Evening Star Newspaper, December 29, 1929, Page 25

Editorial Page Reviews of Books EDITORIAL SECTION he Sunday Star. Financial News Classified Part 2—16 Pages WASHINGTON, D. €., SUNDAY MORNING, DECEMBER 29, 1929 WORLD COURT AND LONDON CONFERENCE LOOM LARGE 1930 Casts Long Shadows on World and Domestic Horoscope as Rumors * strongest impression is the fallibility of | . . fean | third of the Creep In. BY MARK SULLIVAN. HE turn of the year will bring during the coming week the usual quantity of those engag- ing predictions about what is #oing to be during the 12 months ensuing. They feed a human appetite which is as old as the time when the Roman oracles foretold the fate of em- perors and tribal medicine men killed animals to find out from some faint variation in the entrails what would be the outcome of battle or how large would be the coming crop. True, to speak of these ancient augu- ries in the same breath with the eco- nomic_predictions that will be made next Wednesday would be unfair to the latter. Such prophecies of trade as emanate from sound sources have the validity that goes with inference based on tested data. The comparative dis- appearance of belief in arbitrary signs is one of the clearest evidences of the gradual ascendancy of intelligence over | superstition. ‘There is a surprising number of ex- ceptions to this advance. however. The late Mrs. Warren Harding, when she was in the White House, frequently consulted an astrologist. (One rather hopes the seer was good hearted enough to predict less misfortune than actually attended the unhappy Harding family.) Nevertheless, the predictions of even those most competent to prophesy, of those who hold themselves austerely down to deductions from facts already in existence—even such economic for- tune tellers are pretty fallible. Any reader of this article can treat himself to an experience in skepticism by turn- ing back to the newspaper files of la: January 1 and trying to find any prophecy of that day which said that during the year 1929 there would occur the most precipitous and spectacular stock exchange panic in the history of the world. Many Auguries for 1900. ‘The writer of this article, for several reasons associated with his work. has had an unusually large experience in resurrecting prophecies and comparing them with what later came about. Each presidential year, as the November de- cision approached, he has looked back for the predictions preceding previous elections to examine the grounds upon which such predictions were based. About the time of the turn of the cen- tury—about January 1, 1900, that is— the imaginations of men were greatly stirred by the passing of the nineteent] century and the beginning of the twen- tieth. There was an immense outpour- ing of auguary, in books, magazines and newspapers and from the pulpit. Nearly every public figure of any con- sequence in every field was besought to say what was about to be. The writer of this article has had occasion to ex- amine these prophecies with close care. Then at the begin: of each year it has been increasingly the habit of newspapers and periodicals to print predictions, especially in the fleld of trade. These, too, the present writer has had occasion to examine. One deduction from the mass is that prediction, when it comes from persons of standing, has been on the whole in creasingly accurate. It has been in- creasingly accurate because the data on which such prediction can be based has become increasingly accurate and ‘voluminous. One of the important characteristics of the age in which we live is the in- crease of records and their accuracy. Greater and greater quantities of rec- ords are kept; they are kept with great- er and greater accuracy, and the agen- cies by which such records are made public and diffused throughout the world have increased rapidly. The con- sequence is that the world to an extent never known before acts upon facts, plots its course upon facts. More and more we live up to courses predicted for us—even dictated for us—by charts and graphs. Facts are supplanting emotion as the motivation of government and of indi- viduals—and this is decidedly an im- portant facet of our modern world. When Adam Smith wrote his “Wealth of Nations” there were almost no busi- ness data in_existence. Consequently Smith wrote his treatise largely on as- sumptions, one of the assumptions be- ing that he himself was an average man and that mankind in the mass would act, under given circumstances, as Adam Smith would act. We now know there was error in that assump- tion. We now have enormous masses of data showing how men and groups of men have actually acted under given circumstances. A consequence is that today a competent statistician—if otherwise equally equipped. which is a ‘weighty qualification—should be able to write a treatise on political economy more sound in some respects than the “Wealth of Nations.” that has enjoyed l:llhasll;: authority for over a century and & half. None Predicted War. Nevertheless, in spite of the increase | of data and the increased possibility of | forecast based on tested data—in spite | of that, the outstanding impression of | one who has read most of