ABSTRACT
Until the returns came in from California, it was generally assumed that Hughes had been elected President of the United States. David Lloyd George was just about to become Prime Minister of Great Britain. Eighteen million men and women voted in the election. They were certain to divide more or less evenly. No one in his senses ever supposed there would be a difference of two million votes between the candidates. The less popular was sure to poll many more votes than there were human beings in the United States when the nation was founded. And yet prominent Republican newspapers and ex-Presidents talked for months as if Americanism and national honor could be won or lost in a few pivotal states. It is a sign of political immaturity to treat a nation as if it were an individual with a conscience, a sense of honor, a single financial interest, a single head, a single heart, and a single life.
