WHAT WILL WILSON DO?
What Will Wilson Do? DURING the week the newspapers have been speculating freely as to President-elect Wilson's "next move" in grappling with the problems that will confront him at the beginning of...
...He declared emphatically against the Roosevelt plan to control the trusts through an administrative board and proposed instead federal laws that Would definitely prohibit the specific trade practices by which trusts have been built up...
...He made this the chief issue in his campaign...
...I will tell you what I believe, from close observation of the man, from studying his public documents and from knowledge of his record as governor of New Jersey, he is going to do...
...I do not know—and I doubt if anybody else knows—whether Wilson will call an extra session of Congress to meet immediately after March 4. Some Democratic leaders favor an extra session and some oppose it...
...Wilson every day since his nomination at Baltimore...
...He has not spoken a word himself on that subject...
...No individual or group can come to him and say: " 'Here, you must do so and so because you agreed to be guided by me if I helped elect you.' "The first thing he is going to do is to select a cabinet...
...The most significant fact is that he is free from promise or pledge...
...It is reasonable to anticipate he will favor a strict government regulation of banking practices and an elastic currency under government instead of Wall Street control...
...In his campaign speeches Wilson declared in positive terms for immediate and substantial downward revision...
...The first subject to be taken up is most likely to be the tariff...
...He is likely to take months to do it...
...DURING the week the newspapers have been speculating freely as to President-elect Wilson's "next move" in grappling with the problems that will confront him at the beginning of his administration on March 4. An answer to this question is written for the press by Oliver P. Newman, a correspondent who has been with Mr...
...These, I believe, will be the three big tasks undertaken by President-elect Wilson as rapidly as it is safe to undertake them...
...Wilson has very positive and very definite ideas on the trust problem...
...The President-elect has spent years of study on this problem, but he has never, to my knowledge, expressed an opinion showing what he considers the proper remedy...
...But whether or not an extra session is called, the tariff probably will be the first big problem given attention...
...The next problem tackled by the new President is likely to be the trusts...
...He realizes it is going to be an enormous job to transform into law the ideas he holds, which are the ideas held by the other leaders of his party and to which he, they and the party are pledged by the Democratic platform, but he is going at it with the expectation of succeeding...
...The third big question is banking and currency reform...
...Being free from every sort of special obligation, he is able to select the very best man that can be obtained for each position...
...I believe that when he begins his work at Washington he will be surrounded by the most able men who ever undertook to administer the affairs of the government...
Vol. 4 • November 1912 • No. 47