the proph- €cles of the last 30 January lsts—the prophecy. A good many American Teputations could be seriously impaired, | could be brought to the risk of jeering | by & malicious person who should dig | up these prophecies of 1, 5, 10 and 25 | vears ago and print them in the harsh | light of the subsequent facts. No one on any January 1 has been able to see what turned out, as a rule, | to be the most important event of the | ensuing year. No one on January 1, 1903, predicted that within the year the | airplane would be invented. No Ameri- can on January 1, 1914, predicted tha | the Great War would come or that | some three years later we would send | some 8,000,000 young men to fight in it. It is a safe guess—not a prophecy— that during 1930 something will hap- pen, which none of the seers will have foretold, but which subsequent history | will record as the most important, event of the vear. Within the material world there are whispers of possible developments which, if they come, might be as revolutionary as the coming of the automobile, or, underlying both the automobile and the airplane, the internal combustion en- gine—possible inventions as sensational as the radio or the telephone when 1t came. There are whispers about a new process for making nitrogen artificially. and about transmitting electric power without wires. There are intimations | of a development which, if it should | come, would cause the familiar coal car | to disappear from railroads—suggestions | that in the mear future coal will be | burned at the mines and the resulting ncies for power and heat trans- mitted to the cities by pipe lines. There is a story about looking for- ward which every individual might | profitably bear in mind as suggesting | how little a forecast concerning the course of the world in general may mean to any one individual. This fan- | tasy was first told some time ago by | Lord Dunsany. in a charming short | smr;’.l Lately, since the November Stock | fExchange collapse, the story has been | retold, with variations adapting it to | New York, by a comedian on the stage of that city. As told originally, the story was about a London speculator in stocks. The speculator, in the fantasy Lord Dunsany wrote, had secured on & certain New Year day a promise from |a potent agency of destiny, that the | speculator could make any one request and that it would be granted. The speculator, after deliberation as to what one gift would serve him most, con- | cluded to ask for an advance copy of |the London Times of the ensuing New Year day one year later. Omi- | nously, the agent of destiny asked the speculator if he was sure this was the one gift he desired more than any other | | conceivable one. The specualtor was | sure it was. In due course the advance | copy was delivered. Hastily the specu- Iator turned to the Stock Exchange quo- tations. Carefully he made notes of | what would be the price of certain stocks a year later. Thus equinped with the facts with which he could make his fortune, the speculator, in a | mood of agreeable relaxation, thought | it would be entertaining to read the re- | | mainder of the paper. When he came | to the obituary notices he found, lead- |ing all of the rest, an obituary about | himself, satisfactory in its laudatory de- | | tails. but starkly distressing in the grim | | evidence that nothing he could do with | | his_forcknowledge of stock quotations | | could benefit him in this world. If we turn to events in the world | of politics and public affairs and if we | | confine ourselves to matters already | arranged for, we can say there are two that have outstanding importance. One | is the London Conference for the Limi- tation and Reduction of Naval Arma- ‘ment. to which our delegates will be | aboard ship within little more than a | | week. Parley Outlook Bright. We know the conference will take place. Its outcome we cannot know. It would be pleasant to predict it will | be successful—and it is a fact that the | overwhelming weight of the factors are |on the side of its being successful. It | 1s almost inconceivable that the efforts | of such men as President Hoover and Prime Minister Macdonald should come | to nothing—President Hoover with his Quaker conviction and patience, his engineer care about ground work and his resourcefulness and persistence; Prime Minister Macdonald with his idealism, faith and power to move multitudes. Yet in spite of the best these two and their associates can do and have done—in spite of that—the success of | this conference rests on the public opinion of the world and on the agen- cies that inform it from day to day. By happy fortune this conference can begin and go forward in the atmosphere of good will; by evil fortune, differ- ences over details or other misadven- ture, accidental or malevolently de- signed, can be magnified and can cause this conference to go the way of the lt:eunevn Conference, to inconclusion and ailure. We cannot know the outcome. We can, with reasonable certainty, estimate the consequence of failure. If this conference should come to nothing the world will put one outstanding inter- pretation on the failure. It will be re- corded that five great