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About The commoner. (Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-1923 | View Entire Issue (June 20, 1913)
JWfiMHOBW1 ' 1,1 JUNE 20, XM eliminated. The coal bill for the present elec tricity station is about $20,000 a year, and, as it is anticipated that the consumption of current will largely increase under tho cheaper rate now possible, the ultimate saving by tho use of wdsto heat will be very considerable. Should tho supply of exhaust steam not bo available, either through a' breakdown of tho blowing en gines or through the iron works being idle, a supply of high-pressure steam will be obtain able from tho Seaton Carew Iron company. Tho total expenditure Involved in connection with the new scheme is $188,500, the plant alono having cost $150,000. Tho old generating sta tion will be maintained as a stand-by, and also as a town substation. Thore the current from the new station will be transformed to the voltage required for distribution to the town. !(? V' V T1EY are having great trouble in Chicago over the statue of Bismarck. A Chicago dispatch to the New York World says: Was Bismarck, the iron chancellor, of Germany, bow legged? Di& he have a bull neck? Was he pigeon-toed, and did his mouth try to effect a junction with his ears. Those momentous ques tions are agitating hundreds of thousands of German residents, of Chicago, and have brought woe and consternation to the managers of the biggest amusement park' in the west. Some time ago they conceived the idea of erecting a statue to Bismarck. The statue was erected, and has just been unveiled with great cere mony, but the awakening came when the park managers received a peremptory demand from Alderman Victor J. Schaeffor that the statue must be immediately .torn down and another one erected. He, ( accompanied' his dem,and with ..the threat that every German ' in Chicago would boycott the park unless the present likeness of Bismarck was removdd. He declared that the iron chancellor was not bowlegged. That, he was not cross-eyed. That he stood erect on legs straight and muscular., -The alderman declared the statue of Bismarck, was put up as a joke. The press agent of the park placed" before the board of directors what he says is indisputable ( prpof that Bismarck b,ad all of the characteris tics as .shown in the statue. On cross-examination he admitted, however, that the great work of art was erected by a concrete company. Alderman Schaffer has called a meeting of the German citizens of Chicago to protest about the Bismarck statue. t & IN an editorial entitled, "Why Mr. Bryan is buttressed,', a St. Paul, Minn., dispatch says: Mr. Bryan made a characteristic speech in Bal timore the other night and it explains to a large degree why he has maintained so great a per sonal hold on popular sympathy. He said tho defeats he had met with had not embittered him or left him harboring any personal enmities. He expressed his joy that Woodrow Wilson should have been able to do what he himself was unable to dp. He' said that hatreds injured only the man who carried them, and his own life proves that he himself has not been ' cor roded by enmities and bitterness. To go through the fights Mr. Bryan has gone through and to remain optimistic, cheerful, hopeful, un touched by envy' and petty dislikes ig a real achievement of successful living. The big man is the man who cares more for the triumph of what is good than he does for the triumph of that good through him. ' Mr. Bryan, whatever IUb mistakes, holds his position because he has never yet placed his personal fortunes abovo his social duty. He has steadfastly set his gaze "not on the prize, but on the goal." & & Jt REFERRING to Vice President Marshall and his critics, the Homiletic Review says: Much hostile' criticism has been printed con cerning a recent address by Mr. Marshall. The Point attacked is of sufficient importance to make it worth while to cite conclusive authori ties upon the Issue thus raised. Referring to the wide discontent at the unequal distribu tion of the advantages of the commonwealth between tho very rich and the very poor, Mr. Marshall said that wealthy men talk of "both an inherent and a constitutional right to pass their property down from generation to genera tion." Hinting that this might not always bo permitted by law as now, ho said, "The right to inherit and the right to devise are neither Inherent nor constitutional, but, on the con trary, they are simply privileges ziven