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political situation following the party conventions: "On the face of things, unless the Democrat and Farmer-Labor parties fuse, the Republicans have a walk-away. Committees were appointed by both conventions to effect fusion, but they were not successful. The League has largely abandoned its former slogan, 'State-Owned Industries.' The only echo was found in a plank of the Farmer-Labor party platform which asked for an enlargement of the present State-owned experimental flour-mill. . . . The business and financial outlook of the entire State is improving. Farmers are paying their debts and there is a decidedly better tone everywhere."

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A BUSINESSLIKE DEPARTMENT ESS government in business and more business in government," is the keynote of the Department of Commerce. The phrase was uttered by Secretary Hoover while addressing a few weeks ago a group of presidents and executives of Chambers of Commerce. The occasion was a Conference of officers of civic-commercial organizations from New England at the Department of Commerce called by Mr. Hoover in order that representatives of business could see what the Government is doing in the effort to help business. The Conference was the first of its kind, and may be the forerunner of others.

Foreign commerce Mr. Hoover considers to be the balance-wheel of business, serving to absorb enough of the country's productive forces to take up the slack in times of low demand, and, if consistently developed, often spelling the difference between solvency and insolvency through reduction of overhead in proportion to volume. In his brief address to the Conference he emphasized the importance of consistency, once having entered the foreign field, for, he pointed out, lack of continuous service has led many foreign buyers to steer away from American goods. Having built up a demand for a given brand, the producer is unfair if he leaves the foreign buyer in the lurch because the producer chances to have an improved market at home. It is due to American commerce as an institution to support the venture, once undertaken, in a consistent fashion.

The Department of Commerce, the visitors learned, through its Bureau of Foreign and Domestic Commerce, has developed three branches. They are for the collection and distribution of general information regarding conditions and demand in foreign countries; the gathering and dissemination of informa tion to commodity divisions, headed by men who, through experience, speak the

MRS. PETER OLESEN, NOMINATED BY THE MINNESOTA STATE DEMOCRATIC CONVENTION AS CANDIDATE FOR THE UNITED STATES SENATE

language of the business and who have been selected through co-operation with the industries represented; and the bringing together and the broadcasting of technical information relating to such matters as methods of packing, changing tariffs, shipping regulations, etc. It is the aim of the Department to make the information it furnishes, not only what the business man wants, but available when he wants it. It has even gone so far in this direction as to change the character of Census reports. They no longer come to hand a year after the gathering of the data, but within a month, on the assumption that business would rather have a report based on recent data collected from reliable sources, even if it has not been proved up in the scientific characteristic of the old type of Governmental reports.

manner

Books of information about various little-known countries equivalent to fine guide-books, weekly publications giving all available information regarding trade opportunities, monthly data relating to condition of the industries, are prepared and distributed wherever they will be of service. Thousands of inquiries of importance to business men are received and answered weekly. The number of inquiries has multiplied many fold since the expansion of the activities of the Department under Mr. Hoover. He is seeking to expand its usefulness and bring its facilities to the attention of business men throughout the entire country.

THE ARKANSAS SPIRIT

UR readers will remember-certainly our Southwestern readers will remember that some weeks ago we published an article in defense of the industrial and financial prosperity of the State of Arkansas, which had been severely criticised by the New York "Times," one of the most influential of the New York dailies. We have recently received a letter from a wise and observant newspaper man of another Southern State, in which he says:

