Outlook September 12, 1928 W ▸▸ James Cannon, Jr. ◄◄◄ Leader of the Dry Revolt in the Democratic Party HEN he was a young preacher, Cannon tried to go to live among a missionary but, savages as because his health was not robust, his church-the Methodist Episcopal Church, South-would never permit him to go. He showed neither resentment nor disappointment. He worked away, hard and faithfully, as pastor on Methodist circuits and stations, as teacher in schools with Methodist leanings, as editor of papers more or less under Methodist control. When he had barely topped the crest of life, he was powerful enough in the church to attain the goal of every Methodist preacher's ambition, a bishopric. When he became a bishop, James Cannon, Jr., took no conferences to preside over. He became a missionary bishop. He is today Bishop of Africa and Brazil. Just as soon as he attained the position in which he could give orders instead of taking them, he put out for the mission fields and has lived in them a large part of the time ever since. What the rulers of his church would not permit him to do when he was among the ruled he proceeded to do when he came to sit among the rulers. This shows how this man can work by indirection, slowly and through long years, toward the attainment of an end. But he does not prefer that way. His method is to drive straight ahead, not over but through whatever obstacles are in the way. Let a story illustrate the trait. Something less than two years ago, Bishop Cannon was in the heart of the By DIXON MERRITT Congo. The time came when he had to start home. Straight ahead at no great distance was the coast and a ship and an early sailing. But everybody told him that he must not go that way, that the difficulties were all but insurmountable. The way that he should go was roundabout, long and slow, but safe. Bishop Cannon packed his bags and headed straight for the coast. He was beset by all the difficulties and danger that he had been warned of, and more beside. Floods caught him in a river swamp and, but for the kindliness of the natives, he would have died there. He sheltered in a native hut, insect infested. He had a raging fever when he reached the coast. He was given up as dead on the ship. He was confined for a long time to a London hospital for tropical diseases. He reached home a mere skinful of bones. But he reached home by the direct For his Own comfort and safety, he might much better have gone the other way. But he never considers his own comfort and safety. route. analytical chemist could not find in him as much sentiment as would go under the toenail of a chigger. If he has a temper, nothing has ever penetrated his hide deeply enough to reach it. Methodist preachers who have fought with and against Cannon for a lifetime say that nothing makes him angry. His antagonists in debate, in conferences and elsewhere have sometimes deliberately tried to insult him. After the insult, he has answered just as calmly -and just as as politely as before. This trait has won for him recognition as the most irritating debater Methodism. in If it were necessary to write Bishop Cannon's character in a phrase, the phrase would be this: Deadly earnestness wholly devoid of the passion of fanaticism. And yet we know that there is in this man something of sentiment and of emotion. He has confessed both. His life-long, sledge hammer devotion to prohibition began in a sentiment regarding his mother and in an emotional experience of his boyhood. The man who thinks enough of his emotions to keep them eternally locked in a fire proof safe is sure to be a dangerous foe and likely to be a successful reformer. He is of the stuff of Napoleon Bonaparte, of Martin Luther, of Socrates. As a foe, Bishop Cannon is entitled to rank with Attilla the Hun. A man more ruthless never lived. As a reformer, men may place him where they will. He has been in the game for forty years and, despite a body broken anew by his mule-headedness in Africa, is going stronger than ever today. James Cannon was born at Salisbury the Eastern Shore of Maryland. The Eastern Shore is, besides being aristocratic and Southern, as strongly Protestant as the Western Shore is Catholic. Salisbury is the heart of the Eastern Shore, the cathedral town of the Episcopal Church and the center of activity for most other Protestant denominations. If Cannon has an anti-Catholic bias-and there are indications that he has-it is not of lowbrow origin. At twenty James Cannon entered Randolph-Macon College in Virginia with no thought of becoming a preacher. He was a dandy-and the dandy of the early eighties was a bird of particularly gaudy plumage. During his undergraduate days, the "call to preach" came to him. One cannot but wonder how such a thing reaches such a man, ton Theological Seminary. In one missions and prohibition. They must be considered as two interests but I believe that in Cannon's case they are one-missions the end and prohibition one of the means. This has a queer sound, since the man has hammered incessantly at prohibition for forty years and only ten years ago became actively the missionary. But we shall see more about that a little later on. A few years of ministerial work made James Cannon one of the most cordially hated men in Virginia. He was not without enemies among his fellow ministers and, because of his eternal reforming, the press of the State lined up almost solidly against him. It is not easy to believe that this drove the man out of pastoral work, but, on the other hand, it is not hard to believe that he looked about for a better weapon than a pulpit in the country or a small town. However that may be, he became an editor, first of one of the Christian Advocates, the family name of Methodist church papers, and later of "The Virginian". a reform paper which he founded. He was now in a position to make more enemies and to hammer them harder. He gave himself wholly, including the