nations are un- able to agree with each other not to engage in a competitive race in naval armament. Upon such a conclusion the ensuing consequence will be that the race will be on. The race will be on and will go forward at a pace more accelerated than if the conference had never taken place. ‘The other outstanding event in in- ternational relations will be America’s ghgtnx or not adhering to the World u That this question will come to de- cision in 1930 is not certain—but is probable. Such international under- standings are of slow growth. in February, 1922, that President Hard- ing and Secretary of State Hughes transmitted the original World Court proposal, with their favorable recom- mendations, to the Senate. It was not until January 27, 1927, nearly five years later, that the Senate acted, accepting | the original proposal with five reserva- | tons. 'Now, four of the five Senate | reservations have been accepted by the other nations, and as to one reserva- tion the other nations have proposed a modification. Senators Get Anxious. It is on this modification that the coming controversy will turn. As to | the time when the Senate will act, pre- | diction is futile. There is no impera- |tive reason why President Hoover should urge early action, nor why the Senate should act promptly upon his |urging. It has been observed, however, | that some Senators have already ‘be- | come, surprisingly, eager that action should be taken fairly soon. What this means is that public sentiment through- out the country, favorable to the court, has begun to express itself in urgings upon individual Senators, and Senators wishful to show response would like early action. Within the field of domestic politics one coming event is fixed infallibly. In November next we shall elect a whole House of Representatives, 435, and one- Senate, 32. t fixed event of November will cast an elon- gated shadow over every other political event and every other political activity of the year. Its shadow has already b;en on the tariff debate that has taken Dlace. The shadow will be acutely on the tariff deliberations as they resume next week. There will be men, many of them, in both chambers and in both parties who will act on the tariff upon convic- tion. There will be others who will act upon self-interest. But hardly any individual and almost certainly no lead- er can be free from keeping a wary eye on how any one step in the tariff will affect the November elections. Four hundred and thirty-five Repre- sentatives as individuals and 32 Sena- | tors as individuals will be obliged to consider how any one tariff action will affect them locally in their individual districts. (The exceptions, negligible in | number, are such as do not expect to try for re-election.) Aside from their individual fortunes all of them as party {men are bound to consider the nation- wide effect on their respective parties. Leaders of both parties and all fac- tions will consider whether a given action will add to or subtract from the | prestige and numbers of their respec- tive parties. Republicans will consider continuously how best they can hold their present number in the House, 267. Democrats will consider how best they can increase their present number, 163. Democratic Leader _John Garner of Texas will never see Republican Speaker Nicholas Longworth of OCincinnati pass- | ing in his official automobile without re- flecting how deep an impression he, Garner, would make in that Govern- ment upholstery. What is true of the tariff will be true in greater or less degree of every other politieal J:ollcy. action or episode that arises within Congress or outside it. The November election will overhang every- thing political; and without any doubt, inevitably and legitimately, the outcome of the November election will have a powerful bearing on the T}un. BY JAMES T. SHOTWELL, Authority on International Policy. HEN the historian of the fu- ture looks back upon our age through the perspective of time he will find in the period following the World War events possibly more important than those which seemed at the time to be shaking the very structure of civilization. The spectacle which war presents is so much more dramatic, its tragedy and its heroism so much more compelling, than the achievements of peace, that it is difficult to measure them in equgl terms. The process of building is a slower one than that of destruction and one which the scaffold- ing often obscures until the work is done. But if we look over the Western world today and compare it not with that of 1918, but with the peaceful days before the war, we become suddenly BY PAUL PAINLEVE. Former Premier of Prance. HE idea of a United States of Europe is many centuries old; there is nothing meritorious in having thought of it. To have dared to think it could be real- ized and was not a mere utopla is a very different proposition. Doubtless there are many positive and thoughtful men—probably the majority—who re- gard such a scheme as 2 chimera, at least for the present and for many cen- turies to come. Yet we have before us the example of the United Stlates of America as evidence of what is pos- sible. Who could possibly have