I have just made a trip through much of Arkansas, during which I met and talked with business men in both the large and small towns. I am writing to tell you that the reports by Mr. Rogers are not overdrawn and that they represent the real conditions that exist in the State. Arkansas, with one or two exceptions, is the most progressive State in the South. Nothing indicates the prosperity of a State so much as the number of banks in proportion to population. You can look at a directory and see that with its approximately 450 banks Arkansas is unusually well supplied. The business men of Arkansas are up to the minute, carry on their affairs in the most accepted ways, and are reliable and trustworthy. The State itself is a marvel in its possibilities and resources. Its agricultural facilities are extraordinary and its minerals so great in value and number that one has to be on the ground to get any real idea of their extent. Permit me to say that Mr. Rogers's article is a true showing of the situation and a patriotic service to a commonwealth that is setting a splendid pace in that type of progress that lines up with the best in both business and civic thought. In my recent trip I went to Little Rock, Pine Bluff, Fort Smith, Searcy, Arkadelphia, Hot Springs, and Texarkana in addition to many smaller places. came in contact with all types of citizens and my opinions were derived from talking with men in every walk. I made it a point to talk to farmers, garage men, railroad men, and clerks as well as to bankers. No man can go into the State and fail to be impressed with its people, its methods, and its loyal spirit. There is a distinct "Arkansas Spirit" that is doing for the State what the "Atlanta Spirit" does for Atlanta, Georgia. Arkansas is all right.

I

It is pleasant to receive and to quote such a letter. The daily newspapers of to-day with their over-emphasized records of banditry, defalcation, lynching, misgovernment, graft, betrayals of trust, and vice and crime in general, give a distorted idea of modern American life. Men who, like our correspondent, visit the small towns and villages and farming districts of the country come back with a different story. We do not mean to say that there are not plenty of evils in American life to combat. But it is well to remember that, on the whole,

America is sound and is making prog

ress.

CYRUS NORTHROP

Ne

or many American educators have served consecutively forty-eight years in important university work. Cyrus Northrop, who died in Minneap olis on April 4, at the age of eightyeight, will naturally best be remembered for his upbuilding work as President of -the University of Minnesota. He filled

that office from 1884 to 1911, and from then to his death was President Emeritus. He came to the University of Minnesota in 1884 directly from Yale, where he had been a teacher of rhetoric and English literature from 1863 on. The older Yale graduates remember Dr. Northrop vividly as always courteous, always earnest, and always inclined to lay aside the stiff professorial dignity which prevailed more in that day than it does now in order to encourage and interest the individual student. Chief Justice Taft was one of Dr. Northrop's students, and in a tribute to his ability says: "He was a charming lecturer, a most brilliant and effective orator, and in every way a lovable man." Dean Jones, of Yale, had special knowledge of Dr. Northrop's career as President of the University of Minnesota, and speaks of that institution as his monument, adding: "Wise, tolerant, persuasive, he conducted its affairs more than a quarter of a century with a skill and sagacity which made him known as 'the college president without any enemy.' The first citizen of Minnesota, the great moral force of the community, an inspiring teacher, a magnetic orator, a great leader beloved by all who knew him, is gone."

A good example of the friendliness and the easy way in which Dr. Northrop dealt with students is recalled by a Minneapolis correspondent of The Outlook in a personal letter:

I recall my experience with him just previous to the great campaign of 1896. I was then in the law school and president of the Republican Club, an organization which I had brought up from 200 to 1,800 members. He feared I was being misled by the freesilver doctrine of Bryan. I had led the inter-State debate the year before and won it. Our subject was "International Bimetalism," and I had the affirmative. Dr. Northrop stood for the gold standard. When I entered his office, after greeting, he threw down a ten-dollar gold piece and said, "Doesn't that look good to you, my boy?" I said, "A ten-dollar gold piece always looks good to a senior, Doctor." He said, "That gold is worth its face value anywhere in the world." He then threw down a silver dollar and said, "That dollar is worth its face in the United States, but it is only worth fifty cents anywhere else in

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their country in time of war deservedly receive citations and decorations. An army of American teachers are serving their country well, and often at great self-sacrifice, in the war that must be constantly waged on ignorance and superstition. Whenever a veteran teacher is cited for distinguished service we are especially glad to report it. And so we pass along to our readers some information of an incident honorable to Smith College and to an eminent professor of that institution, although it may not be altogether of the nature of news to Smith graduates.

