What Will Hiram Say?
The University has voted overwhelmingly on the adoption of
the League of Nations Covenant without reservations. We have undoubtedly
brought down upon us the scathing invective of Messrs. Lodge, Borah, and
“Hell-Roaring” Hiram Johnson, who comes from the Pacific coast and should be a
walking recommendation for Nuxated Iron. We are un-American. These men stand
for Americanism. Americanism, which has become their keynote, is synonymous
with provincialism. Growth is an evil thing to them. To be great is criminal.
Expansion must be altogether within the narrow confines of our boundary lines.
It is not American to go outside, to believe our interests carry us everywhere.
Yet we fought a great war with millions of our young men in
a foreign battlefield, we gave the lives of thousands of our finest for the
life of the world. What would Mr. Lodge’s or Mr. Borah’s or Mr. Johnson’s
“Americanism” think of this? It seems we have been un-American all along.
And now our University has become un-American for we sent
our men to war (they didn’t all come back), and we have capped the climax by
endorsing the covenant. It was a dastardly thing to do. And now we crouch down
in our little neck of the woods and hope that Mr. Lodge and Mr. Borah and Hiram
won’t hear about it. And if they do—what will Hiram say, Hiram with his calm
temperament and his nobly restrained speech? What will he say?
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