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The Commoner.
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THE COMMONER, Lincoln, Neb.
Mr. Cleveland's victory maker was evidently
out o commission In 1894.
Mr. Parry's union to fight unionism seems
to havo sustalnod a fow punctures.
1
Perhaps by this timo Professor Triggs has ele
vated his esliinato of Shakespeare.
Tho Umo for holding primaries and conven
tions is at hand. Put none hut loyal democrats on
guard I
Secretary Shaw is advising the hoys to stick
to tho farm. Tho trusts Insist on having some
body to gouge.
A Tronton, N. J., man has not slept for ten
yoarB, say his physicians. Ho should movo out o
tho mosquito bolt.
Tho descent of tho republican party Is well
Illustrated by events in Ohio. From a Thurman
to a Dick is a far cry.
The spectacle of Mr. Parry's non-union work
men organizing a strike is calculated to create
considerable amusement in union labor clrclos.
Tho Japaneso havo thus far escaped one sad
affliction. Alfred Austin has not yet attempted
to' manufacture any verses about them.
Wall street's pretended opposition will novo
entirely disappeared by tho tlmo tho gentleman
with the g. o. p fryingpan starts on his rounds.
It will bo noticed that tho papers that claim
Abraham Lincoln as thoir patron saint devote
much less spaco to what Lincoln said than they
do to what Grovor Cleveland says.
Congressman Burton is earning the gratitude
of a heavily taxed people by his opposition to tho
overgrvn naval appropriations, oven if ho docB
sccuro mo opposition of tho contractors.
It is hinted that congress will adjourn early
without doing anything This is not surprising
Tho present congress was elected for tho purpose
of lotting the trusts "do" everything and everybody.
If he undertakes to bust the trusts he will
'havo no campaign fund, and if he does not un
dertake tho task ho will lose the support of trust
victims. Mr. Roosevelt should try this on his
pianola.
The New York "World carries at the head of
Its editorial column dally the market quotation of
tho bullion in a silver dollar. Tho peicentage con
tinues to bo considerably higher than tho pci
cohtago of democracy In the World's political
claims.
; - Secretary Wilson, after long and patient in
vestigation, has discovered that tho poople are be
ing robbed by tho meat trust. Secretary Wilson
,wlll now proceed to study along lines that will
reveal to him: the . astounding fact that 2 plus 2
equals 4.
The Commoner.
It will bo a bravo man who attempts to read
aloud to his neighbors the war reports from tho
Orient
There are many indications that Mr. James
H. Eckles of Illinois is taking himself entirely too
seriously.
Poet Laureate Austin's war poem is very
much on tho "sucking dove" order, but even at
that it gives war a close chase for horror.
Tho report that the Delaware peach crop has
been frosted is an indication that Mr. "Gas" Ad
dicks may be expected soon to warm things up.
The man who would hive tho democracy out
bid tho republicans for trust support is not a
safe man to put on guard in tho democratic camp.
The men who pose as democrats, but who
have been supporting republican policies and can
didates for eight years, snould not feel offended
if requested by loyal democrats to show their
papers.
The making of the democratic platform of 1204
will hardly bo entrusted into the nands of the
men who found more in the republican platforms
of 1896 and 1900 to support than they found in
tho democratic platforms of those years.
The Boston Herald says that Puck was tho
first financially successful illustrated comic paper
published in tho United States. A man must be
very old to remember tho time when Puck was
comic. Or, perhaps Puck issues two editions.
In one of tho counties of Illinois in which
Hopkins is in control of the democratic organiza
tion the committee issued a call for a mass con
vention to select delegates to tho state conven
tion. When, however, tho committee saw that it
was not a Hopkins crowd it retired to an adjoin
ing room and attempted to select delegates with
out consulting tho assembled voters. Of couise,
the mass convention went ahead under the call
and solected delegates and instructed them, but
what shall bo said of a committee which repu
diated its own call in order to carry out the
wishes of Mr. Hopkins? This is a specimen of the
politics which we can expect everywhere if the
sreorganizers take charge of the party.
Secretary Loeb is not yet too old to learn a
few things, if reports are roliable, and they seem
m- i k be' Tno other day Secretary
w Si u wGH,,cal!ed up th0 edit0r "
Has Much Washington Post and demand
to Learn. ed the dismissal of Miss Wade
, 1 , BOciety edItor of the Post- 'he
demand was made on the ground that Miss Wade
had refused to stand in a corner at a Residen
tial reception the command being issued by an
wlZ rner,Secretary Loeb's direction. Miss
Wade said sho was present by invitation nmi
would mingle with the other guests ThG mi w
asked Loeb to explain bis reason for the demand
and Loeb replied over the 'phonef "ComTSn
here and I will tell you all about it." To th,s
!hn,flt0Veplied: "My offlco iA the Post
building; if you want to see me you can rS
down here." Miss Wade is BmS&mcSm
Post, but she does not visit the White houSP
The newspaper correspondents alcte with M?
