H 



The Review of Reviews. 



greater interest has been sliown in the 

 Repubhcan Convention at Chicago and the 

 Democratic Convention at Baltimore than 

 has ever been taken in the national meetings 

 of our own Liberal or Unionist associations. 

 These latter are, perhaps, not sorry to be 

 without the features which luuc invested the 

 duel between Mr. Taft and Mr. Roosevelt 

 with the sensational attractions of an inter- 

 national prize-ring. Into the vicissitudes 

 of the contest at the Repidilican Convention 

 there is no need now to enter. They are 

 not edifying to the self-respect of the 

 ICnglish-spcaking man. Suffice it to say 

 that the " machine " asserted its ascendency. 

 The great majority of the delegates (561 ) 

 were secured for Mr. Taft's nomination. 

 Mr. Roosevelt in the end bade his followers 

 abstain from casting futile votes, retired 

 from the Republican party altogether, and 

 formed a new party, to which he gives the 

 fanciful name of the Bull Moose party. 

 lie has annoimced as its programme 

 the one compi'eiunsive ' j^lank, which, 

 fully carried out, with all its implica- 

 tions, would certainly revolutionise more 

 than the politics of the United States: 

 the venerable precept, " Thou shalt not 

 steal." In more detail he is said to stand 

 for woman suffrage, Presidential primaries, 

 tarifl' revision, control of trusts by a national 

 commission, and monetary law reform. 

 Oolite the most distinctively significant 

 thing from the world-standpoint is 

 Mr. Roosevelt's advocacy of " V^otes for 

 Women." Woman is evidently advanc- 

 ing witii a rush nowadays throughout 

 the English-speaking world. Which will 

 lie the first to do her justice — the 

 United Kingdom or the United 

 States r 



The Democratic Con 

 Mr. Bryan's ventiou at Baltimore has 



Renewed 



Ascendency. 'It Kist arrived at an 

 adjustment of competing 

 claims. Amid scenes of disorder, approach- 

 ing almost to violence, ballot after ballot 

 was taken, but without decisive result. The 

 figures of the twenty-sixth ballot were, for 

 Mr. Champ Clark, 467; for Dr. Woodrow 

 Wilson, 405. The requisite two-thirds 

 majority was thus not yet secured. Mr. 

 Bryan, as soon as the New York delegates 

 supported Mr. Clark, transferred his support 

 to Mr. Wilson, on the ground that he must 

 oppose any candidate put forward by 

 Tammany. He seemed to dominate the 

 Convention. Eventually Dr. Wilson, on 

 the forty-sixth ballot, carried the nomi- 

 nation by 990 votes to 84 for Mr. 

 Clark. The division of both parties mto 

 Progressive and Conservative sections 

 has fiung the States into the furv of 

 Presidential electioneering many months 

 before the excitement usually begins. The 

 protracted turmoil which will culminate in 

 November is likely to make us Britishers 

 grateful that we are under a monarchy ; for 

 no General Election and the consetpient 

 ap|)ointment or reappointment of a Prime 

 Minister so interrupt business as it is being 

 interrupted now in the United States. \\'ith 

 the more genuine loyalty, therefore, may 

 the nation welcome the coming of a<;e of 

 Prince Edward, which was celebrated in a 

 characteristicallv cpiiet way at home last 

 month. By the quiet gradation of growth 

 in the lloval Home does our future 

 President advance to Ins peerless jiosi- 

 tioii. And how the Crown compacis 

 the nation mav be seen in the tre- 



