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The Commoner.
VOLUME 9, NUMBER 1
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THE NEW prlninry law of California will bo
tested for tho first time next August. A
writer in tho Nashville Tennessee Banner, says:
"This law provides that all candidates for mu
nicipal, county and stato offlccs shall be nom
inated by primary votes, and that a' primary
advisory volo may bo taken for United States
senator. Ono feature of the law is the require
ment that nominations of candidates before tho
primary shall bo made by petition, and that tho
'signers of petitions shall represent different
parts of tho election district. For instance, be
foro a man may become a candidate in tho pri
mary for a nomination for a state office tho
petition in his behalf must be signed by at least
ono per cent of the voters of his party in each
of at loast ton counties in tho state and in the
aggregate by at least ono per cent of tho total
number of party voters in tho state. Similar
provisions apply to tho smaller election
districts."
O
THE GOEBEL murder case is now only a part
of history. An Associated Press dispatch
under dato of Frankfort, Ky., April 23, says:
"Governor Wilson at 6 o'clock this evening
cleared tho Kentucky court records of all charges
growing out of tho murder in January, 1900, of
Sonntor William Goebel, who was declared to
Jmvo been olocted governor, oxcopt those hang
ing over state's evidence witnesses in the alleged
conspiracy, by granting pardons before trial to
former Governor W. S. Taylor and former Sec
rotary of Stato Charley Finley, who have been
fugitives in the stato of Indiana for nine years;
to John Powers, brother of Caleb Powers, who
1b bolleved to be in Honduras; to Holland Whit
taker of Butler county, John Davis of Louis
ville, and Zeach Steele of Bell county, under
Indictment, and who did nob- flee from the state.
Those over whom Indictments are left hanging
are Wharton Golden of Knox county, now in
Colorado; lrank Cecil of Bell county, now a
railroad dotective In St. Louis, and William H.
Coul ton of Owsley county, said to have died in
the west a fow months ago. These cases, with
the possible exception of Cecil, will be dismissed,
leaving Henry E. Youtsey, now serving a life
sentence in tho state penitentiary, the only per
son to Buffor for the taking off of Goebel. The
petition asking for the pardon of Taylor and
Finley was presented to Governor Wilson re
cently by Caleb Powers, who himself had only
recently been pardoned by the governor upon
indictment and after four trials for alleged con
nection with tho same crime. The petition was
largely Bigned In Kentucky and other states.
Reiterating tho belief he expressed some months
ago, when ho gnu ted pardons to Caleb Powers
and James P. Howard that no ono but Youtsey
had part in the murder, and that it was not a
conspiracy, Governor Willson says that he be
lieves it a 'sacred duty, which I must no longer
delay, to carry this belief into effect.' "
SENATOR STONE, of Missouri, addressed tho
senate advocating his plans for Philippine
independence within fifteen years or some sim
ilar period to bo determined upon and free trade
with the Philippine Islands in tho meantime
In the form of an amendment Mr. Stone pro
posed to strike out section 5 of the Aldrich
Payne tariff bill and to substitute a pulsion
S1U U t0. Wuo policy of the United
States to grant independence to tho islands
IrZZT thT, hay "oreanlZed stable gov
ernment capable of maintaining public order;"
to negotiate agreements with other powers to
insure tho islands' independence by neutralizing
Stote. untn'nJf fref, futy into the United
States until this policy has been fulfilled "all
articles wholly the growth and product of the
islands," n consideration of which agricultural
implements and machinery, cotton and pohSI
manufactures, books and pubCtionsancl ma
chinery for use in manufactures of all kinds
"wholly tho growth and product of tho TTnitSi
States," should be admitted free 'into tho iSSd?
While not opposing tho section In question on
protection grounds, Mr. Stone admitted that he
had been much impressed by the contention that
tho free imnortat nn nf crm,. .i j, " " U1UL
ill Phiiinni;;", ,";?" .tum lucco irom
i'i". ouuiu uu disastrous to the grow-
crs of tobacco and sugar beets and cane in
this country without a corresponding benefit to
tho consumer. He admitted that free trade
might so alarm those interested in the devel
opment of tho growing beet sugar industry in
this country as to check its expansion. Further
more, he questioned the wisdom of encouraging
tho investment of American capital to build up
industries of a foreign country to tho detriment
of our own. Summarizing his reason for not
supporting the section of the bill as it stands,
Mr. Stone said ho could not do so because
"First, If tho islands are to bo regarded as an
American territory, then they are within the
union, and their products should have free access
to all our ports without restriction or limitation.
Second, If our occupation of the islands is in
tended to be only temporary, and if it be our
policy to surrender them to their own people,
then wo should pass no law which would tend
to create such commercial or political conditions
between the islands and this country as might
dolay or embarrass the final completion of our
purpose; and, third, We are under no such
obligations to tho Philippine people as to make
It our duty to support their government or to
build up their industries at the expense of our
own. I prefer to stand squarely upon the dem
ocratic platform, and do for the Filipinos what
we have already done for the Cubans set them
upon their feet and let them work out their own
destiny."
THOSE ROOSEVELT republicans who be
lieved that Mr. Taft could be depended upon
to support real tariff revision will be interested
in the following Washington dispatch to the St.