"Wade, and declare that the president's Tsecetlrv
22 for a ZS
A Sanitary orebeni0 breald b7
Problem SAfi V
In Panama expended in improving t?8
tion through whlchtfcLrr0"5 ' 'ffi sec!
route is through mos VZT' The ca
western hemisphere d Sft tly R of the
made but a small begtSninfnn fi tho Preut
sands of lives wero S ? the work thou
Clmgres fever and the poisonous JS thG deadly
isthmus. Of the flffrnn s miasmas of the
and clerks taken to Manama ZT' aSSlstants
four died within three Sh a Lesseps' fifty
appointed to investigatrcondiHnlnaVal 8uiec
a shocking condition0
VOLUME 4, NUMBER ,
that the surgeon general of the navy refuses to
havo the report made public. The .refusal of the
president to accept the alternative canal propo
sition, anrl his determination to forco his own
plan upon the government, will result in a vastly
increased cost and in the sacrifice of many lives
Merely
a Question
of Politics.
For some time past northern newspapers
have been devoting considerable space to denun
ciations of what they under
stood to bo the position of Gov
ernor Vardamann of Mississip
pi upon the race question. Theso
newspapers experienced diffi
culty in finding words to convey their detesta
tion of what they conceived to be Vordamann's
position, and they practically accused bim of be
ing ready to condone lynching in any of its hor
rid forms, providing the victim had a black skin.
But In this case, as in nearly all cases wherein
northern newspapers undertake to discuss tho
race question, they were mistaken, and some of
them are fair enough to admit it. Governor
Vardamann recently intervened and saved from
lynching a negro charged with a nameless crime,
and tho negro will be tried by jury. The Com
moner has said, and now repeats, that what repub
lican newspapers call the "race problem" is with
them merely a question of petty politics.
Those -who express righteous indignation at
what they term a growing contempt for the courts
should busy themselves in tho
Why Contempt work of making the courts
of Court more entitled to respect. In
is Growing. vew many court actions and
decisions the masses are not to
be censured for believing that justice receives lit
tle consideration in many cases. The case of
ex-Mayor Ames of Minneapolis is one in point.
Ames was tried and convicted of accepting boodle
from a fund raised for the purpose of corrupting
public officials. The Minnesota supreme court,
however, overruled the lower court and released
Ames, deciding that he did not receive thf boodle
from a fund, but from individuals. If there is
a growing contempt for the courts, that growth
will be hastened by decisions of that kind.
Congressman Lucius N. Littauer of-New York
has been renominated. It will be remembered
that Littauer was accused of
congressmen breaking che law by sharing in
by government contracts, but es-
Llmitatlon. caped through the intervention
of the statute of limitations.
Only a short time before Littauer was accused,
the president spoke of him as "one of my dearest
friends." But the convontion which renominated
Littauer refused to indorse Roosevelt. This may
have been duo to tho tact that the president did
not intervene to prevent investigation of that
famous glove contract. But oven this should not
nave sufficed to make the convention overlook in
dorsement. The president may have been aware
of the fact that tho statute of limitations would
suffice to keep Mr. Littauer out of trouble.
m, ?ew York EvninS Post is of the opinion
tnat the halo the president threw at Postmaster
General Payne will act as a
Boomemnu "boomerang halo" and return
. Hallos to shine above his owu head.
For Pixyne. There Is reason for the' Post's
view of the matter. Tne pres
ident has written a letter complimenting the post
master general for having diligently prosecuted
the men charged with corruption in the postal
department, but the letter sounds very much
Pickwickian when one considers that it was ad
dressed to a man who denounced the charges of
corruption as "hot air" ar.d who replied to the
correspondents who asked him what he had to
say about the charges, "Say that the postmaster
general just laughed."
wy
An American steel rail mill has just con
tracted to deliver to the Canadian Pacific railroad
nut 1 40,000 tons of steel rails at
uillcing $21.25 per ton. The price to
the Home domestic railroads at the mill
Consumer. Is ?28 Pr ton. A reasonable al
, lowance.for the cost of delivery
at Montreal makes the price to the Canadian Pa-
i tt at tho mill or $1 Per ton less tnan
tho United States consumer has to pay on ac
count of the tariff which protects the "steel In
fant." Tho homo consumer is held up for 55
per cent more than the foreign consumer bj tue
aid of the tariff. This fs only a fair sample of
the manner in which tho tariff works to bulwark
tho trusts and rob the people.
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