pjjpp---Tipiiyi MJ"jai.'h"'V Wv i r 1 NOVEMBER 26, 1909 oraturo. Ferrer was not tried for beinr an an archist or for teaching anarchy He was trfed tZdnde,innC? for ovort acts connccUon with tho Barcelona insurrection, in which 138 persona were murdered by the Insurgents. lie was not tried by the civil courts but by military Tdbuna because under the law of Spain where a sta?o of insurrection is formally declared to exist tho civil courts are automatically closed and the military courts take their place. This may not be right law., according to our ideas, but it Is t un, vVf Sl!?in- r,KIng Alfonso had 'no oppor! tunity to pardon Ferrer. HG could not legally do so under the Spanish constitution without tie approval of the responsible minister. This an- ' ?ffV,iaiJ? naDGra. Premier Maura saw fit to withhold. Mr. Maura did with the king what Mr. Stanton did with President Johnson in the ?w m S' SuJfatfc Th0 ony difference was that Mr Maura did not exceed his constitutional an nrwrv0 0ingflwuile Mr- Stanton exercised an arbitrary discretion. In view of these facts 2iYw y ? ul?Be AmerIcans look, who, though neither socialists nor anarchists, persist in praiB Ing as a martyr a professed atheist, whose rulo .JlffLwas No sovernmont! No God! Down with these humbugs!' " THE ST. LOUIS Censor gives the American peoplo something worth thinking about when It says: " 'Trust-Uncle' Joe is a mere figurehead nothing more than acting chairman for the interests, who inaugurated the system and made the rules under which the interests allow the house to act. He is not in the least Indispensable to the system; but the error has gone out that he is, that he is responsible for this vicious and destructive system which ren ders the house powerless before that privilege which plunders the country. When Reed de Vised the system, he made it self perpetuating and most automatic. The real feat was to set up his system and silence the house in tho begin ning. Since then it has been easy. Given arbi trary power, with a bludgeon in one hand and a bunch of rewards in the other, tho game is exactly, like the tariff. Every attempt to re form rii, makes it wprse. Witha speaker with power in the, first place to make any certain member the most favored- and Influential repre sentative of the session, or reduce him to abso lute nothingness without the power to say a half dozen words during the session, as the speaker will, it is easy to understand whence comes the authority to continue such a vicious system. As Cannon is but tho figurehead of tho system, would it not be a stroke of good politics for the interests to wish his defeat, or if not that, to remain passive? It would allay agita tion and divert public attention from a govern ment rotten with wrong. The word would go out that Cannonism was crushed, and it would take the public, in Its stupid "complacency, a year or two to find out that the interests had placed another man. in Cannon's place, and that the system had gone right on without a hobble." EVEN THE New York Sun objects to Senator Aldrich's proposed central bank. Following is an editorial printed in a recent Issue of the Sun: "The Sun will always oppose a central bank of issue. Such a bank is intended by the monetary commission. The policy of that body as now formally disclosed by Senator Aldrich points to no other consummation. It is our con viction that a central bank of issue bearing the same relation to the money of this country that the banks of France and of Engbmd bear to the money of those countries would prove a national evil. This country is traditionally and temper amentally unsuited to such an institution. If Mr. Aldrich and his associates by their united genius can fashion a central bank whose func tions and powers shall be purely automatic and mechanical, well and good. But such a bank with us is impossible. We have developed no class in America from which we could create or recruit the administration and control of such an institution, while to Isolate it from our politi cal life is hopeless. We wish it were otherwise. It is a national misfortune that we can not create a bank of issue, regulation and control like the Bank of England. But it is a misfortune to which we are habituated and which is an ac cepted condition of our economic existence. It might be possible In time, but that time is re mote. Tho temperament, the political genius and the geography of our country assure us that the creation