe and pay back the Russian debt to France. France is perhaps more strenuously anti-Bolshevist than either England or Italy, but there is a growing restlessness in France over the uncertainty and drift that have marked the Allied Russian policy. France is watching England's moves in the Russian matter with undisguised care, but if France feels that she has played her last card in the effort to secure a strong republican Russia, she will undoubtedly

collaborate in a peace policy, although she will probably take little noticeable part in its formulation and display slight enthusiasm over it. Millerand will probably with generous gesture let Lloyd George do it, and incidentally allow the mercurial Welshman to shoulder the blame in the event the policy later goes on the rocks. But this editorial promised not to prophesy.

This drift toward peace with Lenine has once more brought into clear relief two primary ideas about Russia. Because so much is at stake, for the whole world, in any Russian policy, an understanding of these two ideas is of vital importance. One school of political thought is unalterably opposed to any recognition of soviet Russia, while an equally assertive school contends that peace with Russia and her reinstatement in international relations, economic at least, is the only sane political and economic strategy. These two divergent points of view are held by persons equally convinced that Bolshevism is economic insanity. Let us attempt to interpret the basic contentions upon which these two policies rest.

The anti-peace party begins with the belief that any treaty of recognition will be regarded by Lenine as a scrap of paper; that all along his foreign policy has been, and will continue to be, guided by his ambitions for a world revolution; that any peace will be to him only a respite, a chance to gather forces for his world offensive. Persons of this belief take no stock in the idea that Lenine's policy has been altered even in the slightest; they think he is still bent upon Bolshevising the world. They think the Allied governments are in danger of falling victim to an insidious Bolshevist campaign for a premature peace, and that in this matter they are likely to permit Russian propaganda to succeed in doing what German propaganda failed to do. They fear any policy that will give Lenine a chance to thrust out his tentacles of propaganda across the world and to replenish his depleted stores of materials needed for a future revolutionary offensive. They claim that all of the apparent changes in Bolshevism, the apparent compromises with the existing social order, such as the

hiring of bourgeois experts at high salaries, the granting of private ownership of land to peasants, and the reputed moderation of terrorism, are only astute shiftings of ground on Lenine's part for the securing of immediate tactical advantages. They are sure that behind Lenine, the politician, and a clever politician at that, stands Lenine, the revolutionist, unchanged and unchanging. They picture Lenine as sitting in the Kremlin chuckling over the present plight of Europe, delighted over its economic chaos, gleeful as he observes the European exchanges tumbling about the ears of impotent governments, as he watches national antagonisms grow, and sees territorial disputes obscure the fundamental question of the economic restoration of Europe, without which Europe will lack the economic vitality to resist the germs of his doctrines. They picture him as happy while Allied policy begets bitterness in Germany. They are convinced that he is planning to take advantage of Europe before reconciliation and restoration can be brought about, that he wants a respite, such as diplomatic recognition would give him, in order to make quick preparation for his world drive before it is too late.

Some weeks before Lenine signed a peace with Esthonia and proceeded with his peace offensive, a leading exponent of this point of view thus outlined what he thought Lenine's strategy would be:

It is not difficult to picture to oneself Lenine's political tactics in the present European situation. Having defeated his Russian opponents, his first object will be to conclude peace with each of the neighboring States. He is already negotiating with Esthonia; when peace with Esthonia has been obtained, the turn will come for the other Baltic States, for Poland and for Finland. Meanwhile strenuous efforts will be made to induce the Western Powers to follow the example of the border States. Every kind of argument will be brought forward to make such a peace acceptable to Labor and Capitalism alike. The former will be told that Russia has a real working men's Government; the latter will have concessions dangled before their eyes. This sinister combination of deluded workmen and greedy capitalists will be a formidable force for any Govern

ment to resist. We shall be told that once peace is concluded in Russia the Bolshevists will become moderate, and all those who wish to believe this will readily accept it without further question.

This anti-peace party points to the present world-wide sweep of Bolshevist Lenine's propaganda to prove that ambition overflows the Russian frontiers. They point out the activities of Bolshevist agents in Asia, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Germany, Switzerland, France, Great Britain, and the United States. They call attention to Lenine's efforts in Asia aimed at a revolution in India, how he has been manipulating the twenty million Mohammedans in Russia, on the Volga, in the Ural territories, in Turkestan, and the eastern Caucasus, in the interest of a revolution in the Mohammedan East-a revolution that could be turned to Bolshevist account against England. They refer to the success Lenine has had in almost turning Afghanistan into a Bolshevist outpost. They remind us of the celerity with which Lenine took advantage of the Anglo-Persian treaty, but recently signed, to make a revolutionary appeal to the Persians. China has not been immune to Bolshevist agitation, and Japan has officially put up her guards against Lenine's propaganda.

The pro-peace party claims to oppose Bolshevism as an economic philosophy as strenuously as does the anti-peace party, but contends that military opposition and economic blockade serve simply to make a martyr of Lenine, enable him to lay the blame for any practical failures of the Bolshevist system upon Allied persecution, and give him ground for terrorism, in that he can claim it to be a necessary policy of defense against counter-revolutionary forces that would restore the czarist régime. Those who favor economic intercourse with and diplomatic recognition of soviet Russia claim that any government in Russia or anywhere else, if left alone, is bound to become moderate. They claim that error thrives best when persecuted; that when error is forced to compete in the open market with truth, error fails. They want to compel Bolshevism to come into the

open and accept the challenge to "make good" as an economic system. They are confident it cannot succeed, and that once Lenine is robbed of alibis, his practical failures will loosen his grip upon the Russian masses. They claim that the anti-peace party simply has a case of nerves; that the chief difference between the anti-peace party and themselves is that those who oppose recognition of Russia seem to be afraid Lenine is right and might convince the world he is right, to the dread destruction of the social order in which they have such heavy stakes, while they, the pro-peace party know that Lenine is wrong, and are willing to dare him to prove to the world that he is right.

