Laredo Weekly Times

A TRIP Of 13,000 MILES

President Taft Will Have Covered This Distance When He Returns From His Tour Of The States.

By United Press.

Washington, Sept. 10.-President Taft intends to keep his fingers on the pulse of the country during his forthcoming 13,000 mile swing across the continent. He is going to confide in the common people, sound them on their views as to possible legislation, and give them chance to learn his views on practically all the governmental problems now confronting the nation.

First of all, the Chief Executive intends discussing the new tariff law. Then the subject of conservation will demand his attention. His secretary of the interior, Richard A. Ballinger, has been accused of letting the Roosevelt policy of conservation of natural resources go by the board, and the question is a big one throughout the West.

The President expects to talk a good deal regarding corporations, and just what regulative measures he proposes to recommend. He will discuss statehood for Arizona and New Mexico. He expects to tell something of his ideas as to the possibilities of the South in politics, and the value of Southern sentiment.

Then it is likely that he will devote a number of speeches to outlining the Administration's policy relative to army and navy and coast defenses.

President Taft has never ceased to believe that it was his frankness during the past campaign in discussing his labor record and the decisions he made in such cases when on the bench, that contributed in a large measure to his success at the polls.

He is wedded to the notion that the best way to treat the people is to take them into his confidence and tell them without subterfuge just where he stands.

There has been a number of senators and representatives-particularly those from certain sections of the West-who have done their best to dissuade President Taft from mentioning that bugaboo, the tariff. That ill-advised measure he signed on August 5 wasn't particularly popular. The President has tersely remarked to these well-meaning advisers that he wasn't in the habit of dodging subjects. On the other hand, it is by explaining the tariff bill and its whys and wherefores that he hopes to mollify the disgruntled.

That the Chief Executive will have plenty of ammunition relating to the changes he wants to see made in the present laws in order to give the Government greater control and regulation of corporations, is assured, since his "law commission" Attorney General Wickersham, Secretary Nagel, Chairman Knapp of the Interstate Commerce Commission, Rep. Mann, of the Interstate Commerce Committee of the House, and these very matters just prior to his start.

The President will tell the people of Arizona and New Mexico that the next session of Congress will fulfill the pledge of the Republican party and grant them separate statehood. He will do some powerful political evangelizing through the South. He will outline his plans for bettering the defenses of the Coast-a subject that vastly interests the people of the Pacific slope. He is expected greatly to further diplomatic relations between this country and Mexico when he meets President Diaz at El Paso.

A strong bond already holds the two republics together in their assumption of a "moral protectorate" over the Central American republics.

But above all, the President will get close to the people. He wants to keep his ear to the ground. His tour of speech-making will be all the more notable because it will be the first instance in history where a chief executive has frankly dissected his aims and ideas at the very beginning of his term of office.