pocketbook, to "The Virginian". He was, and probably still is, a man of considerable means and he poured multiplied thousands of money into the hopper of his paper. Most men would have counted it money lost. He counted it money well spent, every dollar bringing a dollar's worth of goods. As the fight went on-mainly, it was the fight for prohibition-Cannon may have thought of training classes of recruits for future armies. turned from the editorial desk to the teacher's chair and was for years at the head of Blackstone College for Girls. There is hardly a neighborhood in Virginia without one or more of Cannon's girls engaged in the business of homemaking. He There is something in cold, hard men that attracts women. It is said that these Blackstone alumnae, almost without exception, would go through fire for the Bishop. Cannon began his ministry as he has continued it, preeminently the controversialist. He was in a fight in his first year and has been in from one to twenty at a time ever since. He has lost some of them, but those who know his career most intimately say that he has never once been bested in an argument because of lack of facts. It has been said, whether truthfully or not, that for years he maintained a clipping service on every man of any account in the Virginia Conference because a fight has been able to devote more time to with any of them was always imminent. them. And no less to prohibition. Cannon, very early in his career, manifested his two great interests His attainment of the bishop's bench terminated Cannon's career at Black stone. That was ten years ago. He has been no more interested in missions since than he was before but he Since 1914, Cannon has been Chair(Please turn to page 797) ►► Europe and The Kellogg Treaty Europe has signed Mr. Kellogg's treaty outlawing a good question. It is more important to know what Europe will do than to know what it thinks about the treaty, and it is even more important to know what Europe hopes about the treaty." "First: What will Europe do about the treaty? Europe will sign. That was a foregone conclusion. No one of the different countries is in a position to offend the United States and it has been made clear to every one that your Government takes it very seriously and would be gravely resentful at any country which refused to sign. Europe will sign." "What does Europe think about the treaty," he said after a moment's hesitation, "is very much more difficult to answer. I doubt if any two Europeans think exactly the same thing. We never know quite what to think about Americans. At one moment we are impressed by your practical common sense-your success in material things is obvious. The next moment we are equally impressed by your apparent faith in mere words. We used to think that Wilson sometimes used words loosely-as loosely-as though there were some health-giving magic in sonorousness. 'Self Determination.' 'A World Safe for Democracy.' At times it seemed to us that he was not so much interested in the hard work of giving meaning to the phrase as he was in polishing it. But when we read this treaty of Mr. Kellogg's and think about it, it seems to us even more a matter of words, even less connected with the realities of hard work necessary to give the words effect, than anything Mr. Wilson ever proposed to us. "I can illustrate the way we get bewildered by your methods in another field, much less important, but to me typical. I have had to attend some of the opium conferences at the League of Nations. Opium smoking used to be a regrettable vice of the Far East, modern chemistry has brought the 'dope menace' home to the Western world. It is a difficult problem, because the commodity is so small and so easily smuggled. Well, we had been working on it for a couple of years, not making much progress, but a little. Suddenly an American Delegation turns up and they say that it is easy. All that is necessary is to stop the planting of the poppy from which opium is made. Could anything be simpler? The only trouble is that an unkind Providence has arranged that the poppy grows most luxuriantly in those countries over which a European Diplomatic Conference has a minimum of influence. What is the gain in outlawing poppies when we can't stop them from growing? "When we tried to point out the facts of the situation to these American friends and said that as we did not see any practical way to prevent the Persians, Turks and Chinese from growing opium, we thought it best to see what we could do to control the evil in the areas over which we had authority, they said that was sinful—a compromise with evil. I a am sure that the gentlemen of the American Delegation were quite sincere--even more sure that the American ladies who surrounded them were sincere. We Europeans must have a blind spot-we cannot see that this method of denouncing evil cures it. "We think in much the same way about this Kellogg treaty. There has been more serious work done to prevent war since the Armistice than in all the centuries before. Besides the League of Nations, we have created a World Court. We made a big step towards stable peace at Locarno. We are working on more treaties of the same nature. The rapprochement between the former enemies has been indeed remarkable. This business of peace appears to us exceedingly complicated and difficult, we are working at it from every angle. Besides the ceaseless diplomatic work, we are beginning, in a smal way, with these international cartels to eliminate the m extreme and dangerous for. of economic rivalry. All our educational authorities are working at it, hoping that the next generation will be less inclined to the war frenzy than its predecessors. We may have been stupid about it, but we certainly have not been idle. If we fail to organize the world on a basis of peace, it will not be because we have not tried. "Then Mr. Kellogg, who has not shown any very keen or sympathetic interest in our