Republicans: Conservative-Progressive-Liberal

"In the eyes of the world," George Romney told a Cleveland audience last week, the U.S. has become "the practical successor of 19th century white colonialism. Our motives were good, but we fell into the ancient trap of rich and powerful men and nations. We relied too heavily on the material fruits of our progress. Great as our power is, we cannot by ourselves be a police force everywhere."

As a front runner for the 1968 Republican presidential nomination, Michigan's Governor plainly feels that the time has come to grope his way into the unfamiliar arena of foreign policy. His Cleveland speech, with its echoes of Senator William Fulbright's "arrogance of power" theme, was a curious blend of old-fashioned Midwestern isolationism and the liberal's equally irrelevant preoccupation with world opinion. Even on the specific issue of Viet Nam, Romney could only offer tired generalities.

At the Midwest Governors Conference in Cincinnati, he told reporters that President Johnson "made a great mistake by getting involved in a large-scale land war" and that "we are in the process of making a second mistake by making it primarily an American war." He proposed "an honorable settlement" but did not suggest how one could be achieved. In fact, he maintained, "I don't think you can bring the North Vietnamese to the bargaining table by showing them they can't win."

A former officiary of the Mormon church, he was on surer ground moralizing about what he considers the nation's most pressing problem, the disintegration of the American family. "There has been a decline," he told his fellow Governors, "in the faith, belief and principles on which America was built." The solution? "Personal responsibility, family responsibility and private institutional responsibility—and the place to start is in the home."

As Romney likes to say—and he said it again last week in Cincinnati—he is "as conservative as the Constitution, as progressive as Teddy Roosevelt, and as liberal as Mr. Lincoln." He has yet to show unequivocally which Romney is for real.