When Mary Augusta Jordan, for more than thirty-seven years head of the Department of English at Smith College, retired last June, her friends of the Faculty and members of the official staffs had a medal made in her honor for a permanent memorial in the Browsing Room of the Library, a duplicate being presented to Miss Jordan. The medal, which was designed by Alice

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Morgan Wright, the sculptor, has Miss Jordan's likeness on the face and on the reverse the following Latin inscription: College Dilectæ Ingenio Doctrina Humanitate Præstanti Coll: Smith: Consocii MCMXXI, of which, for the benefit of those unfamiliar with the pregnant meanings of inscriptional Latin, a mem-. ber of the committee has supplied the following free translation: "Her associates of Smith College dedicate this medal to a colleague honored and beloved, distinguished for native gifts of mind, wide and varied learning, broad and discerning sympathy."

Miss Wright, who is a graduate of the College and a devoted admirer of Miss Jordan, having refused any remuneration for her services, there was a considerable sum of money left over from the subscriptions, and this the committee has now used in the purchase of an illuminated manuscript of the Hore Beatæ Mariæ Virginis written on vellum in the first half of the fifteenth century and ornamented with five large miniatures surrounded by floral borders in gold and colors, as a gift to Miss Jordan.

From the same design as the medal the alumnæ of the College have had struck a medal to be presented each year as a prize for the best original literary work produced by a student; the inscription on this medal refers to Miss Jordan's service "in discovering and developing the promising writer and inspiring and encouraging the young thinker." The subscriptions for this medal also exceeded the immediate demand and enabled the committee to present Miss Jordan with a bag containing gold pieces to the amount of $3,000.

The English Department presented Miss Jordan with a handsomely bound volume of eulogia from students representing each of the forty-one classes which had come under her instruction and placed a typewritten duplicate in the College Library.

In the recently published Catalogue of the College the principal Professorship of English Language and Literature appears for the first time as "on the Mary Augusta Jordan Foundation." It goes without saying that Miss Jordan has been made "Professor Emeritus."

May we add that somebody ought to start a fund to donate a medal to the man or woman who invented the term "Browsing Room" for that portion of the Smith College Library which in most institutional libraries is usually called the reading-room? Fixed and formal courses of reading are all right in their way, but there are times when browsing among stacks of books will do more for appetite and taste in literature than all the syllabuses that the most exacting pedagogue can make to meas

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KNOW THE CONSTITUTION

HE National Security League is caran excellent civic and

Trying on an

educational work. It rightly holds that the United States Constitution is the very basis of an intelligent exercise of the franchise. Leading men in the League became convinced some years ago that the knowledge of the principles and provisions of the Constitution is not taught as it should be in public schools and that the popular ignorance on the subject is greater than is generally supposed. They have therefore taken measures to remedy this lack. They have called the attention of the Governors of several States to the matter, have promoted introduction of bills into the Legislatures of the States, and propose to frame a list of pertinent questions regarding salient points of the Constitution, to be sent out to public schools as a test. One result of the movement may be the passing of laws requiring definite courses of study in the Constitution in these States.

Mr. Lloyd Taylor, the chairman of the League's Committee on Constitutional Instruction, in a statement on the subject, admits that a certain amount of opposition may be expected "from those self-sufficient educators who always object to anything mandatory." But he believes that in one form or another the idea of popular knowledge about the fundamental law of the country may easily be carried out. Four States already have such a law as the League would like to see in all the States.

It seems to us that the League is in this plan doing a genuine service to American citizenship.

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International

AMERICA SENDS TREE SEEDS TO FRANCE AND GREAT BRITAIN These tree seeds were presented to France and Great Britain on April 6, the anniversary of the entry of the United States into the World War. Charles L. Pack, President of the American Forestry Association, is at the right; Mr. J. J. Broderick, of the British Embassy, is in the center; M. Jusserand, French Ambassador to the United States, is at the left

presented to England will be used by the British Forestry Commission, not only in replanting areas which were cut down and used for war purposes, but also in planting a large acreage of moorland which has hitherto been practically waste land.

