Easy

"Although I have not given Secretary Kellogg's statement careful study, it seems to be very fair in its statement of America's attitude. Of course, the United States will have to protect its citizens in China, as it is doing in Nicaragua; but it will be a different job in China."--Sir Esme Howard, Ambassador of His Brittanic Majesty to the U. S.

The U. S. Secretary of State had, with good reason, felt it his duty to issue a statement about China. From London, Sir Austen Chamberlain had issued one and was preparing to issue another. Up at the Capitol, Congress was resolving about it. Headlines were black. In Chinese harbors and muddy rivers, U. S. gunboats rocked.

When the Secretary sat down to write it, he must have smiled to think that, in contrast to the harrowing complexity of Chinese news, a statement of U. S. policy would be one of the easiest any Secretary of State was ever asked to write. This is what he had to say:

1) The U. S. would like to see China in control of its own tariffs.

2) The U. S. would like to see China blessed with so pure a judiciary that the U. S. might abandon its extraterritoriality right without jeopardizing its nationals.

3) The U. S. has never (like Imperialist Europeans) grabbed "concessions" of land in China, and consequently has no concessions to relinquish.

4) U. S. guns will protect U. S. lives, where, when, as and if necessary.

5) In regard to No. 1 and No. 2, the U. S. would be delighted to make new treaties with China as soon as the U. S. could discover where China might be said to exist diplomatically. Until then, no treaties, for there is no China to treat with.

That, in effect, is what Mr. Kellogg wrote. It was generally agreed that while a Woodrow Wilson might have been more eloquent, no Secretary of State could have written better sense.

Next day, however, Mr. Kellogg said something original--something more than Sir Austen had been willing to say. He said the U. S. would consider a diplomatic China to exist if the chief contending factions would agree on a joint delegation to represent China. This was a great advance, but Mr. Kellogg did not put it in writing, and there is no immediate likelihood that the Chinese factions will agree.

Fortnight ago. Secretary Kellogg suppressed certain intelligence from China for fear of "unduly alarming" the people. Last week, it appeared that the intelligence in question related to the mobbing and manhandling of a U. S. man, one Butterick, at Hankow. Chinese flung at him pots of dung.