United States cut the islands wholly adrift. They would like to have the United States keep a benevolent guardianship over the islands and American capitalists make investments there. Now they are realizing that they cannot have either American capital or American protection without some degree of American authority.

What Messrs. Quezon and Osmena are now supporting is a proposal known as the Guevara plan. This is not a suggested form of Government for the islands, but a suggested means of considering the whole Philippine problem and formulating a plan to solve it. The author of this proposal is the resident Philippine Commissioner Pedro Guevara. He suggested it at the Williamstown Institute of Politics last summer. We gave some account of it in The Outlook at the time. As summarized by the author this plan is as follows:

The Congress in the United States and the Philippine Legislature should be authorized by a joint or concurrent resolution to appoint committees to meet jointly for the discussion of the facts and merits underlying the Philippine problem, with a view to recommending a satisfactory solution. The President of the United States must likewise appoint four members, two of them residents in the Philippines.

The main purpose of this proposal seems to be to take the Philippine question out of party politics in both the Philippines and the United States. Various political changes have been suggested for the Philippine Governmentamong them a dominion form of government something like that of Canada. But it is clear that the main need of the Philippines is, not a new political formula, but a better economic condition. As Secretary Davis, of the War Department, says in his annual report just issued, "There has been a stressing of the political capacity of the people, at the expense of the development of productive capacity."

A self-governing people must also be self-supporting.

announcement has been made about once a year for two decades and that, despite it, we still find ourselves buying the rubber nature made. Yet some day a successful process probably is going to be hit upon.

Synthesizing rubber has been accom

Senator Vare, of Pennsylvania, whose right to a seat in the Senate is disputed

(See page 451)

plished for many years. The real difficulty is to make rubber that is just as good as the product of the Brazilian rubber tree and to make it for less or at equal cost. And this has never before been done. In 1912 the Germans began making synthetic rubber, but it was not good enough for soft-rubber products, only for hard; and when the war came Germany went rubberless despite her science.

Rubber chemists, of whom there is a whole corps hammering continually on this problem alone, have been learning new things about rubber of late. One interesting thing just discovered is that it is crystalline-something we find hard to square with our ideas of crystals and of rubber. By a comparatively recent application of X-rays-the X-ray diffraction analysis of molecular structure in crystals described some time ago in these columns-Professor Katz, of the University of Amsterdam, has clearly shown that the tiny globules in rubber are mutually hooked together somewhat like mountain climbers on a rope, and are equally helpful to one another. This

is the real secret of rubber's elasticity. All synthetic rubber has had the right chemical composition, but the mountain climbers in it were not roped together correctly; hence it was not very elastic

What the Germans now claim to have done is to obtain their raw materials as by-products of the new Bergius process of liquefaction of coal, recently described .in The Outlook, and to have learned how to rope the molecules together for good elastic team-work.

Rubber from coal is a dreamyes, a dream that delights the chemist.

Other Rubber Hopes

W

HAT of other rubber developments that have been more or less in the news of late? What of Henry Firestone's Liberian plantations? What of the plans to grow rubber in the Amazon basin? What of Mr. Edison's experi ments in Florida? What of guayule (gwy-oo-lay), a kind of shrub rubber to be grown in the semi-desert regions of the Southwest?

Mr. Firestone's plan is progressing; he proposed to grow in Africa the same tree that was long ago transplanted from Brazil to the Malaya plantations-the Hevea, our chief source of rubber. Mr. Edison is experimenting with several of the rubber-producing plants known to all rubber experts; the best showing has been made by a plant of the milkweed family from Madagascar, but only by machine harvesting could this home cul ture succeed in competition with thirtycent Malayan labor. And guayule is already being cultivated on several hundred Californian acres; it is rubber, but not "the" rubber (Hevea), and is not as good, although it is good.

Any one of these plans may push to the front, or the newly announced syn thetic process may win. At present this is anybody's guess.