fore- seen 65 years ago, after the terrible War of Secession, that Statss which had been fighting one another desper- ately for years, would join together in a union free of any constraint whatso- ever and reposing on a perfectly har- monious_basis? | But the skeptic will say, “Surely there is no resemblance between the | situation of Europe today and that of | the United States in the past.” And certainly there are many and varied contrasts between them. Let us ex- amine them, however, and try to dis- cern what were the forces in America favorable to the Union and what were the forces antagonistic. ‘There is no deubt that the States of the American Union are not nations in the same sense as the states belonging to the European Continent. They pos- sessed neither a multiplicity of lan- guages and currency, nor—what is per- haps even more important—had they separate national cultures, Lacking lize into those mutually exclusive tra. ditions which in Europe create a “na- tional” patriotism and inspire this ac- thvity. War Led to Closer Union. Such frontiers as they had were, therefore, not FEuropean frontiers— limits within which the national life is created and at which in consequence have grown up economic boundaries, custom barriers, tariff walls, etc. They are arbitrary districts in which human agglomerations, varying in origin and speech, gradually become merged into one federal unity. Nevertheless, you meet in the United States enormous entities whose interests are by no means concordant. Was it not this very dis- cordance that brought on the War of Secession? And yet this war, instead of splitting up America as many for a time had anticipated, ultimately led to its closer union and made it indissoluble. Other pecple, again, will assert that the War of Secession was a very trifing incident, if compared with our modern wars, and especially with the one we have recently survived. The War of Secession was by no means as insig- nificant as made out; it was, on the contrary, a terrible conflict—one that can be compared quite easily with the great war of 1914, if account is taken of the economic and ethical develop- ment of the American Continent. It was terrible in the destruction and cruelty that was displayed and in the hatred that it awakened in the men surviving it, while the big problem which had brought it about remained unsolved with the victory of the North- ern armies. before debts these, their soclal lives did not crystal- | wi in & word, was to be the lot | of the millions of Negroes inhabiting the Southern States? Was it possible that & real and sincere conciliation aware of vast new forces at work and of great creations that have arisen al- most by magic, with their foundations resting on a soil, both figurative and real, that was devastated by the World War beyond apparent hope of recovery. In view of what has happened in the last 10 years it is almost impossible to recall the prophecies of economists and students of the world’s affairs during the war itself, when the daily toll of destruction of a single week seemed greater than whole nations could re- store in the course of a lifetime. Then it seemed only a sober commonplace to say that for at least a generation the world could not be as prosperous and be again as it had been in the years the war. Yet, today not only Is the staridard of living higher generally throughout Eu- rope, as well as in America, than it was in the pre-war days, but even the war of governments have been brought .within the range of practical settlement. The long, lean years have proved to be the richest in our history and our prosperity is shared by those who are called upon to pay the bill of the vast extravagances of war. It is therefore somewhat misleading to talk about the post-war period as an era of reconstruction, although on the whole we have no better name for it. Strictly speaking, reconstruction sug- gests rebuilding that which had been destroyed in a way to restore the edifice of the past. It implies old lines and reproducing old models, restoring a shattered age as the architect restores the fabric of a Rheims Cathedral. the political world the term “reconstruc- tion” suggests that the pre-war govern- ments should be re-established as the statesmen of the restoration period at- tempted to re-establish those at the | close of the Napoleonic . In eco- nomics it suggests little more than set- would ever take place between the men who had been such enemies the day before, especially in view of the pro- found humiliation which the Southern- ers must constantly experience in hav- ing to associate with those Negroes ‘who had formerly been their slaves and with whom they were now obliged to rub shoulders in town, village and countryside as free citizens? Complete Harmony Restored. ‘That was a difficulty so vast that most men thought it insurmountable, and many were the pessimists who kept repeating that all that the redemption of the black race had achieved was to render impossible any sincere recon- ciliation between the North and the white South, That this prophecy was anything but wild is obvious if the countless dramas that the color ques- tion brought about affer the Northern