CURT COMMENT OF THE TIMES
Right after our matutinal meal lawst
evening', doncher yer know, we perched our
editorial corporosity in front of the type
writing machine, determined to write a red
hot and moving editorial declaring for the
municipal ownership of the street railway
system of Lincoln. But, just as the edi
torial thinkery began working it dug up
from the recesses of memory the facts about
the horrible botch the city government made
of the ornamental street lighting proposition
and the editorial demand for the munici
palization of the street railway system is as
yet unwritten. If the city owned the street
railway system, and went about its manage
ment with the thickheadness that has char
acterized its management of that ornamental
.lighting stunt, we wouldn't have any more
street railway facilities than Belochistan in
about six months.
' But this is not an argument against the
municipalization of public utilities; it is
merely a forceful argument in favor of se
lecting good, levelheaded business men as
managers of city affairs, instead of electing
politicians and dreamers of strange dreams.
Those ornamental street lights would have
been shedding their rays along O street long
ago if a private corporation had taken the
contract to erect and turn over all rea
Ifor turning on the current. Although the
poles and fixtures have been in place for
Svceks, the city has not turned a hand to put
ithem into operation. And when it does be
!gin it will take months to complete the work
that the Tratcion company offers to com
plete in a week or ten days. President
;Sharp of the Traction company has made
jthe city a fair and reasonable offer pertain
iing to lighting those lamps, and common
sense demands that the offer be accepted.
I
I
We greatly fear that the esteemed Star
iis endeavoring to measure men according to
Jthe wrong standard of measurment. The
"iman who have exerted the best influence up
on their generation have not been the men
who made big piles of money and then gave
liberally to quasi-public enterprises. We
never heard that Wendell Phillips and
Owen Lovejoy gave largely to public en
terprises,' but we fail to recall two men of
their time who exerted better influence upon
their generation than they. And for all of
their big gifts to universities and libraries
and peace funds and missionary funds we
are not quite ready to agree that Rockefeller
and Carnegie are exemplary citizens. As
for Will Maupin's Weekly, it is of the opin
ion that men like Edwin Jeary, who give
liberally to the support of such institutions
as the First Christian church of Lincoln, are
of quite as much service to the community
as men who give with equal liberality to such
splendid public enterprises as a Commercial
club building. And, too, this humble little
newspaper that is trying to shed sweetness
and light everywhere within the confines of
Nebraska, believes that men like Howard
and Condra and Burnett, who are leaving
their impress for good upon the minds of
the young men and young women, are of
quite as much value to the state as the men
who are building tall buildings. Let's be
fair in this little controversy over the excise
question. And above all, let us keep sweet!
The Beatrice Creamery Co. has just per
formed a splendid service to Lincoln by
erecting a mammoth and expensive manu
facturing plant and warehouse. It gave em
ployment to scores of mechanics in the con
struction of its big building, and it added
much to the communal value of property.
Because of its enterprise and public spirit
we will now proceed to fine the Beatrice
Creamery Co. about $3,500 or $4,000 a year
as long as it continues in business.
spend a few minutes in wondering how it
came that any Missouri constituency could
prefer the mediocre Treloar to the brilliant
Clark, even for a minute.
What? The supreme court of the United
States coming across with a decision that
is not a 5 or 4 affair! Doesn't seem pos
sible, does it? Yet it is the unexpected that
happens. By unanimous vote the court has
upheld the valdity of the corporation tax
law. Whether this is an evidence of grow
ing senility or returning reason this news
paper is unable to state. But it is gratify
ing to know that the court of ultimate con
jecture can agree upon something.
"Girls are not much given to considering
that question when they marry?" replied
the wife asking for a divorce when asked
why she married a man who had such small
fear of hard work that he would gladly lie
down by the side of it and go to sleep.
Why don't they? Ask the foolish and neg
ligent mothers who should have many heart-to-heart
talks with their daughters instead
of allowing them to keep indiscriminate
company with young men. How many
mothers of today ever sit down with their
daughters who are just budding into wom
anhood and talk to them seriously and plain
ly upon questions that every girl should be
Informed upon? And how many fathers
of boys just crossing the line from youth in
to manhood ever take their boys off into a
quiet corner and "talk turkey" to them?