efforts to establish peace, announces to the world that he has discovered a much simpler way of doing it. If we all hold up our right hands and recite in unison: 'I renounce war as an instrument of national policy,' the job will be done. Are you surprised that the proposal does not appeal to our intellects? "We will sign the treaty which Mr. Kellogg offers. Partly because we do not want to offend your government-not a very dignified reason—and partly because we believe that in time, as circumstances arise, it will be given a meaning, although we cannot as yet see it. It appears to us-if I may use an illustration from your own political life-like an XVIII Amendment without any Volstead Act to enforce it. We all promise that if anybody ever starts a war in the future, we will shake our fingers at them and call them bootleggers." "Come, come," I interrupted, "You must admit that there is a difference. Europeans do not want a war half as much as most Americans want a drink." My hope of lightening the conversation by this weak attempt at a jest was deceived. My friend flushed angrily. He was evidently at pains not to let his feelings get the better of him. "What is it," he demanded, "that makes you talk and think like that? Is it your Puritan tradition? It seems medieval to us. Can you think only in terms of sin and virtue? Do you really think that the serious menace of war comes from naughty men who want war and that all there is to this problem is to persuade these naughty men to renounce their sinful ways? "No, if we allowed ourselves to believe that that is what you think of us, we could not help feeling that it was so insulting-so undeservedly insulting-that we would lose our tempers completely and that is one thing which no friend of peace can afford to "At best it is rather hard for us to keep our tempers when Mr. Kellogg asks us to renounce war-as though it were something sinful but attractivelike making love to your neighbor's wife. Does he really think that we Europeans are so depraved that we like war-that it would be an act of selfdenial for us to give it up, to renounce it? "To us, who have been working as wisely and as earnestly as we know how to stabilize peace-and we have made progress-that does not seem to be the trouble. We are not worrying about those pathological few who want war. Our problem is how to realize the hopes of the great majority of people who want peace. I doubt if there was ever time when the great mass did not yearn for peace, yet neither we nor our fathers nor our ancestors of any generation have discovered how to insure it. "It is rather as though Mr. Kellogg should ask us to sign a treaty to renounce poverty. Probably as many people have suffered from poverty through the centuries as have suffered from war. But to solemnly renounce poverty would not give us prosperity. That also is a problem which the statesmen of this Old World must face. We never were as rich as you are and the war has made us poorer. We have a tremendous task-not of words and formulas to build up a decent prosperity for our people. Here we must stimulate one industry, while in another we are producing more than we can sell. Take this last report of the British coal industry. Nearly a quarter of a million miners for whom there is no hope of work at the trade they know. Somehow they and their families must be moved to other gainful occupations. Every country in Europe is facing similar problems, unemployed, currency dislocation, crises of one kind or another. There is no panacea. All we can hope for is gradual amelioration. Building up a little here, a little there. Renouncing poverty will not help us. Charles Darwin took for his motto: 'Dogged does it.' That is the only way we'll regain prosperity. "And so we feel about this problem of war. It is hard for us to keep our it. tempers when you ask us to renounce The implication that we like it stings. I am sorry that I showed my temper. We won't get anywhere by getting mad. And it really does not matter so much that we get irritated when Uncle Sam talks to us like naughty children. The thing which is important is to make your people realize to go on trying doggedly even when we fail to make your people realize that we are terribly in earnest in this work for peace. Our way may seem wrong to you, but it is vastly important to us that you should understand what we are trying to do. "We think of peace just as you do of prosperity. It is not something that will happen. It won't come to us from wishing. War and poverty are devastating. If we do not get rid of them, they will get rid of us. No end of people have thought up clever, nice sounding, Utopian schemes to get rid of them. But they did not work. We're disillusioned about easy schemes. We've settled down to the hard way. The coral insect way. Much of what we have to do is piecemeal. Little jobs. Keeping the precarious peace in the Balkans from degenerating into war. Trying to reconcile the interests of the Poles and Germans in Danzig. Some of the work we are doing is more fundamental. Rooting down into the deep causes of conflict and removing now one, now another. Building up a little international law here and there. Per Copyright by Harris & Ewing-Wide World. suading oil men to cooperate instead of competing. Above all, working at education-trying to make this great motive of patriotism blossom out into something finer than crude, combative nationalism. "We are at work building up-and making men used to the organization and the instrumentalities of peace. We need new officers to regulate the traffic between nations, just as we have had to organize traffic policemen at our street corners to prevent collisions. And all the time, through all these means, we must touch the minds of men, gradually change the patterns of their thought. "We will sign the treaty, of course, although we do not think that it will help us much, nor make our work more easy. You started