victory are recalled, as well as the many local insurrections, the many secret societies, the lynchings and the revolutionary activities of the Ku Klux Klan. And yet today Northern and South- ern States live in such complete har- mony that it is difficult to imagine that they ever lived in any other way, while such differences of opinion as may arise between them are regulated by a Supreme Court. This, I would like to stress, is the very authority which before the Civil War it had been asked to decide in favor of one or the other of the disputant States and had favored the South—a ruling that the Northern States had refused to accept. Paradoxical as it may seem, the authority of this court, now so sacrosanct that there is no appeal from its judgment—and no case has oc- curred when it has had to invoke the power of the secular arm to obtain compliance with its verdicts—was thus definitely secured, thanks to the victory of a party which had ignored its ver- dict! Here I may be allowed to recall a personal experience. In 1917, at & re- view of American troops, a regiment marched past the saluting base to the music of an inspiring air, and I asked an American colonel n me what it was. “It is an American march called | What’s It |l many yea in subordinate pesitions, found himself suddenly | | near the top of big busi | | To his own surprise his income jumped to more than a hundred thousand dollars a year. * ok Kk A whole new world opened out before . As if by magic all his dreams be: to come true. * ok k% Did it change o that in any cteristic it changed him at all. Not long ago when we were alone he opened his heart. . money in the bank, d all five children in college, and three Automobiles. And down under- neath | am the same that used o get eigh: a week, and took three years to Pay for the piano. Somehow it doesn’t seem re. 1 have to get off in a corner once in a while and ask, what's it all about?” ! know gome other things about him that he did not tell know that he is support- g fiftesn or twenty people who haven't had such good luck. know that he is taking lessons on the fiddle, which has been a secret ambition for y, And know ¢ on Thanksgiving day he marshals his whole All About? BARTON. family and marches them down to church. LI Sinclair Lewis named him, and others like him, Mr. Babbitt. They are more like Jim Bluds the M ppi River engineer. * K Kk % Bludso didn't know what it was all about, either. He just did the day's work, running the steamboat back and forth, r ing his family and living his Ii One day when a fire broke out he did the simple normal thing of sticking to his post “PIl hold her nozzle agin the bank till the last galoot’s ashore. : He was not a deep thinker, nor very r iou often profane. But John Hay ventured the guess that “The Lord ain't going to be too hard on a man That gave his life for men.” My friend is rough like Blud- answer any more than the of us. But he has done his job with courage; he stayed simple. fro He h a nsy atitude, and he has kept his heart young. * % % w Those qualities have enough for this world. Some- how | think they'll be enough for whatever other worlds may be. been (Copyright 1820.) Decade of Reconstruction Dawn of 1930 Finds Western World Rebuilt Along New Lines Undreamed of Before World War tling the old machinery for production at work again and securing for it, if not the same markets in the past, others like them, so that the war should be only an interval in the con- tinuing process of a developing society. ‘This was what the period of recon- struction largely meant at the close of our Civil War; it was what was in the mind of Gen. Grant when he sent the Confederate soldiers back home with their horses to do the plowing for the next year's crop. This kind of recon- struction also took place after the World War, when the demobilized sol- diers were restored to their peace-time activities and the soil “of Northern France was given back to the rdturning refugees. But “reconstruction” after the World War_covers & much wider fleld than this. It has not been reconstruc- tion as much as the building of a new " (Continued on rth Page.) Europe’s Key to Unity First Step Is to Raze Tariff Walls—a Feat That Would Clear Many Petty Jealousies ‘Marching Through Georgia,’” he re- plied, and added: “I was a Southerner, and it is quite true that the Northern- ers crossed Georgia, ‘but they were Americans.” And so a march dating from the Civil War united the con- querors and the conquered of Rich- mond. Let us now compare the situation of Europe after 1918 with that of North America after 1865. In both cases devastations, cruelty, feuds that seemed inexpiable; but also, in both cases, marvelous constancy and heroism among the combatants—who, Wwhatever they may accuse one another of doing, cannot abuse their opponents for lack of courage. Also, in both cases, war leaves behind no wounds of amour propre or of pride; it creates only a feeling of horror and hatred of massacres. In the case of Europe it is true that all the older nations are enveloped in a rampart of' protection- ism and particularism, which was not S0 in the case of America, but, on the other hand, they are without a color