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Show READERS TO GET POLITICS PACTS Mark Sullivan Promises True ij Statement of Conditions in Articles By MARK SULLIVAN ' I WASHINGTON, D. C. Sept 30. ! Tho campaign has now reached a point where candor Is a difficult quality either to get from others or to achieve In ones If. Feelings have been aroused, and the voters have quite generally arrived at the state of emotion or conviction where they have made qp their minds how they are going lo vote I Having arrived at that point, it is la practically universal rule that thereafter a man does not care eo I much to hear the truth as to hear that which gives comfort to his wishes. The number of persons is small who can distinguish between the facts and what they wish were the facts, hetweeu what Is likely to happen and what ihey wish to hap pen. The circumstances at one and the same time tend to make the task of the seeker for candor difficult, diffi-cult, and the purvey or of it unpopu I lar. POSITIIN IF REPORTER For a reporter, candor has always the painful consequence, arithmetically arithmetical-ly obvious if you reflect on it, of 1 being unpalatable in. roughly, one out of every two readers, even when. I as is sure to be the case, candor sometimes hurts Republicans and sometimes Democrats. But candor In a reporter Is painful to practice for reasons more closely personal than that The very intimacy that makes the possession of candid leaders lead-ers and politicians which raise questions ques-tions of delicacy in the recitation ot such facts and Judgments. PARTY INJURED Moreover It Is recognized that party interest is injured by candid statements of conditions. A party leader may admit to you in confl denco that his party is going to lose New York by 200,000. or that his party Is going to lose the bulk of the labor vote. But the public setting down of the facts tends to accentuate accentu-ate the very condition it describes. Every polltlclna knows that the party morale, both of workers and voters, Is injured by a statement of condl tlons or a prediction of results unfriendly un-friendly to tho party, locally or nationally. na-tionally. All these reasons, and more, tend to make candor difficulty. You may be personally fond of a party leader or a candidate. And if you are. you hesitate to do what will injure his chances. Then, too. there Is always locally or nationally, by a too candid can-did statement of conditions as they exist early In the contest when there Is yet time for them to change. CANDIR IS DUTY Nevertheless, candor is a duly to the public Those of us who are making a business of following the campaign, of knowing the candidate and the conditions of knowing the issues and the relations of the candidates can-didates to those Issues, have the opportunity, op-portunity, it becomes a duty to irans uilt these facts and Judgments candidly can-didly as they arise. OUT GETTING FACTS Your correspondent hopes to pi-e sent during the coming month a statement of conditions throughout the country, the candor and accuracy I of which can be depended upon with confidence, 1 have been in confidence confi-dence and their circumstances of it. Including in nearly all cases personal person-al acquaintance with the writer, insure in-sure as near an approximation to candor as can readily be accomplished. accom-plished. As one of my correspondents wrote. "Sure, I can give you the right dope when I nm talking hon est to a friend outside the state." TO TOUR NATION With this Information from all sections sec-tions of the country In hands, your correspondent begins a personal tour of survey throughout the country, in each community checking up by personal per-sonal contact the mass of information informa-tion and Judgments already received. Tho tour will take In practically all j tho Important doubtful states with 1 the possible exception of California, which may turn out to be impracticable impractic-able to visit. I was with Senator Harding on his tour which ended in Kentucky. I expect to Join Governor Cox'a train ln Oklahoma during the 1 latter pari of his tour, and then continue through the important doubtful states ol the West and the Mlddlewest. The survey of the West Ijevond the Mississippi will be made after conditions have crystalized to tho point where, presumably thej v, ill re. main until election day. Uer completing the tour of the West beyond the Mississippi I hope to Join the Cox and Harding trains on their trips through' the middle west and into the South, and will try to estimate conditions in that region, especially In the two important and I doubtful states, Indiana and Ohio. The survey of the big Eastern states will be made during the last week of the campaign With the date I already have and in the personal BUrYey I hope to pay quite as much attention to the fight tor control of the senate as to the 1 presidential contest. Omitting the ! South in the twenty states in which i there are tea I eoiiiesi, ;vv senator. I it is almost the universal rule that Lhe senatorial Contesl In each state eclipses in Interest the contest be- t wi en t'o.v and Harding, noi onh are th contests more exciting in the states affected, but ln aggregate of t lie lr effect on the nation as a whole ihrlr importance ln determining which party shall control the Senate Is hardly less than the Importance of the presidential contest. (Copyright by the New York Kven-lug Kven-lug Post. Inc.) New York Evening' Post Syndicate. j |