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(TANUABY 6, 1905
The Commoner.
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GOVERNOR CUMMINS of Iowa expresses tlio
opinion that the scheme which Senator El
guns has planned out for the establishment of a court
to exercise jurisdiction over questions arising over
the interstate commerce act will not provide the
-people with relief. A railroad publication known as
"Freight" and published in New York city, re
cently asked Governor Cummins xor his opinion on
the Blkin3 measure. In his reply the governor
Bays that he favors the plan outlined in Mr. Roose
velt's message, which ho thinks will, if adopted,
provide relief promptly. The governor adds:
"The bill which, accora.ng to newspaper report, is
to bo brought forward by Senator Elkins, estab
lishing a circuit court of interstate commerce to
take jurisdiction of all matters arising under tne
interstate commerce act, would, in my opinion fur
nish no practical relief for the evils of excessive
and discriminating rates. The examinaton of a
freight rate in a court hampered by all the"" rules
which regulate the introduction of evidence, ac
companied by the delays which are common in
such tribunals, attended with the cost which ia
Incident to technical litigation, and followed by
no effective result until the supremo cottrt of the
Unted States is reached, will afford no remedy to
the business interests of the country. To estab
lish such a court for the original hearing of com
plaints as an answer to the demand which the
people are now making is to keep the promise to
the ear and break it to the hope."
ACCORDING to newspaper dispatches, some en
terprising person has originated a plan for
the collection of the repudiated bonds of
certain southern states. According to these dis
patches, these repudiated bonds are being secured
by' brokers and tho plan is to 1 spose of them in
northern states at a profit. It is held that the
' nortbe-rn states can issue and collect while both
the states and the brokers make good profits. The
Ihitdd States supiemo court, in the case of South
Dakota vs. North Carolina, held that because
South Dakota had accepted a bona fide gift df
North Carolina bonds, that South Dakota was en
titled to recover, although the former individual
owners f thy bauds woulti have no power to sue
North Carolina. It is said that the state of Louis
iana has $32,000,000 of this indebtedness while
Mississippi has ?22,000,000. The Chicago Record
Herald says that the total debt that has been "re
pudiated" by nine southern states is estimated at
more than 5280.000,000; while accrued interest
would double the amumt
RECEisTLY Senator Foster said that great
care should be exercised in framing arbitra
tion treaties made with other countries, in order
that those treaties contain no provisions which
may be interpreted to mean the payment of fraud
ulent reconstruction debts of the southern states.
Approving the Foster note of warning, tho New
Orleans Times Democrat says: "Republicans join
with democrats in denouncing these debts, and de
claring that the question at to responsibility for
them must not and can not be considered by any
arbitration tribunal. No one wants to enforce
the payment of these infernal debts," says Sena
tor Cullom; and his view of the situation is ac
cepted by nearly au the prominent republicans in
cong re3S. 'There is nothing in the objection raised,'
he continues, and a number of lawyers join in de
claring that these debts can not be arbitrated.
The treaties -we make with foreign powers spe
cify the cases in which arbitration should prevail;
and if the debt of any American state were brought
before the arbitration tribunal, we would have a
right to object to its consideration. We aro
further told that tho senate is very careful in
adopting any treaues and will leave no loophole by
which the holders of the fraudulent or repudiated
bonds 'may present their . claims against any
American state."
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THE' United States supreme court, speaking
through Justice Day, has held that an allow
ance to a wife and children is not in the nature of
an ordinary debt and therefore can not be dis
charged in bankruptcy. In his opinion Justice
Day says: "The bankruptcy law should receive
such an interpretation as will effectuate Its bone
ficont purposes and not mako it an Instrument to
deprivo dependent wife and children of tho sup
port and maintenance duo thorn from tho husband
and fathor, which It has ever been tho purpose of
the law to enforco. Systems of bankruptcy aro
designed to relievo tho honest debtor from tho
weight of Indebtedness which has become oppres- -sivo
and to permit him to havo a fresh start in
business or commercial life, freed from tho orig
inal obligations and responsibilities which may
havo resulted from business misfortunes." "In
other words," says tho Atlanta Constitution, "tho
distinction Is clearly drawn between tho obliga
tions and responsibilities arising from business
misfortunes and that high obligation to wife and
children represented by alimony. Tho court un
doubtedly does the just and right thing in draw
ing that distinction."
CHRISTMAS Day of 1904, according to news
paper dispatches, was not all "peace on
earth, good will to men." Tho Now York World
has compiled from newspaper dispatches an in
teresting showing: Gen. Nogi's right wing ad
vanced and captured new flanking position at
the northwest of Port Arthur after hard fighting.
A hotel-runner thoughtlessly turned tho signal
lights at Brown Crossing, and there was a collision
at Mount Carmel, 111., which cost seven lives. Judge
Noye3 of Plaistow, Mass., was called from church,
where he was singing In tho choir, to preside at
the arraignment of twenty-two men arrested at
a chicken fight. A crowd returning from midnight
mass at Plainfleld. N. J., tried to lynch four ne
groes who had fatally stabbed two policemen and
wounded a third. A five-year-old girl in New York
accidentally killed her baby brother by giving him
carbolic acid and camphor by mistake for soda
water. Frederick Fredericks of Brooklyn was fa
tally stabbed by an unknown man for resenting.,
an insult offered to a young woman companion.
Two men were killed and another fatally Injured
in a collision between ice boats on Onondaga
lake. Two persons were suffocated to death and
three others seriously injured in a tenement house
fire on Allen street.
