FAIR PLAY AND NO POLITICS
September 20, 1918
A Democratic member of the Senate has introduced a resolution to investigate the primary campaign expenses of certain Republican candidates for the Senate, including Commander Truman Newberry, whose recent triumph overMr.Henry Ford in theMichigan Republican primaries was greeted with heartfelt thanks by every sincere and far-sighted American patriot.
This Senate, which comes to an end on March 4 next, has the same, and only the same right to investigate the election conduct of candidates for the Senate, which comes into existence on March 4 that it has to investigate the campaign conduct of any other candidates for office.
Moreover, any such proposed investigation undertaken on the eve of an election is tainted with bad faith unless it is conducted with conspicuous fairness and impartiality and is undertaken at once so that it can be finished at least a month before the elections. Personally, I shall be glad if the election expenses or any other conduct of any of the candidates be investigated, provided that the investigation be undertaken at once and finished within the next fortnight, and provided that it be entirely impartial. Therefore, it must deal comprehensively with all serious charges affecting the desirability of candidates as governmental representatives of the American people at this time.
If the men backing the proposal are acting in good faith they will investigateMr.Ford’s record on the following points in order to determine his fitness to represent patriotic Americans at this time. They will find out how much money he spent on the peace ship, and on his lavishly expensive newspaper advertising campaign against preparedness, and against our standing up for Belgium’s rights, and againstour taking action about Germany’s sinking the Lusitania and her other assaults on us, and in favor of the McLemore resolution. This was part of the great pacifist campaign of which another part, as our government investigations show, was financed by the German authorities themselves or by their affiliated societies in this country.
The investigation should includeMr.Ford’s contributions in the last presidential campaign and the names of the candidates he supported, for his politics seem to have been purely personal and pacifist.
Moreover, the investigation should include a full examination of the justification forMr.Ford’s aiding and abetting his son Edsell in escaping draft and staying at home when the great majority of young Americans of his age are eagerly striving for places of honor and peril at the front.Mr.Ford is an enormously wealthy man.Mr.Newberry is not.Mr.Newberry himself at once entered the military service of the United States. His two sons have wives and children, but they immediately entered the service, striving eagerly to get to the front.Mr.Edsell Ford waited until he was drafted, then fought hard for an exemption, which the local board disallowed. He succeeded, however, in escaping service and is at home.
Unless the investigation takes up these matters, it will be stamped with the stamp of unworthy and improper partisanship. The simple truth is that all patriotic Americans rejoice in the nomination and will rejoice in the election at this time of suchAmericans asMr.Newberry in Michigan andMr.Medill McCormick in Illinois.