Which will win the race-the planter, the botanist, or the chemist?

fore the Propeller Club, held forth on shipping trenchantly and, as is his wont, laid all the blame on the protective tariff.

More definite is an elaborate plan put forth by Mr. Hurley, formerly head of the United States Shipping Board. Briefly stated, Mr. Hurley advocates a half-billion-dollar Federal revolving fund to aid ship-building by loans, and in return the enrollment of all such ships in the Naval Reserve; the sale of the Government's merchant ships (preference to be given to buyers who build ships under the revolving fund plan); participation by railways in ship owning and operating; and readjustment (re

through Mr. W. P. MacCracken, Jr., Assistant Secretary for Aeronautics of the Department. It is a serious attempt to get unity of standards fixed as between the Department and the designers, engineers, and manufacturers who have been invited to the conference.

The Department has power to enforce its own standards as to what endangers safety, but it believes that joint discussion may make drastic measures unnecessary.

What the condition today is has been illustrated by Clarence Chamberlin's statement that the work on some of the planes in use is so incredibly bad that a

Uncle Sam's Business

N

OTHING can be found in the annual

report of the Secretary of Commerce to justify pessimism as to the . future of American commerce and industry. On the contrary, Secretary Hoover shows that the year ended on June 30 last was one of high and steady prosperity. Thus in the largest field of productive industry-manufactures-the levels of the previous year were considered high, but were appreciably surpassed in the year under discussion. So also with transportation and electric current production.

The Secretary does not make predictions nor argue about remedies for the weaker side of the record-as, for instance, the farm problems. But it is a reasonable probability that such deflation as has taken place in some directions would have to be much greater and more widely spread than it is now for the general level of commerce and production to be strongly affected.

Mr. Hoover does, indeed, go so far as to say that the situation as a whole is such as to obviate the danger of a serious depression.

Meanwhile, American wages, Mr. Hoover tells us, are higher than anywhere else in the world or than at any other time in world history.

A Prussian Honored in America

tolls. Mr. Hurley is careful to explain that his plan is not at all one for subsidies. "Government subsidies," he says, "destroy initiative and breed inefficiency."

One comment upon the Hurley plan, made by the head of a steamship company, is, in substance: "You can build ships if the Government helps by loans; but how are you going to run them at a profit under the disparity caused by the present American shipping laws?"

The Hurley plan may be a good starter for Congress, but what will it look like when Congress is done with it?

Getting Together in Air Science As

s the science and practice of aviation grow and they are growing faster by leaps and bounds-the element of safety in construction and skill in operation becomes of vital importance. Last week's conference in Washington was called by the Department of Commerce

it, and the remark of Paul Henderson, formerly of the Air Mail Service, that "old tubs, scarcely safe on the ground, are being taken into the air by pilots without qualifications." Wildcat flying is both a menace to life and a detriment to the spread of sound commercial flying.

Today there are nearly a hundred manufacturers of airplanes in America; in two or three years the number may be doubled. Now is the time to fix rules and enforce regulations. This conference at Washington should prove a landmark in the history of aviation.

Not only the United States but the States individually should curb bad manufacture and reckless flying as well as provide airports. Some steps have been taken in this direction, but much more remains to be done.

When experts agree on safety standards and the public ceases to admire dare-devils, commercial aviation will gain the attention it deserves.

ARON VON STEUBEN was a Prussian military expert, but he was not a soldier of fortune, seeking money and fame in wars that did not concern him. He came to America a hundred and fifty years ago because he sympathized with liberty and self-government. The newly appointed German Ambassador to the United States asserted at a celebration of the sesquicentennial anniversary of General von Steuben's landing in America, held in Berlin on December 1, that von Steuben was an exponent of the political ideas of Frederick the Great, but it is well known that the practice and idealistic theory of that monarch were at odds. The example of Lafayette probably at least equally influenced von Steuben.

