Image provided by: University of Nebraska-Lincoln Libraries, Lincoln, NE
About The commoner. (Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-1923 | View Entire Issue (Nov. 3, 1905)
i- m , - -w-rt--rwt if?v The Commoner. 'i ' .VOLUME 5, NUMBER 4a p. , &. I ! i IK . 1 ki'-' tf f l,f- 1 Bh I i s V . RHtR 4 ;$ ISSUED WEEKLY The Commoner A BANKER "SPEAKS OUT IN MEETING', loiow is the truth. There have h?n mmn , , wrongs committed by the corporations hi S al eralities will do no good in deaUne Si?h i.gett' What we want to do is to think disciimit about'these things. What we g Entered at the postofllec at Llocoln, Nebraska, as second class mull mutter. One Yea $1.00 Six Months 50o In Clubs of 5 or more por Year 75o Three Months ...25o Single Copy....- 5o Sample Copies Froo Foreign Postage 52o Ex tra. SUBSCRIPTIONS can bo sent direct to The Com moner. Thoy can also be sent through newspapers which have advertised a clubbing rato, or through local agents, whero sub-agents have con appointed, ah remittances should bo Bent by postolllco money order, express order, or by bank draft on Now York or Chicago. Do not send Individual checks, stamps or mR!NEWALS.-Tho date on yr wrapper JSJX.8 when your subscription will expire. 1 bus, Jan. . Jj meant that payment has been received to and Includ ing tho last issuo'of January, 1006. Two weeks are required after money has been received before mo date on wrapper can bo changed. CHANGE OF ADDRESS. Subscribers requesting a change of address must givo OLD as well as tho NkW address. .. ADVERTISING rates furnished upon application. Address all communications to THE COMMONER. Lincoln, Nob MR. BRYAN'S LETTERS Mr. Bryan took passage on the Pacific Mail steamship Manchuria, which sailed from San Francisco September 27. He will go to Japan via Honolulu. After a few weeks in Japan 'he will proceed to China, the Philippine Islands, India, Australia, New Zea land, Egypt, Palestine, Greece, Turkey, Italy, Spain, Switzerland, Germany, France, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Russia, Holland and the Brit ish Isles. L The trip will occupy about one year, and the readers of The Commoner will be able to follow Mr. Bryan from the letters which will be pub lished in The Commoner from time to time. ..k How can the voters of Ohio expect a "square deal" from the "phoney box'! in the hands of Senator Foraker? It is all right that Senator Foraker should dissemble his love, but why should he kick rail road regulation down stairs? By the wayk all of us have heard of Poe, but who are some of those people who have been admitted to the Hall of Fame? Every time Mr. Foraker happens to think about "Bryanismr' he makes that fire alarm sound like an overworked electric gong. . President McCall says ho believes his duty has been well done. At any rate the' policyhold ers will admit that they have been well done. Tho kind of freight regulat.on Senator For aker favors is the regulation that will permit the railroads to squeeze every dollar tho traffic will bear. An oil tank steamer on the Atlantic was saved by .ar -wireless -telegram. A great many oil schemes have been saved by using political wires. ' The wonder is not that Oregon has sentenced a-congressman to jail, but that about forty-four other states haven't done the same thing several limes. Mr. Joseph Benson Foraker seems to be supporting the president's railway regulation plan just like Sampson supported the pillars of the temple. Perhaps the president instructed his cabinet officers not to talk about public matters so that he might have a "scoop" every day while on "his southern tour. - Mr. James Hazen Hyde says he is now ready to tell all he knows about the life insurance business.. Mr. Hyde will please take the stand for about three seconds. President Roosevelt says he hopes that in time public officials will be authorized to exam ine tho books of railroad companies with the same power that is now exercised by the na- Tho Nebraska Bankers' association met at Lincoln October 24. Secretary of the Treasury Shaw, Charles G. Dawes, JEormer comptroller of the currency, and now president of the Central Trust company of Chicago, and other disting uished gontlemen addressed the gathering. Unquestionably the most Interesting address was delivered by C. M. Brown, president of the First National bank at Cambridge, Neb. Mr. Brown's plain, unequivocal talk brought out heated criticisms from Mr. Dawes, and the re sult was, perhaps, tho most interesting joint de bate that has ever taken place at a bankers' meeting. Mr. Brown severely arraigned the trusts and other dishonest corporations for corruption and avarice. He said that the bankers as a class wero requirod to suffer in the public judgment from those evils. According to, Mr. Brown, there seems to be a "pervading suspicion that there is some subtle power,N the result of mutual in terests, which binds the whole fraternity to gether." Mr. Brown said that the bankers were largely to blame for this impression, for the rea son that they have "always been content to stand as the apologists for all the crimes committed in the name of wealth." Denouncing the trusts and the schemes of the "frenzied financiers" he said that it was the duty of the -bankers to cor rect public opinion concerning themselves as a class by manifesting an interest in the welfare of the people in general; that bankers should discharge the duties of citizenship "as honestly and fearlessly as they discharged the duties of their daily avocation." Mr. Brown advocated federal control of corporations, and the regula tion of railroads as an alternative to government ownership. He also favored laws prohibiting public officials from receiving honors from cor porations, and said that a direct primary law was necessary. Mr. Dawes took exception to Mr. Brown's remarks. He said that he deeply