Louis Republic: "All hope of a revision down
ward disappeared and the chance of the enac
tion of an income tax was materially lessened
when President Taft's indorsement of the Aid
rich bill minus an income tax became known
today. The immediate result was the display
of absolute confidence by Senator Aldrich, who,
after Senator Cummins introduced his income
tax amendment and delivered his speech de
fending it, started his tariff bill upon greased
ways and down towards its final passage. The
formal reading of the bill paragraph by para
graph was begun. Those persons who hitherto
have doubted are now convinced that President
Taft has lined with the 'reactionary forces in
the senate and against the western element,
known as the 'progressives.' Until now other
developments have indicated that such is the
position chosen by the new president. He stood
with Speaker Cannon and assisted him in pass
ing the 'gag' rule whereby the Payne bill, some
what mutilated, but still a measure carrying
higher average duties than the Dingley law,
was put through the house. He permitted At
torney General Wickersham to whitewash the
threatened new prosecution of the beef trust
for rebating. Appointments have been made
under the machine system which obeys the
wishes of the politicians working through the
senators. In these and other minor ways those
of the 'Roosevelt policies' in line with western
radical sentiment have been obviously tossed
into the discard."
TIE OLD question "who wrote the Junius
letters" is being revived. Charles R. Brock
writes to the Denver News this note: "Apropos
the recent and interesting article in the News
on the identity of 'Junius,' copy of a clipping
from the Cornhill Magazine is herewith submit
ted. This clipping I found in an edition of
Junius, presented to me nineteen years ago by
le..latS,uCol??el. John - Hodees of Lexington,
Ky." The clipping from the Cornhill Magazine
follows: "It seems strange that a love letter
should supply another link in fixing the author
ship of the most scathing invective and the bit
terest sarcasm in the language. But there is
published at the end of Mr. Chabot's book, as
the work of another well known expert, Mr
Netherclift, the fac-simile of an epistle to a lady'
in a disguised upright hand of Sir Philip Francis1
that is identical with the disguised upright hand
nf 'S8; Za r,Itten at Bath ln th winter
of 1770 to a Miss Giles, daughter of one of the
officials of the Bank of England, afterward gov
ernor when in the time of Mr. Pitt the Bank
of England stopped payment. In those days it
was customary at the assembly rooms for a lady
to retain her partner during the whole of the
evening and for several evenings Mr. Francis
and Miss Giles danced together. The result of
it was a very tolerable copy of verses, delivered
to Miss Giles with an anonymous letter, wherein
tho writer declared that, having found tho
verses, which were unaddressed, he. could not
conceive for whom they were meant, unless for
her. At the time tho young lady suspected the
author, but said nothing, and it was not till
years afterward, when, through the wife of Mr.
King, of Taplow, she still kept the papers, that
a scrap of Junius' writing was being handed
round the company in which she happened to
be.' 'Why,' exclaimed Mrs. King, when the pa
per came to her, 'I know that writing. The
person who wrote that wrote me some verses
and a letter.' And on comparison, though the
verses were plainly by another hand, the letter
was as plainly in the hand of Junius. The
verses, Sir Philip's composition, were afterward
proved to have been dictated to his friend, Tilgh
man, who spent the winter of 1770 with him at
Bath, in one of whose letters from America part
of a verse is jokingly quoted, in proof of Fran
cis' capacity for poetry of the highest order."
IN AN EDITORIAL entitled "Mr. Bryan
Should be Heard From," the New York
Tribune says: "It will be remembered that
shortly after the election Mr. Bryan, with ar fine
minatory air, called upon Tammany to explain
why it had done no better for the national dem
ocratic candidate. He reminded the public that
four years before it had also made a signal
failure, although that year 'it was understood
that both the ticket and the platform suited
Tammany.' And he asked the very pointed
question: 'Is the national party to have Tam
many used as an argument against it, and when
Tammany is powerless to help the national
party, even when it does its best?' In other
words, must the democracy continue to suffer
from the discredit of harboring the Tammany
organization without any compensating benefit?
This we have always thought was one of the
most promising lines of inquiry ever opened by
the democracy's moral leader. Nothing is more
likely to stir the democratic conscience than the
thought of a dishonorable connection, with
'nothing in it for the party. We have been
waiting eagerly for Mr. Bryan to proceed along
this line. If he has been pausing only until
further occasion should provoke him, he has his
occasion now. One of his issues in the last
election was reform in the house rules and im
provement in the conditions of legislation in
congress. Yet when the democratic party had
it in its power, with the aid of the republican
'insurgents' in the house of representatives, to
reform the house rules, Tammany, with its ally,
McCarren, deserted, preventing the democracy
from putting a substantial achievement to its
credit and leaving its representation in the house
demoralized. Mr. Bryan has thus a new count
against Tammany. Not only is the connection
discreditable to the democracy at election times,
but it is disadvantageous at all other seasons,
lammany is not only a disgraceful but a treach
erous ally. Let Mr. Bryan give this practical
situation a moral turn and rouse the conscience
of his party, for if he does nothing after what
has just happened in Washington his party's
conscience will surely go stale."
WILLIAM MARION REEDY, editor of the St.
Louis Mirror, knows something about tho
kind of prosperity which the republican party
!?Jii .?Bt th?v.Am.?,rican pePle In an editorial
printed in the Mirror, Mr. Reedy says: "O,
yes; prosperity is here. Men are selling them
selves on the block in Brooklyn, to the highest
bidder. A man in Baltimore offers himself for
sale in a want ad' in one of the papers. What
a ghastly damnable fraud the papers foster with
their edito-ial proclamation of returned good
times and revived business. There may be
'white Jies.' This prosperity lie is not one of
them, it is the blackest sort of lie, for it nurses
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