question to poison their relation: Difficulties Are Different. Are the difficulties in the way of the ‘United States of Europe any big- ger than those which the American States experienced after the Civil War? They are doubtless very different. They demand more time, more patience to solve—and an infinite tact. The first thing to do is to lower the custom duties and tariffs. The idealist Who was the eloquent propagator of the idea of pan-Europa spoke not of sup- pressing frontiers, but of making them invisible. Let us begin by lowering the tariff walls, by enlarging the field of those who profit by them. - All this may be done without touching the soul of sensitive nations that are always ready to sense an insult. This will be the first and slowest phase in the molding to- gether of the United States of Europe. When this will have been realized many prejudices will by that time have been dissipated, many particularisms will have vanished as obsolete superstitions; all this, I repeat, without there being any St need for a nation to sacrifice one whit of its real individuality. Then we will be able to work toward creating a political federation for the European states. This evolution naturally is possible only if there is no rupture of equilibrium in a world which is still suffering from the shock of the war. The United States of North America accepted every decision of the Supreme Court without there be- ing ever any need of coercion; but for many years after the Cilvil War it nevertheless was necessary to use the most stringent police measures to pre- vent armed risings in the South. Must Guard Security. I hope the day will come when a war between two European nations will ap- pear as absurd or unlikely as a war be- tween two States of the American Union, but this will take place only after a long period of collaboration and con- fidence. In the years that are coming European nations will still have to take measures to guard their security so long as the League of Nations does not, as M. Briand expressed it, “dispose of a secular arm”; in other words, so long as international measures will not follow as a uence of any attempt to bring about & war. The day will come, however, when the threat of this secular arm will no lon, be necessagy’ to impose compliance. But Ads PEACE ABOVE PARITY AIM OF PRESIDENT AT PARLEY. Policy of Reduction Seen as Apparent Return to Wilsonian Conception. BY FRANK H. SIMONDS. AST WEEK I discussed the ques- tions of the naval conference as they affected the cruiser. In this direction certain facts are ines- capable. The double insistence of | the American Government upon parity and the British upon a minimum ton- nage of 339,000 abolishes any chance | of reduction. The Rapidan agreement, which fixed the American figure for parity at 315,000 tons, as against the British of 339,000, foreshadowed an | American construction of 15,000 tons in | excess of the total of 300,500, which was the limit set by Mr. Coolidge in the 15- cruiser bill. Since under the Rapidan agreement the United States would be committed to build 165,000 tons of cruisers in the next six years, it is manifest that re- duction cannot be claimed. Since Japan and France have 'similarly refused to | consider any abolition of the subma- | rine, it is equally manifest that nothing | is possible here. Finally, it is plain that unless the French agree to accept a low ratio, giving Britain at least two-to-one strength in cruisers, the 339,000-ton fig- ure will have to be raised and so will the American counterpart. But there remains the question of battleships, and here, 1t is conceded in advance, the American Government looks for results which may be a justi- fication of hopes alike for economy and reduction. First of all, as a maximum, there is the notion that the battleship may be abolished altogether. It has be- come expensive beyond all conception. Has it also become obsolete? Have the developments of the airplane and the submarine reached the point where the n?lu] ship is only a colossal target? Admiral Sims is on record ‘as asserting that in the next war the place for our battleships would be up the Mississippi River, and a like view is held by certain British authorities. Gen. Mitchell has expressed the same view even more ex- plostvely. French-Italian Situation. It remains true, also, that the French and Italian governments still adhere to their decision made after the Wash- ington Conference to build no capital ships, & decision that was based first upon financial reasons, but also had at least a measure of expert support. There is then a school in Britain and in the United States and a majority among the experts of France and Italy—and per- haps Japan—holding the battleship to be obsolete. To Battleships. Nevertheless it is equally true that the mafjority in both English-speaking navy cireles holds to the battleship, that anything .80 drastic as a program of abolition would arouse an enormous controversy and might be equally re- Jected by Parliament and the American Congress, following the majority naval Jjudgment. For the present at least it seems certain the baitleship cannot be abolished. But there is an alternative proposal. ‘Why