Saturday, August 24, 2013

Root For Wilson In Mexican Plans.

New York Times 100 years ago today, August 24, 1913:
Strong for President's Stand Against Intervention in Neighbor Republic.
PUTS BLAME ON MADERO
Says He Was a Dreamer and Tried to Force Conditions People Were Not Ready For.
    United States Senator Elihu Root, who has been in England attending the sessions of the Institute of International Law at Oxford, was among the arrivals yesterday from Liverpool on the Cunarder Campania. Senator Root was away exactly one month, and soon after landing left for Clinton, N.Y., to spend the week-end with his family. To-morrow he will return to Washington to resume his duties in the Senate.
    Senator Root said he had not kept very closely in touch with political affairs in this country, and added that his only information concerning the Mexican situation was what he read in the British newspapers, although he admitted he was deeply interested in the question.
    "I am entirely in accord with President Wilson," said Senator Root, "in his policy of non-intervention in Mexico. As to the proposition that has been put forward by some that the United States should permit the free exportation of arms and ammunition into Mexico for the use of both sides in the present civil strife I am opposed to any such thing. I am against making the United States a basis of operations in a civil war in any of our neighboring countries."
    "Did the present critical state of affairs in Mexico have its beginning during the time that you were Secretary of State?" Senator Root was asked.
    "No, everything was peaceful at that time. It began when Madero accomplished the overthrow of Diaz. Madero was an idealist, a theorist, and a dreamer and tried to apply principles in the governing of Mexico for which the Mexican people were not ready or prepared."
    "The same principles that some people would like to apply in the Philippines? " remarked a reporter.
    "Exactly," Senator Root answered.
    Senator Root said he had several talks with Lord Haldane, the Lord High Chancellor of England, who is due to arrive in New York next Thursday on the Cunarder Lusitania.
    "It will be Lord Haldane's first visit to America," said Senator Root, "and I regret that he will be with us so short a time. It will be his first visit to this side of the water, and from New York he will go direct to Montreal, where he will address the American Bar Association. Chief Justice White of the United States Supreme Court, who will preside at the sessions of the association, will introduce Lord Haldane."
    Senator Root said he did not know enough about the local political situation to express any opinion as yet. He said, however, that what little he had read about it indicated that it was a very interesting situation.
    Among Senator Root's fellow-voyagers on the Campania were Dr. S.H. Anders, Mr. and Mrs. George D.F. Barton, the Rev. Daniel F. Buckley, Mr. and Mrs. R.W. Chapin, Dr. and Mrs. Haven Emerson, Dr. D.S. Fairchild, and the Right Rev. Bishop Schrembs of Toledo, Ohio.

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