Show Stolen?

On Wednesday evening, Chairman William Edgar Borah of the Senate's potent Foreign Relations Committee had dinner alone with President Hoover. On Thursday Premier Laval arrived from France for White House "discussions." Through an "oversight," Senator Borah's invitation to the White House dinner that night did not arrive until 6:30 p. m. On Friday afternoon the first of the Hoover-Laval discussions got underway. Simultaneously, a dozen agreeably surprised French newspaper correspondents and some 30 U. S. newshawks were ushered into the big meeting room of the Foreign Relations Committee in the Senate Office Building, their request for an interview with Senator Borah having been granted. For the first time, last week the grizzled, truculent, 66-year-old Idahoan permitted his remarks to the Press to be taken down stenographically. Robert Thompson Pell, private factotum to U. S. Ambassador to France Walter Evans Edge and liaison man to Premier Laval, was there to serve as interpreter. This service was necessary only once.

A French Reporter -- Will you give us an accurate idea of the sentiment of the Senate in regard to foreign entanglements, or to be more precise, a guarantee of intervention? . . .

Mr. Borah --Personally, I am not favorable to any intervention of any kind under any circumstances. . . .

A. F. R. -- But with regard to disarmament; you are in favor of disarmament by the Continental countries, such as France. . . .

Mr. Borah -- I expect France to determine for herself how far she can afford to disarm, and I shall not find fault with her judgment. My opinion is that there is not going to be any disarmament by Europe until things are changed considerably. . . .

A. F. R.--In what direction do you think the changes will have to come about before there can be disarmament?

Mr. Borah--To begin with, I think there will have to be some changes in the Versailles Treaty . . . the Polish Corridor, for instance. And there is Hungary. She is divided into five parts and so long as she is divided that way they will keep their division by force of arms. You cannot expect Jugoslavia and Czechoslovakia and Rumania to disarm while a part of the territory they have is in dispute. . . .

A. F. R.--I was wondering what substitution you would suggest to guarantee Poland's access to the sea.

Mr. Borah--I am not sufficiently familiar with the physical conditions there to determine what arrangements could be made. . . .

A. F. R.--Do you think it would satisfy the inhabitants if Hungary were united again? Do you think the Czechs would want to be under Hungarian rule?

Mr. Borah (faltering)--Well, I think it might not be proper; I think there was a condition there, existing prior to that time, which needed consideration. . . . I would change the Polish Corridor if it was [sic] possible to do so; and I would change the situation with reference to Upper Silesia if I could.

A. F. R.--Would you advocate an absolute cancellation of [War] debts and reparations?

Mr. Borah--I would, yes. . . . I think the time is past for moratoriums. . . . We have reached the time when if we are going to relieve the economic situation we shall have to cut, instead of push [debt payments] back a year or two and destroy the credit of every nation against whom it stands. . . . I think we are economically affected by the situation in Europe, and I think we shall have to be interested in it.

A. F. R.--Is there not a direct interdependence between these political problems and economic problems?

Mr. Borah--No. . . . I certainly see a distinct difference. . . . From George Washington's Farewell Address down that has been the teaching of the American people.

That evening all the politicos of Europe wanted to know one thing: Where did Mr. Borah get his brand new explosive opinions? U. S. politicos were not so much at a loss. They understood that the Senator was raised with nine brothers and sisters on an Illinois farm. They knew how--to get away from it all--he studied law and fled to bad Boise in woolly Idaho. In the years since the death of Henry Cabot Lodge, they have beheld how Borah's tongue has grown golden, how he has leaned out and blossomed as Chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, how now he walks in the full stature of a giant of the Senate.

Americans would understand. But in Europe, they do not understand this giant of the Senate, his primitive background, and incalculable idealism. In Europe they believe that all politicians are realists. Non-partisan experts have said for years that debts and reparations should be cancelled, that the Polish Corridor was an invention of the devil, but these honest opinions in the mouth of a politician are for Europe nothing short of deadly weapons of aggression. Warsaw's newssheets shouted "Borah, a German Agent," the mildest adjective that Paris papers found for him was "naive." Intentionally or not Mr. Borah had stolen the show of Laval's visit.

M. Laval himself read Mr. Borah's interview and remarked pointedly that he had come to the U. S. to confer with President Hoover. Next evening, however, the two met at Secretary Stimson's and talked for an hour and a half. Afterward . . .

Said Mr. Borah: "I do not think we were any closer together when we parted than when we started. We talked over everything. . . . We had a delightful conversation."

Said M. Laval: "He made some very sensible remarks on Security."

But Mr. Borah's diplomatic encounters were not yet over. He attended the French Embassy reception in honor of the Premier, and there Ambassador Tytus Filipowicz of Poland seized him by the buttonhole. Mr. Borah is no man to retreat. He repeated his opinions on the Polish Corridor, but added by way of diplomacy that he did not pretend to be completely informed. Ambassador Filipowicz drew himself up in his diplomatic uniform, with all his decorations jangling, and made the retort courteous: "I congratulate you, Senator, on your moral courage--in admitting the incompleteness of your knowledge."

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