not lengthen the life of the battle- ship from 20 to 25 years? Under the terms of the Washington Treaty the British and American navies will begin replacement of battleships in 1931. If the battleships are allotted a longer span of life would it not be possible to postpone replacement and thus save vast. sums of money? ‘The answer here touches upon tech- nical details. Despite the popular im- pression, England and the United States did not arrive at parity in cap- ital ships at Washington. What was fixed upon was a process of parity. To- day the British have greater tonnage (the disparity is 60,000), more battle- ships and in the Rodney and Nelson two decisively superior ships. But the day will come, in 1936, when by scrap- ping and replacing there will exist something as close to parity as is hu- manly possible. America and Britain will then have 12 older battleships, measuring for the British 366,000 tons and for the United States 375,000 tons, and five new boats aplece aggregating 175,000 tons in each case. This very slight preponderance of 9,000 tons in favor of the United States will dis- appear with later replacements until both fleets stand at 15 ships and 525,000 tons, the parity figure of Washington. No Replacement, No Parity. If, however, the Conference of Lon- don undertakes to arrest replacement at once and for five years, it automat- ically arrests parity. Instead of attain- ing parity in capital ships in 1936, the United States would not attain it, at best, until 1941, If the principle of parity were to be preserved, the post- ponement of replacement 'could not begin until 1935, when the two fleeis would be substantially equal. Other- wise the American delegation would lay itself open to the charge of having sur- rendered parity in capital ships to ob- tain it in cruisers. But it is clear that no impressive showing would be made if the largest single result of the London conference were an agreement to begin in 1935 to postpone replacements. This fact is the more unmistakable because between 1931 and 1934 the Bl;‘l"sll;l :ll:‘l? Amelrlgln rograms call for the building of five ’.’m; capital ships in each case. To announce that the two English-speak- ing powers were to build 10 capital ships and the Japanese 3 before any postponement, and therefore saying, be- gan would not serve to offset disap- pointment awakened by the cruiser pro- grams, necessarily envisaging vast con- structions. Of course, this means that much greater efforts will be made to achieve abolition of the capital ships. But one must at once perceive that it is the view of the American naval experts that any such program would be dispropor- tionately disadvantageous to the United ates. To quote one of our best known rts’ ‘All_reduction in batt] ips and in this day is not yet. This is the evolution that I long for and believe possible for our old continent. If I am too old to see its full realization I hope at least to be present at its birth. Finally, as for the British Empire and its connection with the United States of Europe, I would like to say that it is immaterial what England elects to- do— whether she chooses to create a vast autonomous confederation of her domin- ions and, having done so, enter into some further union with the new fed- eration that we would have created, or whether she has other plans in mind. In any event, I am certain that it is with the greatest amity and geod will, and with the most cordial and constant relations between ourselves and the British Empire, that the United States of Europe will be constituted and the evolution developed which I have had the hardihood to propound in this article, ‘The same cordial relations and good will would, I am sure, exist between the new union and the United States of America, or any other grouping that may then have been constituted, whether in South America or elsewhere, to in- crease the markets and the exchange Ppotentialities of f cruisers, either in total tonnage or indi- vidual size, increases the military value of the ships which Britain can mobilize for war out of her predominant mer- chant marine, and also increases the security of those remaining in commer- cial service.” The American naval experts, the body of official opinion, rt from certain exceptions. thus holds to these views. ‘Total abolition of the battleship would disproportionately weaken the American fleet. Postponement of replacement, undertaken before 1936, would similarly redound to British benefit by perpetu- ating an existing condition of decisive superiority for the British. If either decision should be made, it would fore- cast a violent struggle in the United States Senate, where the Navy view would find adequate defense. Faint Battleship Hope, Viewed objectively, therefore, the hope to achleve great things in the battle- ship direction seems faint. Total aboli- tion is excessively unlikely; there the British and American naval opinion will stand together. But unless there is actually a program of scrapping, the necessity for new construction in cruis- ers will insure that the London confer- ence results will forecast not reduction but construction. Even economy seems hardly to be realized until 1936 