The school in which boys learn these things
nowadays merely graduates them into rakes
andjdissolutes ; the schools in which young
women learn these things too often grad
uates them into "grass widows" or flip
young things that no soberminded young
man would think of choosing as a helpmate.
Just as soon as Will Maupin's Weekly can
frame up some scheme whereby it can get
it past some shallowpated postoffice official
it Is. 'going to write so plainly about some
of these things that prudes will throw up
their hands in horror and shriek a blamed
sight louder than Freedom did when
Kosiusco fell.
On next Monday evening a" lot of demo
crats who have been holding a wake over
the political remains of the oft-killed Wil
liam Jennings Bryan are going to foregath
er at the Auditorium in Lincoln and howl
themselves hoarse when the corpse throws
aside its cerements and arises to make a
few remarks. It does beat all how dead
that gentlemen will not stay.
Of course a lot of the Bryan denouncers
will avow and aver that they are going sole
ly for the purpose of hearing the irrespres
sible and irresistible Champ Clark, and
have prepared themselves for the affliction
of a Bryan speech. But, just the same, be
fore Bryan has been orating seventeen sec
onds those same gentlemen are going to
be up on their rear underpinning and yell
ing themselves hoarse. We've seen this
happen so many times in days gone by that
we are willing to stake our reputation as a
seer and sage upon the foregoing prophecy.
A few years ago a gentleman named Tre
loar addressed the Young Men's Republi
can club of Lincoln. Mr. Treloar is the
gentleman who defeated Champ Clark for
congress in the big slump of 1894. Mon
day night the members of that club should
go and listen to Champ Clark, and then
A lot of good measures are bound to die
an untimely death by reason of not having
been reached when the legislature adjourns.'
Something like 1,700 bills have been intro
duced in both house and senate. Some of
them are excellent measures; more are good
measures, and still more are vain and im
possible. But we'll continue to have the
bill without merit until we are able to de
vise some method of compelling every
member of the legislature to remain on duty
until the whole list is thrashed over. It
might be a good idea to limit the number
of bills a member may introduce.
A man may be engaged in business for
himself and making money, but possessing
less than $500 worth of property. He is
secure against gaarnishee proceedings. A
mechanic struggling against adverse fate,
possessing nothing but his meagre wages
and owning but a few dollars' worth of
household goods. Although his wife and
babies may be dependent upon his weekly
wage for bread and butter, those wages may
be garnisheed and the family deprived of
creature comforts. That is the present leg
islature's idea of justice and equity.
A number of Lincoln women have peti
tioned for the passage of the Hatfield anti
hatpin bill. Sure! But we move to amend
by prohibiting the wearing of a bale or two
of jute upon the feminine caput, and the
heinous crime of pining a lot of animated
weinerwursts " in geometrical designs upon
the outer surface of said jute piles. Gee, if
a woman's hair naturally grew the way she
fixes it with infinite pain and discomfort
she'd make the barber business a better
snap that a license to rob banks.
We read in the public prints that a firm
is about to erect a forty-story building in
Seattle. We presume this includes the
twenty-two or twenty-three stories some
would call them by a shorter and uglier
name told by the promotors.
Excuse a word personal: Will Maupin's
Weekly is receiving many words of praise
from men who know a good thing when they
see it. A great deal of its cheerful com
ment is being quoted by leading newspa
pers, and as a result subscriptions are com
ing in from all quarters. Just as soon as a
people weary of predigested editorials,
isterlized comment and scandalmongering
news columns get wise to the fact that
there is a newspaper to be had that looks on
life cheerfully and through rose colored
glasses, unbiased and unafraid, they'll make
the subscription list of Will Maupin's
Weekly look like a roll call of the nation's
wisest and most discriminating citizens. A
dollar a year fifty-two consecutive week
ly does of optimism, sunshine and good
cheer. The dollar will be devoted to the
maintenance of a poor family we know
about, consisting of one wife and six chil
dren, dependent for support upon one poor,
weak man. Never put off until tomorrow
something that you should have done sev
eral weeks ago. If you live outside of Lin
coln we'll cheerfully pay exchange on your
personal checks. We're actually foolish on
this matter of being accomodating and
obilging.