by the state to its citizens." Saying that "nothing but The Commoner. a desire to aTouso thoughtless rich men to a sense of their dangor" inducod him to sug gest this, he counseled them to "hear what tho people are saying about them, and not to dream that what has been forovcr will be." For this his critics have bitterly assailed him as "im prudent, if not reckless," and that that "sonslblo persons have been shocked by his foolish utter ances." What have the highest authorities to say upon the issue thus joined? Professor Bowen, of Harvard, thus Bpeaks for the science of political economy: "Nothing is more certain than that all inheritod proporty is actually en joyed by the gift of law and the consent of society; Its distribution is rdgulated by considerations of expediency alono." Nbto that this was published in 1856, long before our present social problems reached their acute stage. In 1908 Professors Dewey of Columbia a"nd Tufts of Chicago spoke thus for the science of ethics: "There'll no absolute right to private proporty. It has been esti mated that a trust fund recently created fdr two ' grandchildon Will 'exceed five billion dollars when handed over." Reference to tho political as' well as financial influence of such a sum leads them to 'remark: "Society will bo obliged to 'ask htivf rtiuch power may safely be left to any individual." Fbr our comment on the caso, see Proverbs 15:2. i w w' w SPEAKING of the: lobby at Washington, a writer in the 'Baltimore Sun says: Tho president is clearly doing tho right thing in telling .the country about' the lobbyists at Wash ington. Tho, country hasla right to know who is fighting tho Underwood ' bill at the capital, and why, and how much it is costing thorn. It has a right to know what methods they are using. Any man who is opposing the bill legi timately can not object to this. There was a good deal of crlticisni tho other day when Sec retary Redfiold announced his intention to make a gbvernmental Inquiry Into tho situation If any corporation's reduced tho wages of their em ployes and blamed It on the new tariff. In such an dvent we think the country would have a right to 'know whether 'the corporations were recouping 'themselves for losses duo to tho now tariff or for losses due to the payments they are now making to defeat the Underwood bill. One other observation. The chief harm to busi ness caused by the Underwood bill will be due, not to the provisions of that bill, but to arty un necessary delay in its, passage. White tho un certainty lasts merchants are not going to lay In large stocks of goods; until the Underwood bill passes they will live on the hand-to-mouth principle, and that, of course, Is not good for business. It is to tho interest, therefore, of every honest merchant and of the whole com- - mercial world that the bill be passed as soon as possible. No one doubts that when the bill Anally reaches tho president it will bo in tho main as it is how. The only end that delay tan serve is that sbme corporations or some class of corporations more influential than the others may secure changes in certain schedules 'favorable to them. "And fdr this they ask the whole body of business to pay the price that extended delay will cost. The lobby at Wash ington is the chief active agency working for delay. J w J THE European edition of the New York Herald prints tho following Interesting edi torial: That the California alien land bill has created no real war feeling in Japan was made very clear recently in an important special cable gram from Tokio to tho Herald. There has been some "war talk" in Japan, just as there has been "war talk" In the United States. But our correspondent's dispatch showed that the Japanese "war talk" has emanated from sources as" irresponsible and uninfluential as the sources of the American "war talk." And our corres pondent also proved that "peace talk" is over- " powering the "war talk." The Japanese do not like the bill. That fa but natural. A nation that within half a century has been regenerated politically and by force of arms and steadfast ness of purpose has won for itself a place among the great powers of the world must In fallibly object to being treated as a pariah Japan could not reasonably be expected to ac cept veithout raising a protest a law that debars Japanese for color, that is, racial reasons, from enjoying In America concessions that are en- : joyed by white aliens. But only a few Japanese ' jingoes and a very few American "yellow Journals" can have