out by asking what we thought about the treaty. Some of what we think had better not be said. I apologize for having shown my own resentment at what we all think the insulting implication of the phrases Mr. Kellogg has used. Leaving that aside, we think there is little in the proposal but words. It will not do much to decrease the probabilities of warwe will have to continue, just as before, working our hardest to organize peace. Calling a criminal an 'outlaw' does not do much good unless you have some machinery for arresting him and locking him up. With no enforcement act, (Please Turn to Page 797) SECRETARY KELLOGG Signing The Third Treaty with The Polish Minister W How Sweden Does It HILE the battleaxes and shillelahs crash in the debate over American prohibition, it is interesting to consider Sweden's experience with a system which is neither rationing nor completely dry. In this country alcoholic beverages are accesible in accordance with the individual's competence to consume them without abusing the privilege. By EINAR ROSENDOR The specific proposals for liquor regulation, as Under a passbook system persons may obtain intoxicants up to a prescribed maximum, so long as they demonstrate that they are not using it to excess. Drunkenness is disciplined by revocation of the passbook. These methods have been in full effect for about as long as prohibition in America, and while there are objectors, they appear to be successful. There is little or no bootlegging. Available statistics reveal highly improved social conditions. In the Swedish law there is this unique characteristic, that it evades generalization. It is not assumed, as in most systems of rationing, that one person is of the same alcoholic capacity -to manufacture a phrase-as every other person. The system takes account of personal variations. It is an attribute of law that it must be more definite and certain than nature itself. In republican countries, for example, the privilege of suffrage is fixed by drawing an arbitrary line across the calendar. At a certain age, no sooner, one may vote; although it is obvious that some persons are qualified in judgment and integrity to cast the ballot earlier, while others may not mature until much later. Swedish regulation of liquor escapes that fault. Not a lawyer but a physician applied this new principle: Dr. Ivan Bratt, now fifty years of He began age. with the notion that general prohibition is not an effective remedy for the injurious effects of alcohol. The community, he thought, should endeavor to establish an individual relation with each member. It must acquire, in this particular at least, a certain degree of knowledge of each one. And from that premise he devised his system. Under this system the importation, manufacture and sale of wines and Only those persons who obtain special permission may purchase alcoholic beverages for home consumption, and in Sweden this represents ninetenths of the traffic. Every purchaser is registered; his right to purchase is regulated, in proportion to his personal circumstances and personal characteristics, up to a certain maximum. Every purchase is registered in the passbook, and the sale of intoxicants is strictly individualized. The saloon has been abolished by a method not unfamiliar to other countries. The sale of intoxicants for immediate consumption is restricted to restaurants or hotels on condition of taking a meal; and only a limited amount may be served to each guest. Neat and orderly restaurants have supplanted the old public houses, and anyone abusing alcohol in such a place loses the right to purchase even for home consumption. Communal temperance committees have been organized to influence, if they can, those who abuse alcohol, and restore them to a temperate way of living. If they fail, and a drunkard becomes a nuisance to his family or to the community, they see that he is taken for treatment and restraint in a public institution. The administrative apparatus is now in full working order. The problem of organization has been solved. But from 1917 to 1919, when shortage of raw materials and the wartime commercial blockade forced a drastic rationing of intoxicants, Sweden experienced some of the ill effects which have attended complete prohibition elsewhere. The legal maximum was cut down to about a pint a month, and for a little while extremely advantageous results were observed. But after a few months drunkenness began to increase, especially in the larger towns, and the hospitals reported many more. cases of acute alcoholism. Bootleggers sprang up, and illicit distillation spread abroad like a pestilence. It began to appear that the gains of regulation would be quite lost. In 1920 the supply of intoxicants again became normal, the original passbook system was reintroduced, and the illicit distillation of intoxicants decreased. It would not be accurate to say that this was done all at once. Currency conditions in some of the Baltic States were such as to make extremely profitable the smuggling of liquor into the Scandinavian countries. Only during the last two or three years has it proved possible to reduce this smuggling considerably, and even to put a complete stop to it. Doctor Bratt regards his system as primarily educational. Has it served also its economic, physical and social purposes? What has it done in making Sweden a sober country? To answer these questions we must turn to statistics, and due allowance must be made for other factors than temperance. In order to give a more complete picture, I will consider the whole period since 1913, without attempting to avoid the two years when the Bratt plan did not have a fair trial. In 1913 Sweden had a population of 5,600,000. At the end of 1926, this figure had risen to six millions, and the increase was almost entirely of persons more than twenty-five years old. The Swedish birth rate is practically stationary, and it cannot be said that |