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f the American people; how large no one could yet say. But the Congressional elections of 1914 had conveyed a warning to the Democrats. They were left with a majority in both houses, but the huge preponderance obtained in 1912 had disappeared. And the reason was even more alarming than the fact; the Progressive Party almost faded off the map in the election of 1914. Most of the voters who had been Republicans before the Chicago Convention of 1912 were Republicans once again. Of the Progressive Party, there was nothing much left but the leaders, and many of these were obviously thinking of going back to the old home. The Government had already had occasion to protest against British interference with allied commerce when, on February 4, 1915, the Germans proclaimed the waters about the British Isles a war zone open to submarine activities. The President promptly warned the German Government that it would be held to "strict accountability" if American ships were sunk or American lives lost in the submarine campaign. Along with this a message was sent to the British Government protesting against British restriction of neutral commerce. There was good ground for objection to the practices of both Governments, and the simultaneous protests emphasized the neutral attitude of the United States. Not until later was it evident that to the Germans this policy seemed to indicate the possibility of putting pressure on England through America. "Strict accountability" seemed to be a popular watchword, except among pacifists and German sympathizers, but Americans soon began to be killed by the submarines without provoking the Government to action. When the Lusitania was sunk on May 7, 1915, and more than a hundred of the 1,200 victims were Americans a great part of the nation which had been growing steadily more exasperated felt that now the issue must be faced. The President was the personal conductor of the foreign policy of the Administration; Mr. Bryan's sole interest in foreign affairs seemed to be the conclusion of a large number of polite and valueless treaties of arbitration, and it was certain that with Germany, as with Mexico, the President would deal in person. In the few days after the sinking of the Lusitania the nation waited confidently for the President's leadership, and public sentiment was perhaps more nearly unanimous than it had been for eight months past, or was to be again for two years more. The President
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