imagined that popular senti ment in the two 'Countries could bo worked up into a warliko sontlmont. As tho Herald's Tokio correspondent cabled, Japan, though resolved to arrive at a sottlcmont of tho difficulty, is equally resolved to sottlo It amicably and to convlnco not only America, but tho rest of tho world, that she has noithor warliko desires nor warlike de signs. Convincing evidence of Japan's peaceful spirit is her intention, reported by our corres pondent, and confirmed In an official agency dis patch from Tokio, "to instituto a caso in tho federal supremo court to test tho validity of tho California law." Such an intontlon proves that "war talk" in connection with tho Callfornlan incident is shoer nonsense 7 0 J HERE is a human interest story as glvon In a recent issuo of the Sioux City, (la.) Journal: A middle aged man paced restlessly up and down the lobby of tho Martin hotel. Now and then ho pulled a heavy gold watch from his pocket and glanced at it. "Ho will bo here in a few minutes now," ho told tho woman who kept step .with him. Proaently a. gray haired man of soldierly bearing entered the door and walked to tho dosk. "Will you pleaso hayc- J. T. Kirtland paged?" he requested of tho clerk. The waiting man and woman hoaTd his requesti They rushed joyously to tho old man and seized him, by the hand. Tho woman throw her arms around his nock. "Father!" thoy ox claimed. "My son and my daughter," quavorod the old man, as he took them in his arms. The elderly man was Capt. R. McC. Kirtland, of . Sioux City, and the other was his son, J. T. Kirt land, a wholesale jeweler of New Orleans, who, with his wife, had come to meet tho father ho could, not remember. Capt. Kirtland onlisted in the Second Iowa cavalry In August, 1861. From the ranks ho rose to a first lieutenancy and a place on Gen. Ed Hatch's staff. Whilo at LaGrango, Tenn., he was married. Aftor the ; war. ho settled in that town. Hero his son was born. His wife dying a year later, Capt. Kirt land left his son with his wife's relatives and went west. Ho was in Arkansas for many years, becoming United States marshal at Little Rock. In the meantlmo the relatives with whom he had left hlH son left LaGrango. Blttor enemies of the north at hoart, they had nover forgiven the mothor for marrying a federal ofllcor, and when thoy had loft their homo thoy did not communicate with Capt. Kirtland. For years he searched for his son without finding him, and finally gave him up as loBt. When his son grow to manhood he, too, began a search for his father, but it was only a few weeks ago that through tho war department in Washington he finally located his father in Sioux City. As soon as he found his parent he communicated with him and arrived in Sioux City to pay him a short visit recently. From the Martin hotel ho communicated with Capt. Kirtland at tho Ar cade, hotel. Seizing his hat and cane the father hurried to meet tho son ho had not seen for nearly half a century. "No; I did not know you at first, son," ho told him. "You see, you were only a tiny baby when I left you down in Tennessee. Now you are past middle ago, and have a wife and a business. "Why," he con tinued reminlscently, "it seems only yesterday that I saw you in your mother's arms. How proud I was that day. But she died soon after that and since then I have been all over these United States looking for you. And to think that aftor all it wasn't I who found my boy, but he who found his old daddy. And when, he did find me ho brought me a now daughter," and with tears coursing down his cheeks the old, man stroked the dark hair of his new found daughter-in-law. Capt. Kirtland has lived in Sioux City for about ten years. His niece is the widow of tho late Congressman E. H. Hubbard. Mr. Bryan's Selected Speeches. Revised and arranged in a convenient two-volume edition. These books present Mr. Bryan's most notable addresses and orations, and cover tho chief important phases and features of his career as an orator and advocate. A familiarly intimate and interesting biographical introduction by Mary Baird Bryan, his wife, opens Volume I. The two volumes, bound in cloth, sent to any address prepaid on receipt of price, $2.00. Tho half leather edition, 2 vols., sent for $3.00, prepaid. Address The Commoner,' Lincoln. Neb. A BARGAIN OFFER A limited number of broken sets of Com moner Condensed will be closed out at a special low price for quick salo. See offer on page IS, .iiJiffSi triunu riiOU J . iJc.ii&i& -jMLt-v. JWiJ4teii;ulsisW- JfeaWi-j