In between these two extreme parties stands a group that was well interpreted in a recent cartoon. Standing outside the door of a quarantined house, occupied by a family afflicted with the dread disease of Bolshevism, was an eagerlooking gentleman with a basket marked "Trade." The legend under the car"I'd like to go in if I thought I would n't catch it."

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The news of the months to come will bring us the story of the practical application of one of these policies, perhaps of each of them in succession. We shall have the privilege of seeing these political theories subjected to practical test.

GIBBON ON THE 1920 CAMPAIGN

THE surprising timeliness of old books has been before commented upon in these columns. The other evening, while we were re-reading Gibbon's "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire," the following sentence leaped out of its pages and bridged the gap between ancient history and modern politics:

The temper of soldiers, habituated at once to violence and slavery, renders them very unfit guardians of a legal, or even a civil, constitution. Justice, humanity, or political wisdom, are qualities they are too little acquainted with in themselves to appreciate in others.

An impertinent and irreverent friend, who did not realize that he was laying himself open to suspicion as a Red sym

pathizer, suggested that the sentence should be duly engraved and forwarded to the Republican National Committee.

This is not set down as a malevolent partizan thrust at any particular candidate, but simply upon the impulse to pass along the smile our impertinent friend's suggestion evoked from us. The sentence does, however, suggest the wisdom of looking to the temper of mind as well as to the platform of a Presidential candidate. Long ago some one suggested that party platforms, like street-car platforms, are used in getting aboard, but not for riding. In the very nature of the case, party platforms signify little. We do not expect a President to follow the platform upon which he is elected. Theoretically we do; actually we do not. We know that platforms are deliberately designed to catch votes, and that fundamental issues that might divide the country are avoided, regardless of their importance. By the very exigencies of party politics, platforms are saturated with insincerity -the insincerity that comes from avoiding vital issues, rather than the insincerity of saying what is not meant. There are voters on both sides of the fence, hence a party ambitious for power tends to take its stand on both sides of the fence. This opportunism of parties, with its by-product of insincerity, has about obliterated any fundamental distinction between the Republican and Democratic parties. About the only difference is a difference in personal leadership from time to time. One of Mr. Hoover's friends has interpreted his valuation of political parties in this country as follows:

Mr. Hoover . . . regards the two parties [Republican and Democratic] as nothing more than names and political machines, and considers that as matters now stand, and have stood for some time, they represent only organized aspiration to control the government. There is, he believes, no real difference between the two parties except in history; that no momentous issues separate them; that no man really knows why he calls himself a Republican or Democrat, beyond the force of habit, sentimental tradition, and the selfish associations of the conflict between the "ins" and the "outs."

It may be bad politics to talk in this wise, but it is sound sense. Even the sincerest of men would find it difficult to follow to the letter any platform designed at this time for the four years ahead. In such fluid times, a man of real Presidential caliber must of necessity change his mind from time to time and thus court the charge of inconsistency. We require a growing wisdom in the White House, not the literal following of a campaign blue-print. This being the case, it is more important to consider the intellectual quality, the temper of mind, and the point of view of a Presidential candidate than to concern ourselves with the party platform or even with the party of which the man is candidate.

In fact, it might not be an unwise experiment in the 1920 campaign to eliminate platforms altogether, and let the candidates go to. the country, on the stump and in the press, for a frank crossexamination by the public. We should like to see the Democratic and Republican candidates for the Presidency make a joint tour of the main centers of population of this country and, unhampered by opportunist platforms, submit themselves to the searching questions that plain men might put to them. Three months of such honest debate, of heckling and answer, would show us the minds of the candidates in action and give us a better basis for deciding our vote than we can ever find under the customary campaign tactics. Men can

not dissimulate and trim before an audience that has the right to talk back, as they can in party platforms and set speeches. Why not try it?

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who, through organized effort, have been able to ease the burden. Envy has resulted in imitation, so that we have "Middle Classes' Unions" springing up here and there throughout the world. It is a case of class consciousness among the unclassified.

One of the earliest manifestations of this new class consciousness occurred in Germany early in 1919, when the professional men of a North German town brought an unexpected pressure to bear upon the swaggering Spartacide workmen by threatening a counter-strike. Even a revolutionist listens when his child is sick and the doctor threatens to strike. This movement for organization among the "white-collars" or the "black-coats" or, to use a term gaining vogue in the London press, the "salariate" appears in as widely separated places as Germany, Japan, and South America. It has taken the most definite form, however, in England. Early in 1919 there was organized in London a "Middle Classes' Union," the purpose and character of which was plainly stated by its general secretary, Captain Stanley Abbott, in the following statement:

The Middle Classes' Union is not conIcerned with social distinctions or religious variations. What it is concerned with is the interests which exist between those of Capital and those of Labor. In this sense the Middle Classes are the people with the Middle Interests. In political and economic affairs there are three main sections; two of them are the extremists, call them what you will, the Upper and the Lower, the Right and the Left, the Monopolist and the Syndicalist. The third is the Middle Classes. It is for the individual to determine whether he or she comes within this section-as a consumer, as a taxpayer, as a law-maker.

Capital is organized for self-preservation. Labor is organized for self-advancement. But in the operations as between these two sections, the other, the unorganized Middle -the section which is the butt, the buffer, and the burden-bearer when Capital and Labor are contending-has no locus standi and no representation. Within this body are the brain workers-the commercial and trading, the professional and administrative and managerial classes, and those whose in

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