In France these trees will be planted on the battlefields and throughout the devastated territory where the fine forest growth was in most cases utterly destroyed and in other cases very seriously damaged.

Great Britain showed her wisdom in adopting a forest policy immediately after the war so that she may for the future be assured of sufficient homegrown timber to supply her needs. During the war Great Britain was forced to sacrifice her forests, magnificent parks, and woodlands to the extent of almost sixty per cent of their area.

France has had for over a hundred years a most successful forest policy, by which her forests continually produce without being decreased in area; in other words, she does what this country must do grow timber as a crop, and thereby secure a continuous yearly supply.

The French forestry authorities will, therefore, see to it that for every Douglas fir cut down another Douglas fir will be planted. It is also most likely that the seeds from the mature trees of this planting will be used to spread Douglas fir trees over wide areas of other European countries.

Under the wise forest policy of Great Britain and France, the trees planted from these seeds will serve not only as a memorial to American soldiers who fell beside their British and French comrades, but will reforest great areas devastated in a cause that was American as truly as it was British or French.

In 1919 and 1920 the American Forestry Association sent two separate shipments of Douglas fir seed to Great Britain and France for experimental planting. These have thrived so well that Mr. Pack determined on a larger and a personal gift.

THE IRONIES OF GENOA

C

to

ALLED establish peace in Europe, the Genoa Conference has discovered, much to its own surprise, that its first product is an exclusive partnership between Russia and Germany in defiance of the rest of the world.

Engineered by the Russians, this arrangement has caused in the minds of the British, the French, and even the Italians, much perturbation, to the Russians' obvious enjoyment.

When the Russian delegates arrived at Genoa to confer with the rest of Europe, they carried in their baggage, or up their sleeves, several huge jokes. They have already displayed some of these specimens of humor. No people in

the world are in a better position to appreciate the Russians' sportiveness than Americans. It is much easier to see humor in somebody else's position than in one's own. If America had been represented at Genoa, we should have had to laugh at our own expense-if we could have laughed at all. As it is, the sort of comedy that is on the stage at Genoa is very close to tragedy.

When the Russians were invited to confer with Britain, France, Italy, and about thirty other nations, they were told beforehand how they should behave. They agreed to observe all the rules of etiquette laid down.

They

As Bolsheviki they had rather prided themselves in their emancipation from the accustomed codes of manners and morals. They made promises without any intention of keeping them. plotted against other governments with whom they sought friendly relations. They printed paper money with the definite purpose of destroying all money values. They preached pacifism and practiced the most tyrannical kind of militarism. They laughed at the popular will as something negligible and contemptible; and controlled the people by an army recruited by starvation. They repudiated the acts and the debts of the Government as it was under the Czar, and let it be known that any promise by treaty or by bond which Russia had made before Bolshevism got into the saddle was nothing but a scrap of paper.

Finding that their method of ostracizing the world simply meant that they themselves were ostracized, much to their own peril, they made what they explained to their intimidated Russian victims was a strategic retreat. Outside of Russia there were many who believed that the Bolsheviki offered this explanation to save their face, and that the change in policy meant the beginning of a genuine abandonment, not only of Communism, but also of the Bolshevist code which listed treachery, dishonesty, and tyranny among the virtues. Though Bolshevist leaders plainly said that they were making concessions simply to fool their capitalistic neighbors, they were treated as if they had experienced a real change of purpose. So they were invited as equals to Genoa.

