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The Commoner.
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VOLUME 13, NUMBER
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The Commoner. Woodrow Wilson's Great Work in New Jersey
ISSUED WEEKLY
Entered at the PoHtofllco at Lincoln, Nebraska,
an second-class matter.
WlM.TAM J. II n YAM
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IliciiAiin h. Mmv.At.vK
A moo.) uto Editor
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THE COMMONER, Lincoln, Neb.
Investigation before hostilities begin, that war
will become practically impossible. The time
that will bo allowed gives a chance for the
separation of questions of fact from questions
of honor and it gives a chance also for the
operation of public opinion which is increasing
for peace.
"It is tho hope of those who believe in the
plan that when it is adopted between this nation
and other nations it will bo adopted by other na
tions between themselves until the nations of
tho earth will be knit together by these agree
ments and people will learn to war no more."
Cardinal Gibbons in a letter expressing re
gret that ho was unable to be present said:
"Lot Drittania and Columbia join hands
across tho Atlantic and their outstretched aTms
will form a sacred arch of peace which will ex
cite tho admiration of tho nations and will pro
claim to tho world tho hope that with God's
holp the earth shall nevermore bo deluged with
bloodshed in fratricidal war."
INTEREST ON GOVERNMENT DEPOSITS
Secretary McAdoo has announced his determi
nation to require interest on government de
posits. Why not? Why give to favored banks
the benefit of deposits of government money
without interoBt? Tho last democratic national
platform demanded the establishment of a com
petitive system for tho deposit of government
moneys, such a system as Ohio, Missouri and
a number of other states now have. Until tho
competitive system is inaugurated there is every
reason why tho banks should be required to pay
for the deposit of government money, as they
do now for private deposits and for deposits of
states, counties, cities, school districts, etc. The
secretary of tho treasury is moving in tho right
direction and furnishes another illustration of
what tho president means when ho says that
tho government should bo administered by tho
people in thoir own interest.
CALLING THEIR BLUFF
The manufacturers of pottery are threatening
to roduco wages if tho tariff is reduced, aro
they? Well, that is an old game and it has
worked splendidly in the past, but times have
changed. Secretary Rodfleld announces that A
REDUCTION IN WAGES WILL, BE INVESTI
GATED. That's different What an advantage
it is to have tho White Houso on the side of the
people!
TARIFF BILL PASSES HOUSE
The democratic tariff' bill passed the houso of
representatives Thursday,' May 8 231 yeas and
139 nays. It was announced that tho house
would take a three weeks recess while tho senate
Is considering tho measure.
It is further stated that when tho houso
meets again about June 1, it will take ud the
currency question.
Tho president keeps an open mind on all
complex and difficult questions, and he crosses
no bridges before he reaches them. But when
the time for speech, decision or action comes,
his "single-track mind" is clear and ready.
In New Jersey the jury issue is simple enough
to require straight talk. The president has given
such talk to the bosses. He has called spades
spades, and crooks crooks. He has denounced
false partisanship, fake referendums, perver
sions of law and justice by controlled sheriffs,
ballot frauds and the rest of the machine game.
No Jerseyite can misunderstand the issue or
tho alignment. The present jury system is a
monstrous fraud, and the men who fight to pre
vent reform are the bipartisan tools of the
actual or prospective beneficiaries of the fraud.
Tho kind of jury reform Wilson pleads for is
that for which no pleading should be necessary
in this day and generation.
The chances are that the Wilson speeches will
defeat the Jersey bosses. The people can not
be fooled after his exposition of the case, and
they will finish the work he has begun for them.
Chicago Record-Herald.
OUR "UNDIGNIFIED" PRESIDENT
President Wilson is "undignified" when he
goes into New Jersey to fight Jim Nugent in
the interest of honest juries and clean elections.
It is "unworthy the traditions of his high office."
Of course it is. This plea of the damage done
to "dignity" when wrong is rebuked in the con
crete and the beneficiary of corrupt politics con
fronted in his lair is as old as the history of
hypocrisy.
As Lowell says:
"I'm willin' a man sh'd go toler'ble strong
Agin wrong in the abstract, 'cause thet kind
o' wrong
Is allers unpop'lar, an' never gets pitied,
Because he mustn't be hittin' particoolar sins,
'Cauce thet w'd be kickin' the people's own
shins.
President Wilson might confine his activi
ties in the interest of honest government to mak
ing talks on "good citizenship" and civic purity
before applauding audiences of sympathetic
auditors who were in agreement with him be
fore he began. But to go into a region where
tho fight hangs in the balance, where men,
backed by the power of the "organization" and
fat with the spoils of years of profit through the
peoplo's wrongs, are ready to contend with him
for the "right" to despoil their fellow-citizens
further to go into such surroundings, call tho
bosses by name and lay bare the burrowing of
the forces of political corruption through the
tissues of tho body politic, as pus burrows
through human flesh this is unspeakable! How
can a president so demean himself?
