Mr. Baker & a Ghost

"I would not take the United States into the League, if I had the power to do so, until there is an informed and convinced majority sentiment in favor of that action in the United States. I am not in favor of a plank in the Democratic national platform urging our joining the League. I think it would be a great mistake to make a partisan issue of the matter. . . . Any opinion I entertain on the subject of America's relationship to the League of Nations must be recognized as merely an opinion such as any private citizen is entitled to entertain."

Thus spoke Newton Diehl Baker in Manhattan last week before he sailed for Mexico. Less than a fortnight before in a ringing letter to the League of Nations Association, he had passionately appealed for U. S. membership at Geneva. During that fortnight Baker-for-President stock slumped sharply. His second statement disentangling his personal and political views was unmistakable evidence to many observers that Mr. Baker was not as uninterested in the Presidency as he had appeared.

Advocacy of the League blighted the end of the Wilson Administration. It helped defeat James Middleton Cox in 1920. Even today a political belief persists that no outspoken friend of the League can sit in the White House. But as a practical issue the League is so moribund that few persons bothered to associate Mr. Baker with it until he doggedly championed U. S. entry last month. Well aware of the damage it can do parties and politicians he hastened to lay its ghost for 1932.

Hardly had Mr. Baker's boat passed through the Narrows before speculation began to fit him into the 1932 Democratic puzzle picture. His friends liked to depict him as a rallying point for the "Stop Roosevelt" movement. He was also envisioned as a compromise nominee after a possible deadlock between Smith and Roosevelt forces on the convention floor had spent itself.

Mr. Baker had many a point in his favor. While declining to make Prohibition a national issue, he is on record in an individual report filed with the Wickersham Commission favoring remission of the liquor question to the States. Back of him lies the electoral strength of Ohio, a "pivotal" State. Businessmen could be reminded that he is a prominent lawyer in Cleveland, a director of Baltimore & Ohio R. R. Liberals could be told that as Mayor of Cleveland (1912-16) he carried forward the Reform torch fallen from the hands of the late Tom Johnson, famed tribune of the people who fought for a 3-c- carfare. The South could be made to remember that Newton Baker's father rode with Jeb Stuart in a company commanded by a Baker cousin and manned by 20 Baker first cousins.

Like Franklin Roosevelt, Newton Baker came under the spell of Wilsonian idealism. Both worked hard for their idol at the hectic Baltimore convention of 1912. Both were rewarded with membership in the Wilson political family. Mr. Baker was first offered the Department of Interior portfolio. He refused it only to accept the War Department post in 1916. His activities as head of the nation's greatest army were last year glowingly described in Newton D. Baker; America at War by Frederick Palmer.

Mr. Baker's wife is the daughter of the late Howard Leopold, who once ran for Governor in Pennsylvania on the Prohibition ticket. She wears a pince-nez, plays tennis, golfs. During the null regime she was a lively member of the Administration dancing class. Asked last week what he was going to Mexico for, Mr. Baker answered: "It's just a vacation. Not for business, for law, for statesmanship, or romance."

He paused, then added: "Except, of course, a romance with Mrs. Baker."

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