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About Will Maupin's weekly. (Lincoln, Neb.) 1911-1912 | View Entire Issue (May 12, 1911)
TALKING OF MEN AND THINGS Second Assistant Postmaster General Stewart, testifying; before the congres sional committee investigating the post office department, admitted that faithful and efficient postal clerks had been sum marily dismissed because they dared to exercise their constitutional rights and joined an organization, of postal clerks. In other words the postal clerks Avere discharged for joining a union. 'ODIA.TOS & pajnsKour st oji ji -ifaoiiiaui The object of the organization was similar to that of all trades unions to secure better working condi tions, to be able to assist one another, to prevent unjust discrimination and to safeguard their lives and limbs. The postmaster general issued the order for bidding the clerks to organize. With equal right he could have issued an order forbidding them to join the church of their choice or the fraternal society of their choice. The constitution of the United States declares that the right to petition congress for the redress of griev ances shall never be denied. The post office authorities have denied the em ployes of that department the right to so petition. It is high time that congress take a few haughty postoffice officials by the slack of their official trousers and throw them over the office transoms. There is altogether too much czardom and too little efficiency about the "P. O. D." It is high time that political manipu lators be ampu ted from place and power and the department put upon a business basis. doubly valuable to the municipality. Her reappointment makes Lincoln indebted to the new board. President Gompers of the American Federation of Labor lias issued a call for 15,00,000 for the defense of John J. Mc Namara. There can be but one reason for the raising of such an immense sum for that purpose furnishing an object lesson of the solid front of organized labor. No such sum os needed for the ac tual defense of McNamara. Under no circumstances must organized labor be put in the attitude of trying to secure acquittal by the use of money. It will be sufficient to provide McNamara with the best legal talent that money can secure, and defray the expenses incident to his trial. This will be afforded McNamara, never fear. He. will not be allowed to be come a sacrifice to prejudice and hate. He may not get a square deal in Los Angeles, but the courts of that district are not courts of final resort. His comrades will stand by him until he is either proved guilty beyond a peradventure, or ac quitted. If guilty he will be repudiated by union men everywhere, and he should be. If innocent his fellows will see that he has every opportunity to prove it. The appointment of Ernest Hunger (o be chief of police was a surprise to many. That he will render the city faithful ami efficient service is beyond question. Al though without experience as a member of the police force, he is not unacquainted with that class of work, having been a constable and game warden for many years. He will maintain the discipline so well established by Chief Malone, and may be trusted to inaugurate some re forms that come only with the injection of new blood into such a department. Mayor Armstrong would do a graceful act, and at the same time render a ser vice to the city, by appointing ex-Councilman Mike Bauer to the councilmanic position made vacant by the resignation of Councilman Hardy. Mr. Bauer's ac quaintance with municipal affairs makes him a valuable man to the city. When the work of remodelling the Mayer Bros, store front is completed Lincoln will have something just a 0:1 ahead of anything of the kind in this sec tion of the country, and equal to any thing in store fronts anywhere. A de tailed description of this improvement would be entirely too technical, therefore the lovers of the artistic are advised to view it in person. It will repay a long look. E-Chief of Police Malone is justly en titled to great credit for the work he ac complished while at the head of Lincoln's police force. At no time during the past ten years has the force been adequate. Owing to internal dissensions and politi cal manipulation it was lacking in dis cipline when Malone was made acting chief. He immediately set to work to en force discipline and it was not long un til Lincoln had a police force that looked like a police force, small as it was. Think of a city of 4.5,000 people with seven pa trolmen! But Chief Malone managed to spread it out and get from it better ser vice than forces many times its size are giving cities of Lincoln's size. He won all the compliments that have been paid him for his services as chief, and he re tires with the consciousness of having performed his duty well and faithfully. The new excise board of Lincoln has started off well by retaining the services of Mrs. Dora Doyle as police matron. Mrs. Doyle's experiences and her knack for that sort of work make her services Ex-Mayor Love takes with him into private life the consciousness of having given Lincoln a clean administration. He was unfortunate in that he was com pelled to undertake the task of meeting almost impossible situations. On the one side was an element that demanded that he try to do what no man has ever yet come anywhere near accomplishing, and on the other side was an element that damned him because he tried to do his best in that direction. A man of ad vanced ideas along municipal lines, for he was a close student, lie made the mis take of trying to get too far in advance of public sentiment and experience. In other words, it is the opinion of Will Maupin's Weekly that Mayor Love was impractical in many ways. Yet there is no gainsaying the fact that because of his advanced ideas of municipal government Lincoln is better educated today than it was two years ago, and more likely to move forward along reform lines ad vocated by the retiring mayor. It is Mr. Love's misfortune, if he thinks of con tinuing to take an active interest in po litical affairs, that he lacks about all of the elements of the successful politician. Apart from practical politics this may, after all, be a compliment to the ex-, mayor. As a representative of the city on public occasions Mayor Love was a credit to the municipality, and as chief executive he gave Lincoln the unselfish service of a man who honestly and sin cerely tried at all times to do that which he thought was best for the city and its people. A lot of snobbish papers are slobbering over Queen Alexandria of Great Britain because she has announced that hobble skirts and harem skirts will be taboo at the coronation. That sort of rot gives us a feeling of lassitude in the lumbar re gion. What did people expect of her? Did they imagine that she would an nounce that fleshtights and chiffon clothes and Sappho attire would be on regale at the coronation?. Queen Alex andria impresses us as being a woman of average intelligence who may be trusted to carry herself properly. . But the mere fact that she is a queen does not make her a bit better than a million or two Ameri can women who are equally queens, with a somewhat smaller kingdom over which to reign. As the consort of the head of an imperial government she is entitled 10 recognition and due deference ; as a woman she is no better than a million and more other women right here in this republic and not entitled to a bit more reverence than the good wife of any workingman who is a devoted mother to her children and a helpmate to her hus band. This Democratic uewspaper and we use the big "D" in Democratic, is woefully tired of this "first lady of the land" tommyrot. We want it distinctly understood that the "first lady of the land" does not preside at White House functions, nor does the "first lady of the state" preside over the executive mansion at Fifteenth and H. Splendid women they are, to be sure. But the "first lady of the land," who is also "first lady of the state of Nebraska' presides over a modest little cottage at Thirty-third and Q, and puts in something less than twenty-four hours a day taking care of a big bunch of healthy, frolicsome, hungry kid-