regretted what he called the "miasmic pessimism" of the second speaker, and he added: "What we need in the solution of this great question of the trusts is clear thinking, right thinking. It is not a question to be dealt Willi by the scheming politician seeking to make po litical capital out of the popular ery against trusts, nor by the political platform writer, nor by the dealer in platitudes but it Is a problem, for the clear headed business men of the country. "To hell with platitudes. What we want to re- Mr. Dawes referred to the agitation for a cltisen of Linco.n, and he LeaS? S'oS the sentiments expressed bv Bankm. n! CnmittiM -1IT-. TTk -' "U. camG hf tlemen. signed by him in tlie Nebraska State Journal wu b , i-uuruttaB ior discrimination. What laws have we on the statute books todav to prevent this same discrimination? I am not preaching the gospel of despair. I have si ruck at no corporation that stands within the law He (referring to Mr. Dawes) stood hero justify.' iiig corporations which are violating tho law witness the beef trust which a jury in Chicago found guilty of violating the law, and one mem ber of which pleaded guilty. Witness the North ern Securities Co., which the supreme court de clared Illegal. Will some one here tell him what he (Dawes) said for us to do? Didn't I tell you my remedies, federal control, the direct primary, no gifts from corporations to public officials? He was instrumental in denouncing the policy of the railroads. He has been 'in the east since. We' know how he got there. We know how he se cured his position. We know what influences were behind him.-" At this point a member of the association protested against the use of personalities, and the president requested Mr. Brown to refrain from following that line. Continuing, Mr. Brown said: "Evidently some one else knows how he got there. It is he who preaches the gospel of de spair just like Tom Lawson. He sa. s there is no relief by legislation. Place the corporations under the same restrictions as the banks nd there would be no waterei stock; no stockholders robbed. He says we can not protect the people from being robbed. Didn t they shut up a bank in St. Louis just the other day to keep people from being robbed? "He is here for the purpose f telling you to do nothing. I advocate an increase of the pow ers .of the Interstate commerce commission, but he says not o do it. Bankers are condemned for doing just what that gentleman wants you to do today, stand as the apologists for these trusts." AN IMPORTANT ELECTION IN NEBRASKA On November 7 the people of Nebraska will select a justice of the. state supreme court and two regents of the state university. The people of Nebraska need not be told that the republican party has for so long been under tho domination of corporation influences that it can not reasonably be expected that the public welfare will be advanced by agents of that po litical organization. Judge W. G. Hastings, the democratic nomi nee for justice of the supreme court is recognized as a good lawyer, and in his servlse as judge of the district court and as commissioner of the supreme court he proved himself to be every inch a judge. He should be elected. The people will make a serious mistake if they vote the republi can ticket this year under the impression that the professions of repentance and reform on the part of present-day managers are to be relied upon. The only way to overthrow corporation domi nation in Nebraska is to overthrow the party which the corporations have, so long used. Many Nebraskans have in the past had the habit of overlooking the Important office of re gent of the state university. The filling of this place is particularly Important this year because of the position which D. C. Cole and Louis Lightner, the democratic nominees, have taken with respect to certain matters important to university interests. Messrs. Cole and Lightner promise that if elected they will exert their in fluence to do away with secret meetings of the board of regents. They also pledge themselves to favor the return to John D. Rockefeller of the money recently donated by the o:i trust king to Nebraska's uniersity. They promise to vote to rescind the resolutions of the board of regents by which-the chancellor of the university was permitted to serve on Mr. Rockefeller's educa tional board, and they promise to do whatever lies in their power to make it plain that uie Nebraska state university will not be operated as an apology for the wrong doing of a trust magnate. 9 . ht On this issue alone Messrs. Cole and Ligni ner deserve to be elected by a large majority. If every voter of Nebraska could be made to understand the issue, there is little doubt that the Rockefeller proposition would be overwhelm ingly condemned. Those who are opposed io planting, in tho Nebraska university, the maiiwi influence of the Rockefellers should remind ine" neighbors of the importance of electing Mcssi. Cole and Lightner to the board of regents. tional bank examiners as regards national banks. But the people will object to investigation of railroad books in like manner as national bank books. The people have had some experience with national bank examination that did not examine. President Roosevelt issues an executive order allowing cabinet officers to discharge em-' ployes regardless of civil service rulesand It is hailed by the administration press as some thing calculated to benefit tne puunu "-. But what would the republican press have s about "spoilsmen" if a democratic president iwu issued a similar order"? When Mr. Charles Gates Dawes ad(1jf Uq the bankers of Nebraska at Lincoln last w bu found several of his utterances of the late ringing in his ears before he got througn. 3 w ! i7- I, f i :j a i V tmmt tiuu C mifcii yu I mni it i.nifVifr j?faatiijfr, -".- - x'x r jf-ffi m