of such an institution would lead Inevitably to disaster graver and more far reach ing than tbat which our recurrent panics and The Commoner anv!?1 w c,ontvuls,on8 entail. They constitute an evil, but It is a negligible evil compared with VnulS possITbllItl of another Bank of tho ;!r f In country of vast wealth whore there is not a dollar of money for which a dollars worth of gold can not bo hnd there must, from the operation of natural forces, pres ently develop a system or a habit wheroby tho minimum of tho physical mobility of actual mon SniSa combined with tho maximum of sta bility and liquidity of credit. That end can bo attained, and in our belief will bo attained, with out tho injection of any federal dogma of any CONCERNING the much talked of British V budget a writer in the Chicago Tribuno says: A misapprehension of tho intent and of nrSiFJ0??!0118 tUo Brit,8h budeet not unnat urally follows tho attempts of Americans to analyze and comprehend this great financial measure, to which the term 'socialistic' has boon attached by the privileged class whoso prlvllogo it hits. If tho abuses which Lloyd-Georgo Ib endeavoring to correct existed in tho United btates and were the endeavors of correction so moderate and temperate as his, Americans would start a revolution. Tho budget is condemnod as socialistic because it seeks to extend tho application of tho old ago pension system and because It seeks a revision of tho land tax Through old age pensions Great Britain Is striv ing to find a remedy which Germany has found more effectively In industrial insurance. In tho increasing poverty of tho English people the British statesmen find an alarming danger to the national life, growing with every year, and Americans who may be startled by tho magni tude of the fund which it Ib proposed to devote to the relief of the Impoverished profitably may consider the fact that the United States govern ment annually pays in pensions to tho veterans of tho civil war a sura far in excess of that whioh is contemplated in the extension of tho British system. The land tax is socialistic in the opinion of the great land owners of England who, with tho brewers also hit by an increased tax and the connections of both, rule in the house of lords. If it were to be proposed as a remedy for a kindred III in America it would be rejected with paving stones. If one man owned all of downtown Chicago, and if three men owned New York south of Forty-second street, and if these holdings and others like them were subject to a tax which had not been revised since Cromwell's time, which was a tax merely in name, and which operated to make land own ership a weight bearing down on the prosperity and development of the country, Americans would not waste time listening to an opposition which called the proposed remedy socialistic. If 90 per cent of the land In America were owned by less than 10,000 persons something more than the land tax provisions of the Lloyd George budget would be used to restore owner ship to the people." TyrR. CHARLES W. ELIOT, former president JlVX of Harvard University, and now president of the National Conservation Association, has issued tho following public statement: "The National Conservation Association is convinced of the urgent need of Immediate measures to prevent the control of tho great sources of heat and mechanical power in tho United States from being seized by monopolistic organizations and to secure their best development in the interest of the whole people. These sources aro water falls and coal. Under the existing laws tho wisest development is practically impossible. Tho following statement describes the situation with respect to coal lands: Tho qoal lands in the possession of the United States are being rapidly absorbed under the present inadequate law. Tho great fields of Alaska, estimated to contain 15,000,000 tons, shall remain in the heritage of tho peoplo. But bad as is the general coal land law of the United States, that of Alaska is even worse, for there tho government is absolutely limited to a charge pf $10 an acre, which, according to a public statement by the director of tho United States geological survey is less than one-tenth of tho real value of these coal lands. It is true that tho field was recently withdrawn from entry, but tho legality of tho withdrawal has been questioned. Even if the nine hundred existing claims now coming to trial should be declared