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About The commoner. (Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-1923 | View Entire Issue (March 1, 1912)
MARCH 1, 1912 15 The Commoner. ir tice, more short-sighted in its in ability to face the changed needs of our civilization, than this decision by the highest court of the state of New York. Many of the judges of that court I know personally, and for them I have a profound regard. Even for as flagrant a decision as this I would not vote for their recall, for I have no doubt the decision was rendered in accordance with their ideas of duty. But most emphati cally I do wish that the people should have the right to recall the decision itself, and authoritatively to stamp with disapproval what can not but seem to the ordinary plain citizen a monstrous perversion of the consti tution into an instrument for the per petuation of social and industrial wrong and for the oppression of the weak ,and helpless. No ordinary amendment to the constitution would meet this type of case, and intoler able delay and injustice would be caused by the effort to get such amendment not to mention the fact that the very judges who are at fault would proceed to construe the amendment. In such a case the fault is not with the constitution; the fault is in the judges construction of the constitution, and what is required is power for the people to reverse this false and wrong construction. WRONGS IN NAME OF LAW "I wish I could make you visualize to yourselves what these decisions against which I so vehemently pro test really represent of suffering and injustice. I wish I had the power to brings before you the man maimed or dead, the women and children left to 3truggle against bitter poverty because the breadwinner has gone. I am not thinking of the terminology of the decision, nor of what seems to me the hair-splitting and meticu lous arguments elaborately worked out to justify a great and a terrible miscarriage of justice. Moreover, I am not thinking only of the sufferers in any given case, but of the tens of thousands of others who suffer .be cause of the way this case is decided. In the New York case the railway employe who was injured was a man named, I believe, Ives. The court ad mits that by every moral considera tion he was entitled to recover as his due the money that the law intended to give him. Yet the court by its de cision forces that man to stagger through life maimed, and keeps the money that should be his in the treasury of the company in whose service, as an incident of his regu lar employment and in the endur ance of ordinary risks, he lost the ability to earn his own livelihood. There are thousandS'Of Iveses in this country; thousands of cases such as this come up every year; and while this is true, while the courts deny essential and elementary justice to these men and give to them and the people in exchange for justice a tech nical and empty formula, it is idle to ask me not to criticise them. As long as injustice is kept thus Intrenched by any court; T will protest as strong ly as -in me lies against such action. Remember, when I am asking the people themselves in the last resort to Interpret the law which they them selves have made, that after all I am only asking that they 'step In and authoritatively reconcile the con flicting decisions of the courts. In all these cases the Judges and courts have decided every which way, and It ia foolish to talk of the sancity of a judge-made law which half of the judges strongly denounce. If there must be decision by a close majority, then let the people step In and let It bo their majority that decides. Ac cording to one of the highest judges then and now on the supreme court of the nation, we had lived for a hundred years under a constitution which permitted a national income tax, until suddenly by the vote-of the gupremo court reversed lta previous decisions for a century and said that for a century wo had been living under a wrong interpretation of the constitution (that ia, under a wrong constitution), and therefore in effect established a new constitution which we are now laboriously trying to amend so as to get it back to the con stitution that for a hundred years everybody, including the supremo court, thought it to be. When I was president, we passed a national workmen's compensation act. Under it a railway man named Howard, I think, was killed in Ten nessee, and his widow sued for dam ages. Congress had done all it could to provide the right, but the court stepped in and decreed that congress had failed. Three of the judges took the extreme position that there was no way in which congress could act to secure the helpless widow and children against suffering, and that the man's blood and the blood of all similar men when spilled should for ever cry aloud in vain for justice. This seems a strong statement, but it is far less strong than the actual facts; and I have difficulty in mak ing the statement with any degree of moderation. The nine justices of the supreme court on this question split into five fragments. One man, Jus tice Moody, in his opinion stated the case In Its broadoBt way and de manded justice for Howard, on grounds that would have meant that all similar cases thereafter justice and not injustice should be done. Yet the court, by a majority of one, decided as I do not for one moment believe they could or would now de cide, and not only perpotuated a lamentable injustice in the case of the man himself, but set a standard of injustice for all similar cases. Here again I ask you not to think of the -mere legal formalism, but to think of the great immutable prin ciples of right and wrong, and to ponder what it means to ren depen dent for their livelihood, and to the women and children dependent upon these men, when the courts of the land deny them the justice to which they, are entitled. "Now, gentlemen, In closing, and in thanking you foryour courtesy, let me add one word. Keep clearly in view what are the fundamental ends of government. Remember that methods are merely the machinery by which these ends are to be achieved. I hope that not only you and I but all our people may ever remember that while good laws are necessary, while it is necessary to have the right kind of governmen tal machinery, yet that the all important matter Is to have the right kind of man behind the law. A state can not rise without proper laws, but the best laws that the wit of man can devise will amount