TO AVOID a collision with a trolley car the
driver of a fire-engine raced his. horses along
a crowded sidewalk. Nobody was hurt. Two
Italians fought a duel in We3t Farms square In
the midst of a crowd of pedestrians. One of tho
principals was mortally wounded, and the other
then tried to shoot a policeman. A crowd of
Italians in One Hundred and Ninth street assailed
policemen who were making arrests and the po
lice had to draw their revolvers to protect them
selves. A prominent democratic politician of
Brooklyn was assaulted and robbed by three
negroes. Mrs. Mary E. West of East New York
fell dead while trimming a Christmas tree. Some
body exploded a dynamite bomb In a three-story
tenement house on Third avenue. Christian Law
rence was knocked down and fatally injured on
Broadway by a runaway horse. A young woman
companion was painfully bruised. A Brooklyn
boy died from hemorrhage of the nose after ar
ranging a Christmas celebration. During a fight
with the city marshal a young man at Black
shear Ga., killed his father. A freight elevator
operator. att Sherry's fell to tho bottom of tho
shaft and was killed. A socialist leader at Paw
tucket was found dead on the railroad track. A
Baltimore man was seriously wounded by a negro
burglar who entered his daughter's bedroom. Two
men held up a passenger train near Valley Springs,
S Dak., shot the cars full of hole3 and made the
passengers dance jigs In the aisle3.
THE total vote for president In the late elec
tion was 13,508,496. The New York World,
which seems just now to have a weakness for
election figures, says: "This was 400,078 less than
the vote in 1900. notwithstanding an estimated In
crease of nearly 7,000,000 in population and of
1 400 000 in eligible voters. What should the total
vot 'have been in November had the interest of
citizens in the result been profound and their
Preferences between tho candidates sharply de
fied ? The fullest vote in proportion to popula
tion over cast In a presidential election wan In
189G, when tho ratio was 1 to 5. By this ratio tho
voto In November would havo boon 16,000,000.
Tho voto actually pollod was 3,092,000 Rhort of this,
DR. LYMAN ABBOTT rocontly delivered an
address beforo tho Harvard students and his
statements on that occasion have created a
commotion in ecclesiastical circlos. Dr. Abbott is
being eovcrely criticised by many clorgyraon and
Yet ho is not without nrdont supporters. Tho Now
York b'un contributes to tho discuaalon an Inter
esting parallel column. Tho Sun takes from Dr.
Abbott's address this extract: "Tho Ton Com
mandments did not spring spontaneously from
Moses, but were, like all laws, a gradual growth,
and that man is a creature of ovolutlon, not a
creation. I beliovo in a God Who Is in and
through and of overythlng not an absentee God,
whom we havo to reach through a Blblo or a
priest or somo other outsido aid, but a God who Is
closer to us than hands or feet. There is only ono
energy. That energy has always been working, it
in an Intelligent energy. No sciontlst can dony it.
My God is a great and cvor-prcaent force, which
is manifest In all tho activities of man and all tho
workings of nature" Then the S'un compares tho
Abbott remarks with the following declarations
mado by Tom Paino: "Tho Commandments carry
no internal evidence of divinity with them; they
contain somo good moral precepts, such as any
man qualified to bo a lawgiver, or a legislator,
could produce himself, without having recourse to
supernatural intervention. In fine, do wo want
to know what God is? Search not tho book called
the Scripturo, which any human hand might
mako, but tho Scripturo called tho Creation. Tho
only Idea man can affix to tho namo of God is
that of a first cause of all things. Do wo want to
contemplate His power? Wo seo It In tho immen
sity of the Creation. Do wo want to contemplato
His wisdom? Wo seo It in tho unchangeable or
der by which tho incomprehensible whole is gov
erned." THOSE who Imagine that tho republican con
gress may be depended upon to provide tho
people with protection from corporation imposi
tion will do well to read a telegram sent to the Now
York Press, a republican paper, by Its Washington
correspondent. That correspondent says; "Va
rious Wall street Interests havo been 'assured' from
here than the recommendations mado In President
Roosevelt's message should not be regarded too
seriously, because there Is no possibility, In tho
opinion of these Congress lobbyists, that legisla
tion such as recommended will bo enacted. They
seek, in other words, t bolster up the stock mar
ket, with the assurance that they will "take care"
of all legislation looking to tho federal control of
railroad traffic rates, or to Federal espionage over
tho great insurance corporations of the country,
or to strengthening the anti-trust laws. A finan
cial expert sent out the following from here to
day: 'The financial world has been assured that
there shall be no legislation along tho lines rec
ommended In tho President's message relating to
tho regulation of railroad rates. This assurance
has been given in ample time to protect tho mar
ket, and it Is claimed that Washington should not
bo held responsible for the crash which Wall"
Btreet is experiencing.'"
THERE are now said to be only 1333 American
buffalo in existence. The various herds
with the number of each are given Jy tho
Kansas City Journal as follows: "Pablo-AHard,
etc, herd, on Flathead Indian reservation, Mon
tana, 330; running wild, west of Great Slave lake,
200; in the Austin Corbln park, New Hampshire,
160; herd of James Philip, Fort Pierre, S', D., 90;
herd of Charles Goodnight, Goodnight, Tex., 50;
in Banff Rocky Mountain park, Canada, 45; in
Yellowstone park (inclosed), 40; in Bronx park,
New York, 32; in Yellowstone park (running wild),
30; herd of Jphn E. Dooley, Utah, 30; herd of G.
W. Llllle (Pawnee Bill), Oklahoma, 28; herd of
Lincoln park, Chicago, 20; herd of Burgess & Han
son, Luana, Iowa, 20; herd, of J. J. Hill, Cardigan,
Minn., 18; in the Cincinnati Zoological park, 16;
herd of C. J. Lenander, Bancroft, Iowa 10i i
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