fraudulent, new claim ants may file on these lands. We have urged the present administration to postpone, for the common good, the trial of these claims, and wo 7 luL, ?,OU,)t,' !? .T,ow of th0 fact nd ot the Sn aw."1.0 ft,d,In,n,fltratlon as declared by Presi dent laft in his speech at Spokane, Wash., on SKIS!" ,0r ?.' ftat. our ro(lUC8t will bo granted, inero is a limit, howovor, boyond which such delay can pot go. Should congress fall to act at tho coming session, It Is possible that the opportunity to obtain ndequato legislation for the coal binds still In possession of tho United States will bo lost. Wo therefore appeal to tho AS??S!CttJ S?1 t0 bring tho urgent needs of tho situation to tho attention of thoir ropresonta tlvcs in congress in order that comprohonBlvo legislation on tho mattor may bo enacted at the next session of congress." 0N 'VuJ7 ,12.' 1908' th0 SL Lou,fl Ropubllo published Its centennial Issuo, that papor having boon established in 1808. Soon thoro aftcr tho Republic took an actlvo part in tho formation of a Century Club of American News papers, composed of weokly and dally journals that aro 100 years old or older. A booklet jus published by tho Ropubllc describes tho eighty two papers that aro members of tho club. Thoro aro fifty-flvo dallies and twonty-Boven weokllc. twonty-two of which aro published in Now Eng land, thirty-eight In tho mlddlo Atlantic state, nine In Ohio, ono in Indiana, cloven south of Mason and Dixon's Ho, and one- tho Ropubllc west of tho Mississippi rlvor. Pennsylvania hau thirteen mombors of tho club, and tho two oldest, tho Philadelphia North American and Saturday Evening Post, each founded in 1728. Then fol i -.ion Charlc8tn Nows and Courlor, founded nr ' tho AnapolIs Gazette, founded in 1740; tho Portsmouth Chronicle, foundod In 175C, and tho Newport Mercury, foundod in 1758, oach mor0 than 150 years old. Tho Gor man languago Is represented by two nowspapers in tho club, tho Newmarket Shenandoah Valloy. published originally In German as Dor Vlr glnlscho Volksborlchtor und Newmarket Woch onschrlft, founded In 1807, and tho Lancaster 7?io .,round uud Bebachter, established in 1808. A REMARKABLE case of ,tho dovolopmont of criminal Instinct is that of Earl Bullock, seventeen years of ago. His homo wan In Law rence, Kan. On October 11 Bullock was arrested at Eudora, Kan., on tho charge of having robbed a second-hand store. Tho deputy sheriff had taken Bullock into tho Eudora bank. Whilo there Bullock drew two revolvers and forced tho deputy sheriff and Cashier Wilson into tho bank vault. Ho then snatched about $1,000 and fled. That night Policeman Prlndlo went to Bullock's homo and called him to como out and surrender. Bullock replied with a rain of bul lets and Prlndlo was killed. Bullock then made his escape. Tho authorities were unable to locate him, but it later developed that he began, life In a fashionable hotel at Jacksonville, Fla., under an assumed name. There ho became ac quainted with William McKay, a fifteen-year-old boy, holding out to McKay "tho beauties" of a robber life. Bullock persuaded tho boy to accompany him and on November 12 they re turned to Eudora for tho purpose of robbing tho samo bank which Bullock had robbed on November 11. Bullock and McKay entered tho Eudora bank. Fred Star, the cashier of another bank happened to bo in the Eudora bank and Bullock shot him through tho jaw. Snatching money amounting to, perhaps, $800, Bullock and McKay fled followed by a posse of citizens. McKay surrendered but Bullock wrenched tho revolvers from his faltering partner's hands and ran, returning the fire of his pursuers. Finally being surrounded he put the pistol to his own head and flred. Tho wounded lad was taken to a hospital where ho died a few hours later. THE KANSAS COMMONER Tho Kansas Commoner, published at Wichita, has been purchased by Mr. M. B. Murphy, late of Malone, N. Y. Mr. Murphy is a thorough go ing newspaper man and a faithful democrat. In his salutatory Mr. Murphy said: "Tho present editor proposes to make tho Commoner tho exponent of pure democracy as advocated by Its acknowledged leader, William Jennings Bryan, and invites the public to read tho Commoner for further Information along these lines. With tho abiding faith that tho new enterprise will redound to the credit and welfare of democracy, lth in state and nation, permit me to subscribe myself." 1 l i w 1 I 'A -! ' Mt V II .. .--.l A".'. , mrirllrtA' ,-