Of course there were conditions laid down, which the Bolsheviki professed to accept. One of these was that the Bolsheviki should recognize the debts to other countries incurred by Russia under the old régime. The Bolsheviki blandly accepted this condition. Hardly had these gentlemen appeared at Genoa than they perpetrated a great joke. They said, in effect: "Yes, indeed; we Nowe the money that other countries

lent Russia before the war; but in the meantime other countries have become indebted to us. We Bolsheviki had trouble with certain Russians who were trying to overthrow us, notably Kolchak, Denikine, and Wrangel, and for the moral and material support that these men received from the Allies Russia was injured to the extent of several billion dollars. Besides, we lost to Rumania our rich province of Bessarabia. We have cast up the accounts and find that, while we owe you five billion dollars, you owe us about twenty-five billion. We should be much obliged to you for the balance." That was joke number one.

Joke number two promptly followed. Ever since they came into power the Bolsheviki have been pushing one industry-the printing of paper rubles. As a consequence, they have made their money so worthless that actually it injures the value of a piece of paper if they print upon it the statement that it is worth several thousand rubles. They have done this on purpose to destroy money as a medium of exchange. They have consequently driven gold into hiding or out of the country. Having destroyed the means of exchange with other countries, they thereupon complained that they were suffering under an international boycott and blockade. They impressed sentimentalists even in hard-headed America. Finally, at Genoa they have come forth with this delicious proposal; they say: "You other countries have garnered the world's gold supply. We suggest that you now extend to Russia credit."

Incidentally they introduced joke number three. Professed pacifists, they have organized out of a disrupted and. unwilling people what is probably the biggest army in the world to-day. They have turned starvation into a recruiting sergeant. With this army they first sought in vain a military union with the radical element in Germany; they failed because they were withstood by Poland and by France. As soon as the Bolshevist delegates arrived in Genoa they proceeded to agitate for disarmament. They were very skillful; for they thus diverted the attention of the nations from the real cause of Russia's catastrophe and brought France and Poland into the picture as culprits. They found that the disarmament joke was accepted seriously during the war, when it served the purpose of destroying the eastern front and enabling Germany to reach the Marne for a second time. Perhaps the Bolsheviki are not miscalculating when they think that men's memories are short enough to enable this joke to be worked successfully

again.

The biggest joke of all, however, has been the Russian partnership with Germany. Eight years ago the war started as a conflict between Germany and Russia. Into that conflict France was drawn by her fidelity to her ally and to her sense of justice and liberty, and England was drawn as well. When Russia collapsed, the duty of the Allies was to see that Germany, thwarted in her attempt in one direction, did not succeed by finding a way over prostrate Russia. It was therefore in the interest of the Allies, as well as of Russia herself, that they should do all in their power to protect the Russian people from exploiters both within and without and to enable the Russian people to control their own affairs. Unfortunately, the Allies did not have the courage of their convictions. They intervened, but intervened feebly. They gave no true support to the forces that were working for Russian self-government. As a consequence a dictatorship arose in Russia which was distinctly in the interest of Germany and contrary to the interest of the Russian people. Now the dictators, still in power, have made a compact with Germany. In return for recognition as masters of the Russian people, they have opened the way for the Germans, the most ruthless of military and industrial organizers, to become their partners in exploiting the man-power and resources of Russia. In this alliance there is a formidable threat to the order, justice, and peace of the world. Concerning this compact the Russian people themselves have had nothing to say. They are the victims. The only beneficiaries of that compact are the Germans and the Bolsheviki. Thus Russia and Germany, invited to Genoa to be taught how to behave, have used the occasion to establish an alliance, not only in disregard of all the other countries of Europe, but actually to their peril. This last is the greatest and grimmest joke of all.

The trouble at Genoa is that the statesmen of Europe have been trying to find a way to say, "Peace, Peace," when there is no peace. They have thought that they could follow the example of the Washington Conference by disre garding its fundamental principle. International relations cannot be established on a basis of confidence except between friends. The nations at Washington were with regard to each other morally disarmed. The nations at Genoa are not. As long as Russia is under the control of men who wish to disrupt the order of society, and as long as Germany cherishes the sort of ambitions she had before she was beaten, so long will it be impossible for the nations that want justice and order and peace to deal with

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