or toward the end of the term of the Pres- ident who may be elected in 1932. On the naval side and from the American point of view, the problem of London is complicated by certain cir- cumstances. On the one hand the Cool- idge administration adopted and the Hoover administration at the outset ac- cepted the policy of parity. That policy not only involved building a relatively huge cruiser tonnage to catch up with the British, but also persevering in the building and scrapping process for bat- tleships, fixed by the Washington treaty, until in 1936 actual parity should be obtained. Between 1930 and 1936 the United States must build 165,000 tons of cruis- ers and 175,000 tons of battleships, if it is to obtain parity. In no other way can the goal be realized unless the Brit- ish agree to scrap some of their new battleships ahead of time and also to reduce the cruiser tonnage from the fig- ure which the British admiralty has set as the minimum of security. And neither the one nor the other sacrifice can be expected of the British by any reascnable human being. Does the United States really want rity? Would a majority of the Amer- ican Feople follow President Hoover in & policy which amounted to a more or less tacit renunciation of parity as a detail in a new gesture to Rurc;pt a gesture comparable with that of Mr. Hughes at Washington, when he sank more ships (all American, to be sure) than went down at Jutland, in the hope of setting in motion a new spirit in the world? That is, after all, be- coming the real question as to the Lgn don conference. Back to Wilson's Policy. And, in a sense, what is arri 1s a distinct break between the Coolidge policy of parity and the Hoover policy of reduction. Coolidge saw, somewhat tardily, that of these two was was to be attained, and in his Armistice day speech a year ago he at last came down firmly for parity. And the 15-cruiser bill was the measure of this gecmon, in which Congress eon- curred. Viewed from the outside, the Hoover administration would seem to be mov- ing away from the Coolidge decision, in fact to be turning backward to a Wilsonian conception, to the notion that the mission of the United States in the world is moral, that this country should be prepared to make sacrifices and to assume responsibilities not wholly dissimilar from those envisaged hy the covenant of the League (always, of course, outside the League). In no other way can one explain the intervention in Manchuria and the transformation of the Kellogg pact into the Hoover doctrine, But any real program of reduction at London must be headed by the scrap- ping of the principle and pollcg.of parity. The United States must aban- don parity in cruisers or postpone real- ization of it in battleships, or, finally, give it up altogether by joining in the abolition-of the battleship. That done, we can give the world a new example, which it is at least conceivable will be followed more readily than was Mr. Hughes' example at the Washington conference. And, after all, the real question is whether in the matter of national de- fense Mr. Hoover is an idealist or a realist. My own guess is that he is an idealist and that, as a consequence, the emphasis in the American delegatign at London will be laid upon di - ment and not upon parity, that the President is betting that the American people, & majority of them, set peace above preparedness and see the reduc- tion of armaments as the necessary first step toward peace. I believe that at London Mr. Hoover, speaking through Mr. Stimson, will follow the example of Mr. Wilson at Paris and Mr. Hughes at Washington and set the moral above the military in his estimate of Amer- ica’s mission. In the next article here I shall dis- cuss the political aspects of the London conference, and particularly the pros- pects of a three-power and a five-power agreement, (Copyright, 1920.) . 100th Birthday of Bus Celebrated in London London's unified subway and bus system, to which this city owes the brightest posters and the gayest under- ground stations in Europe, has given a further spice to life by the celebration of the centenary of the London omni- bus. George Shillibeer began his mous omnibus service on July 4, 1829, between the Yorkshire Stingo, Maryle- bone, and the Bank. For four days from July 3 a replica of Shillibeer's omnibus was put on that journey, along with two other types of horse bus of a later period—an old-time bus of the knife- board pattern of 1850 and a garden- seat omnibus of 1880. Shillibeer's bus had to be bullt in replica, but the other busses are survivors. The drivers and conductors of these venicies wers dressed in the costumes of the period, and the busses ran from 10 in the morn- ing until 6 at night. The Times and the Morning Post reprinted facsimiles of their issues of July 4, 1829, and these were given to passengers to assist the at- mosphere of their anachronistic joure ney. On July 6 a procession of busses, old and new, left Westminster at 10 o'clock, traveling round the west cen- tral district, and ended at the point at noon. In this parade the pas- sengers were drawn from the ranks of the dramatic society, and were dressed n the costumes of the period.