In a semi-fictitious but basically historical article in the current issue of the "Saturday Evening Post" von Steuben is made to remark that he had gone through a hard life of all but continuous battle and was getting old, adding: "You'd think I'd have had enough war. I am rich, I have activities that are not

military-among other things, a canonship of the Cathedral of Havelberg. It wasn't St. Germain that, at heart, persuaded me to come to America. No, it was the feeling America had shown again -a spirit of liberty."

The service General von Steuben did for Washington and for America was enormous. He wielded raw, unruly patriots into disciplined, organized troops. Our Revolutionary soldiers had courage aplenty, but they lacked drill and training. Old as he was, von Steuben was

open to new ideas and saw that the independent and self-reliant spirit of American soldiers could be adapted to a less mechanical style of fighting than that of Hessians or even British.

When the war was over, von Steuben identified himself with his adopted country, became a landholder, and died an honored citizen.

tional question Governor Smith laid all responsibility for prohibition legislation upon the Federal Government. He declared in a speech before the New York State League of Women Voters on December 2 that there was no need of a State enforcement law. He said that the only difference occasioned by the absence of a State enforcement law was that all violators of the Federal act must be tried in a Federal, not a State court. As he put it, the discussion of the Volstead Act ended "as far as the people of this State are concerned in 1920, when the Government said, 'Keep your hands off.'" He added that the enforcement of the law rested upon local authority. Briefly, in respect to prohibition Governor Smith seems to be an extreme Federalist.

a dinner attended by opponents of prohibition at the Union League Club in New York. We wonder if Governor Smith would abandon his Federalistic view or Governor Ritchie would abandon his States' rights view in consequence of a popular referendum.

At present the opponents of prohibition appear to be agreed only in being opponents.

Wetness Revives Drought PERHAPS that little group of earnest

wet Republicans who met at the Union League Club in New York and commended the project of raising $3,000,000 to annihilate Federal prohibition will be remembered gratefully by certain Southern politicians who are both dry and anti-Smith.

These Republican wets have unconsciously provided an answer to the argument that Governor Smith's nomination is a necessity of Democratic practical politics. The theory is, of course, that to carry the wet Eastern States the Democrats must nominate a wet candidate. That theory rests on the assump

from the United States has guaranteed a fair test of political strength. The landing of naval forces, followed by the armistice proposals of Henry L. Stimson as representative of President Coolidge, as outlined in an editorial on another page, brought to an end the civil war between the Conservative faction supporting President Diaz and the Liberal faction headed by former VicePresident Sacasa. Now the organization of a Nicaraguan National Guard, under United States marine officers, is under way. Anti-Administration spokesmen

have opposed all of these measures. But elsewhere in this issue General Moncada, who commanded the Liberal army, tells what he thinks of the United States policy and the need for the marines. And the local election returns back up his words.

The United States forces in Nicaragua are the only guaranty there of fair elections and representative government.

The Fourth Champion in
Fifty Years

454

ITH United States marines in control, Nicaragua has recently held some significant local and municipal elections. They are important as signs showing which way the national elections next year may go under similar supervision. Despite the fact that the election machinery was in the hands of the Conservatives, who are now in power, the Liberals won.

The outcome of the voting is the best evidence that the presence of troops

o most outsiders the world of chess is a world by itself. Yet even to those who know little or nothing of the game the emergence of a new world champion in chess is an event of note. Before Capablanca, the Cuban master who has just yielded his title, there had been only two recognized world champions in the history of the game. Paul Morphy, of New Orleans, was, it is true, recognized generally as the foremost chess player in the world for a few years after 1857; but the first champion of record was Steinitz. That was fifty years ago. Following him came Lasker, then Capablanca, and now Alekhine.

The match in which Alekhine won his title was the longest ever played. It began at Buenos Aires on September 17 and, after thirty-four games in seventyfour days, it concluded there with Capablanca's resignation after the eightysecond move of the last game on November 29. Of the thirty-four games played, twenty-five were drawn. Until this match was played Capablanca was generally supposed to be unbeatable. It was in 1921 that Dr. Lasker yielded the title to Capablanca, in which the Cuban out of fourteen games won four to Lasker's none. But Capablanca has now fallen in the first championship match which he has played since that year. Like many other chess players, he began as a boy, being champion of Cuba at twelve years of age. While at Columbia

The Outlook, December 14, 1927

University, New York, he was the leader of the chess team. He was more, however, than a chess player, for he played baseball and tennis.

