I don't know that the President could have done differently--unless, before he sent the _Lusitania_ notes, he had called Congress together and submitted his notes to Congress.

But, as the matter stands, the Germans are merely encouraged to blow up factories and practically to carry on war in the United States, because they know we can (or will) do nothing.

Mere notes break nobody's skin.
We don't seem to have any machinery to bring any influence to bear on foreign governments or on foreign opinion; and, this being so, it is little wonder that the rest of the world does not follow our republican example.
And this sort of impotence in influence has curious effects at home.

For example, the ship-purchase bill, as it was at the last session of Congress, was an economic crime.

See what has happened: We have waked up to the fact that we must have a big navy.