When will he return to the harmless tradi
tions of the great days of Theodore Roosevelt,
a man so inflamed "agin wrong in the abstract"
and so gentle towaTd Piatt and Penrose, Quay
and Flinn?- St. Louis Republic.
MORE POWER TO PRESTOENT WILSON
Why does the president of the United States
leave the duties of his high office to participate
in a. factional fight in Now Jersey? Because
tho issue in that factional fight is whether
juries shall be chosen and election officials
appointed fairly and honestly, or by men who
take orders from the boss.
In New Jersey the names of jurors are drawn
by the sheriff of tho county. When the sheriff
is the henchman of the boss this pollutes tho
Jurisprudence of the state at its source.
In many New Jersey counties tho clerks and
judges of election aro appointed by tho sheriff
of tho county. When tho sheriff is tho hench
man of tho boss this vitiates popular government
at its source. Popular government rests on
popular choice When that choice is exercised
ostensibly by tho people but really hy the boss'
man, Popular government is a name instead of
a reality. Until tho questions now at issue in
New Jersey are rightly settled in a community
ft can not with truth bo said to be self-govern-
The republic glories in President Wilson's
courage and in his earnestness. If the cause in
Which ho Is now opposing Jim Nugent is not
worth while, then nothing in public lifo is worth
while. wuitu
It is tho same cause in which this paper did
its utmost last winter. Tho primary law of St
Louis, up to tho recent campaign, was such as to
m m r J r 4- T T"rtr rvll i-- ..... . -
fcuuictuLcu w mo uudo cwi cue power which miehf
safely be exercised in view of the explosivo lEi.
sibil ities of outraged public opinion. The new
primary law put the cap-sheaf on the primary
election movement in Missouri, begun under
Governor Francis more than a score of years
ago.
The day is now forever past in Missouri when
a political boss may announce through a friendly
paper that he has secured an overwhelming ma
jority of the city committee for a certain can
didate, that the money is provided and that his
man will be nominated. More power to Presi
dent Wilson, as he fights the same fight in New
Jersey the people's fight against boss-selected
election officials and moss-chosen juries.- St.
Louis Republic.
THE PRESIDENT'S CLEAR VISION
President Wilson in his recent New Jersey
tour made it plain to his fellow citizens of the
union that he is laboring under no delusions as
to the political conditions which made the suc
cess of his party possible at the last election.
As one very practical leader of the party
put it into legal phrase, "The democratic party
took judgment by default," and it is all to tho
credit of the wisdom of the president that ho
so fully and so keenly comprehends the posi
tion of the administration and of the party.
If he can but impress his counselors and tho
administration members of congress the neces
sity for considering most carefully every im
portant administrative act and legislative
measure, looking well at all times to the welfare
of tho people and the continuing of tho pros
perity of the country, he may be able to placo
his party once again in the majority of tho
popular vote of the country.
That sense of a critical political situation,
that knowledge that he and his party won tho
victory of last November through the division
of the opposition, which prompted the president
to warn his party associates in New Jersey of
danger if they did not serve the people faith
fully and well, these should also warn in Wash
ington and in every state in the union.
Two years run rapidly in the course of a na
tion, and when November, 1914, arrives the
country will pass upon the entire membership
of the national house of representatives and
probably upon one-third of the membership of
the senate.
The result of that popular scrutiny, whether
it be approval or disapproval, can be largely de
termined by executive action, by executive ad
vice, counsel, and support of measures conducivo
to the advancement of the interests of the
great majority of the people.
The responsibility does not all lie with con
gress, or with the members of the cabinet, and
as he so well evidenced in his trip to New Jersey
and in his addresses there, the president shirks
neither the responsibilities of the private citizen,
the party leader, nor those of the executive of
a mighty nation.
This realization of the party's weakness and
surrounding dangers should make for party
safety, for party success.
"The keen spirit seizes the prompt occasion--makes
the thought start into instant action, and
at once plans and performs, resolves ana
executes." Cincinnati Enquirer.
THE PRAIRIE SINGER
Don't talk about your Tobins
That trill the song of spring;
The medder lark
'S the bird I hark
Unto the most, by jing!
He haunts the greening places
That stick out on the plain;
Ther's something rings
In what he sings
You long for it again.
It ain't so much of gladness,
As faith and trust and hope;
You echo it
To clink of bit
As homeward bound you lope.
Small comrade of the prairie,
How many men you cheer;
Men long alone
find sadness flown
When you, brave bird, appear.
-Arthur Chapman, in the Denver Republican
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