His successor is a Russian by birth, but now a citizen of France by choice. He has an extraordinary memory, as a chess player must have, which is another way of saying that he has the power of excluding everything but chess from his mind. He holds the world's record in playing blindfold chess. Capablanca says of him that in the "middle game" he is apt to turn the balance in his favor at the slightest error of his adversary, but that his playing is best in certain endings.

Capablanca, according to an article by him in the New York "Times," believes that skill in the playing of chess has reached such a stage that all games could practically be transformed into one of half a dozen well-known lines, and he says of himself that, if one were satisfied to draw, it would not be impossible to draw all the games.

Chess, the former champion believes, at least for contests among the masters, needs to be modified.

Gerard and Turkey's Envoy

A

NY American has a native right to espouse the cause of an alien people, to despise another alien people, and to voice his feelings towards both of them. But when he is a public man who has held the post of Ambassador it is his duty to speak responsibly. That demand may fairly be made upon the Hon. James W. Gerard, formerly Ambassador to Germany, in connection with his attacks upon Moukhtar Bey, the new envoy of Nationalist Turkey in Washington.

Mr. Gerard denounces Moukhtar Bey as the one-time representative of his Government in Moscow, and declares that he was responsible in that capacity for an agreement which led to the killing of 30,000 Armenians in a Turkish attack on the Armenian Republic of the Caucasus and to the division of that tiny nation after it was recognized by the United States. He also asserts that the arrangement by which President Coolidge has received the Turkish Minister is unconstitutional, violating the terms of the treaty of 1830 with Turkey. As a leader of the Committee Opposed to the Ratification of the Lausanne Treaty with Nationalist Turkey, Mr. Gerard insists that the earlier compact is still in force. And he calls the pres

sition in Ohio sponsored by the AntiSaloon League which would have legal ized a modified fee system in minor prohibition cases. And immediately after the defeat of the anti-Smith resolution the Board's talented secretary, Mr. Deets Pickett, announced that Senator Thomas J. Walsh, of Montana, a dry Roman Catholic, would make, from the Board's point of view, an acceptable Democratic candidate for President..

It is evident that the censory appara tus of the Board has informed its membership that there are many who are beginning to feel that prohibition may have been created and maintained by denominational bodies functioning as political factions. It is not necessary to be opposed to prohibition per se to feel that this is a dangerous approach to a form of theocratic government in the United States which is untraditional and in every way undesirable. This view may not be unanswerable, but in a campaign which threatens to be unusually complicated by discussion of the relation of Church and State it might easily be seized upon by the agitator. An avowedly Methodist veto on Governor Smith's nomination might indeed become a major issue in the campaign of 1928. There is therefore to be no formally resolved anti-Smith campaign among Methodists for which their most conspicuous political agency can be blamed.

Moreover, the example of the Board and the precepts which may quietly be handed down from such eminent authority may check the practice of conferences and local organizations to pass direct anti-Smith resolutions, or at least to suggest that they do more considering before they act. Individual Methodists, like other individuals, will, of course, be left free to oppose Governor Smith and any other candidate with his views. But it appears that the decision has been judiciously made that no fight shall be undertaken by the Methodist Board as such. It is a good sign. The example might well extend to all denominational bodies.

No reform is worth the cost of "sectarianizing" American politics. Conservation and Christmas

as applicable to Protestant bodies as it is to the Catholic Church. Almost immediately before the failure of the antiSmith resolution an editorial statement in the Board's official organ was printed discountenancing the referendum propo

Christmas tree problem in a way that at once delights the children and pleases the conservationists. The forty thousand trees used in the community this month are the overflow of the Pike National Forest and of timber lands un