to nothing If the state does not contain the right kind of man, the light kind of wo man. A good constitution and good laws under the constitution, and fearless and upright officials to ad minister the laws all these are necessary; b.ut the prime requisite in our national life Is, and must always be, the possession by the average citizen of the right kind of character. Our aim must be the moralization of the individual, of the government, of the people as a whole. We desire the moralization not only of political conditions, but of industrial con ditions, so that every force in the community, individual and collective, may be directed towards securing for the average man, and average wo man, a higher and better and fuller life, in the things of the body no less than those of the mind and the soul." Hrfc$&xr 7i!ZZ H&rW try WXjjV f f pk The government, in the trial of the so-called bathtub trust at Detroit, introduced 400 alleged signed trade agreements between jobbors and manufacturers. Thirty indictments against Abe Ruef, the former political boss of San Francisco, were dismissed. Reuf will testify in the trial of former Mayor Eugene Schmitz. Another revolution appears to be on in Mexico. An El Paso, Texas, dispatch says: A manifesto pro claiming General Geronimo Trevino as president ad interim, and decrying Francisco I. Madoro as a "Gringo lover" was printed and circulated in El Paso. The document is signed by Gonoral Pascual Orozco, Emillo Vas quez (without the Gomez), Andres Garza Galan and several other promi nent Mexicans. ceedingly bitter. Senator Simmon's term of offico will expire one year hence and ho Is a candidate for re election. His principal rival for the toga appears- to bo Governor W. W. Kitchln, who has already taken to the Btump and delivered some vigor ous attacks on Simmons' political record, particularly his vote In tho Lorlmer case. A third candidate for tho senatorship Is Former Governor Charles B. Aycock and a fourth is Chief Justice Waltor Clark of tho state supremo court. It is believed that a second primary confined to tho two leaders in the first primary will bo necessary to settle tho contest." Father impressively) "Suppose I should be taken away suddenly, what would become of you, my boy?" Irreverent Son "I'd stay here. The question Ib, What would become of you?" West Chester Critic. They are having Interesting poli tics in North Carolina. A Raleigh disnatch says: "With the senatorial primary fight In North Carolina but a few months, distant, outward and visible Bigns are abundant that the contest for the seat of Senator Sim mons is to be hard I ought and ex- A Cincinnati, Ohio, dispatch says: Thirty indictments charging conspir acy to obstruct and monopolize tho cash register business in violation of tho criminal provisions of tho Sher man anti-trust law were -returned against officials and sales agents of the National Cash Register company. Houston, Texas, was visited by fire and 200 buildings were destroyed, 1,000 persons being made homeless. Many manufacturing plants were wiped out and It is estimated that the loss will reach $7,000,000. TENTH CENTURY RELIGION" Mrs. Mary L. Keys, Steolville, Mo. In The Commoner recently was an article entitled "Tenth. Century Religion," by E. A. Fitch, of Wil mington, Vt. As I think this article not just fair to neither the Bible nor Mr. Bryan, I beg a little space in The Commoner. In this article by Mr. Fitch, he says, "That the dis coveries in modern science, especi ally that of evolution and kindred sciences have disproved and dis credited the Book of Books in many important particulars." I feel like saying to Mr. Fitch, as Jesus said to the Sadducees in regard to the resur rection of the dead, "Do yo not err not knowing the scripture?" I find no place in the Bible where it teaches the earth is flat or that it has any particular shape, but It does teach evolution plainly, if we but read it correctly. In Gen. ch. V., it says, "This is the Book of the gene rations of Adam in the day God made him in the likeness of God. Malo and female created He them, and called their name Adam in the day when they were created." This process of changing Adam Into man took twelve periods called genera tions, or eighteen hundred 'and fifty six years, for Noah was the first man found righteous. before God and per fect in his generation. Noah walked with God. Was not this process evolution? It certanlly took a long day. As for the religious utterances of Mr. Bryan in The Commoner they show him to be a man of higher and broader religious views than most of the ministers that occupy the pul pits of our land. I do not like the teachings of the church in many respects, for they are not true to the Bible teachings as I understand them. But wo should remember that in tho generations of the heavens and tho earth Eve (the church) Is the help meet of tho spiritual Adam and that they par took of the knowledge of good and evil. The Apostle Paul says this is a figure of he that was to come, tho Lord from heaven. Shall we mor tals question tho wisdom of the great Creator? . Let us hope the twentieth century will see the blind eyes opened and' the deaf ears unstopped and all come to a knowledge of the Lord. A lover of both tho Truth and tho Bible. THE MISSOURI SONG Denver Times: "They Gotta Quit Kickln' My Dawg Aroun'," is the name of the campaign song adopted by tho democratic conven tion of Missouri. The song has made a big hit all through the middle west and is as follows: Wunst rao 'n Lem Briggs 'n ol' Bill Brown Tuk a load of cawn to town, An ol' Jlm-dawg the onry cuss He jes' nachelly follered us. CHORUS Every time I come to town The bbys keep kickln' my dawg aroun', Makes no difference if he is'ja houn They gotta quit kickln my dawg arouri'. As we driV past Sam Johnston's store Passel o' yaps kem out th' door; When Jim, he stops to smell a box They shied at him a bunch o' rocks. They tied a tin can to his tall An' run him apast the county jail; N' that plumb nachelly makes me sore, 'N' Lem he cussed 'n Bill he swore. Me 'n Lem Briggs 'n ol' Bill Brown We lost no time In a-Jumpin' down. An' we wiped them ducks up on the' groun Fer kickln' my ol dawg aroun'. Folks say a dawg kaint hold no grudge, But wunst when I got too much budge Them town ducks tried" to do me up, But they didn't count on ol' Jim-pup. Jim seed his duty thar an' then, An' he lit into them gentlemen, An' he shore mussed up the cote- . chouse square With rags 'n meat 'n hide 'n hair.