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Show BRYAN LiKELY TO CAUSE SUB Two Big Issues Face Platform Makers at Democratic Convention BY H. N. RICKY. N. E. A. Staff Correspondent. CHICAGO. May 1 . Two big issues will face the platform makers at the Democratic convention at San Francisco. Francis-co. Each of them spell trouble and disharmony. Together they make a combination that promises to precipitate precipi-tate the bitterest struggles In the history his-tory of the party. i They are the treaty of peace and liquor. The party leaders are giving more attention to the matter of platform than to candidates because they realize real-ize that if they misjudge public sentiment senti-ment on the peace treaty and liquor, whatever chances they may have for electing a Democratic president win bo lost,- Irrespective of who the candidate candi-date may be. This Is one of the reasons why the contest for the nomination is so much less interesting among the Democrats than among tho Republicans. Whatever hope the Democratic leaders lead-ers may havo had that they would bo able to avoid a knock-down-and-drag-out fight in the platform committee and later on the floor of the convon-Ition, convon-Ition, hag been given up, now that Bryan has been elected a delegate-at-; large from Nebraska. No Mystery Here. There is no mystery about where Bryan stands on tho two disturbing issues which the party will have to face and there is no doubt that he Is determined to put up the fight of his life to force his will on the convention. con-vention. He has given notice time and again during the past few months that the last ounce of his effort and influence will be usetl to prevent the party from making the slightest concession to the liquor interests. He has been equally frank in taking issue with the president presi-dent on the treaty. If Bryan can have his way he will put a plank in the . platform binding the party to the strictest enforcement of the prohibition law. Opposed to inm on this proposition win be some of the ablest and most influential leaders, lead-ers, who believe that a declaration in favor of light wines and beer offers the one and only hope for Democratic victory at the November election. About Prohibition. They figure that there Is a great reaction against prohibition, in so far as it applies to light wines and beer, in many of the industrial centers of the East and middle west and in Call- jfornia, and that this reaction can be capitalized with an encouraging plank In the platform. I This is their argument. We can car-iry car-iry the solid south with any candidato Ion any platform. With a plank in the ! platform favoring light wines and beer 'Wo can carry Now York, Massachusetts, Massachu-setts, New Jersey, Connecticut, California, Cali-fornia, Illinois, Wisconsin and have a fighting chance to carry Ohio and Indiana. In-diana. It would be the paramount issue of the campaign, as the liquor question always is when it Is an issue at all. Bryan's answer is that the liquor question as a political issue is dead and that if the Democrats take it up they will be tying themselves to a corpse. He might be -willing to agree to a policy of silence, which will probably be the Republican policy, but he will fight to the last ditch to prevent the party from mentioning favorably fa-vorably anything stronger than grapd juice. If Bryan Loses. If Bryan loses his fight in the platform plat-form committee he will appeal to the convention and If the convention turns him down and adopts a light wine and beer plank he may boll. Whether or not under such circumstances circum-stances the Commoner would actively oppose the Democratic nominee is a question. My guess is that he would. Bryan feels more strongly about prohibition pro-hibition than about any cause he has advocated since he entored public life. The Bryan attitude toward Mr. Wilson's Wil-son's treaty is equally annoying. He thinks that the Democratic senators and the president should have accepted accept-ed the Lodirp repervntlnns nnrl mtiftrl i I the treaty on that basis. He has I the treaty on that basis. He has-said that it was little short of a crime -to 'throw the treaty issue into the presidential presi-dential campaign, and he undoubtedly' proposes to go the limit in opposing the Wilson program of having a no-reservatlon no-reservatlon plank written into the platform. Bryan View on Treaty. Frankly Bryan doesn't believe the party can win on the Wilson no-reservation platform. It in no secret in Inner Democratic! circles that Bryan's view is shared by many of tho party leaders, whose loyalty loy-alty to the president cannot be questioned. ques-tioned. When the showdown finally comes on these issues, we shall know, belter than it Is possible to know now, just how firm a hola the president has on the Democratic party. If the Democrats go to tho country with a platform calling for treatv ratification without reservations, it will bo a remarkable demonstration of Wilsonian power, for it will be against the judgment of most of the men who write the platform and a majority of the delegates who adopt it. That Bryan will submit to the con- vention's decision on the treaty, whatever what-ever that decision is, is pretty certain. cer-tain. He may not agree with it but he does not consider it a moral issue and the question" of conscience does not enter. His attitude will be: "I think it is a mistake but I am a Democrat." oo . |