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The Commoner
VOL. 15, NO.
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The Commoner
ISSUED MONTHLY
Entered at tho Fostofllco at Lincoln, Nebraska,
as second-class matter.
WILLIAM J. BRYAN CHARLES W. BRYAN
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THE COMMONER, LINCOLN. NED.
Query: If a national bank charges a washer
woman, twenty-four hundred per cent, what
would it charge a man?
13 per cent of the national banks of the
nation charging usury. Why did republican
comptrollers fail to And this out? Answer: A
soft campaign contribution turneth away repub
lican wrath.
Merely to prove that the world does not move,
the New York Sun declares that the direct pri
mary is "ineffective, cumbersome, unsatisfactory;
expensive and complicated." Similar testimony
can be secured from the ex-bosses in every direct
primary state.
As showing how widespread and how deep is
the belief that the next year is going to be a fine
year for standpat republicans who want to bo
president, here comes the information that the
Hon. Charles Warren Fairbanks expects to en
ter the national convention with the solid dele
gation from Indiana.
Tho gentlemen who formerly gave vehement
voice to the belief that the way to make wars
impossible w.as to make them more frightful
through the use of new means of wholesale
slaughter have not been heard from since the
European holocaust began.
The danger that comes ty men who refuse to
read any newspaper but a. republican organ is
readily apparent when one contemplates tho num
ber of republicans who have been misled into be
lieving that the party grave is about to be vio
lated next year by the voters and who have en
tered the lists as candidates.
PRESIDENT FOR EQUAL SUFFRAGE
The president has given out the following
statement in favor of woman's suffrage:
"I intend to vote for woman suffrago in New
Jersey because I believe that the time has come
to extend that privilege and responsibility to the
women of the state, but I shall vote, not as tho
leader of my party in the nation, but only upon
my private conviction as a citizen of New Jersey,
called upon by the legislature of the state, to
express his conviction at the polls. I think that
New Jersey will be greatly benefited by the
change.
"My position with regard to the way in which
this great question should be handled is well
known. I believe that it should be settled by the
statesand not by the national government, and
that in no circumstances should it be made a
party question, and my view has grown stronger
at every turn of the agitation."
This is very gratifying and will help the cause
in New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania and
Massachusetts, where the subject will be voted
upon this fall. Secretaries McAdoo and Red
field, who vote in New York, have declared for
suffrage, as have also Secretary Garrison, who
votes in New Jersey, and Secretary Wilson who
votes in Pennsylvania. So the movement grows
next!
The Shylock bankers who are charging usuri
ous interest are somewhat hampered by the law
limiting loans to ninety dr.. s. If they were per
mitted to loan for one year they could, by charg
ing only one hundred per cent and taking the in
terest out in advance, avoid the necessity of
giving the borrower any part of tho loan.
Over the entrance gates to tho steel mills at
Gary, Indiana, are Jarge electric signs reading
"Did booze ever do you any good? Did booze
ever get you a better job? Did booze ever con
tribute anything to the happiness of your fam
ily?" Tho great temperance lessons of today
are being taught by the great industrial plants
in terms of efficiency. In a commercial ago it is
a most potent argument to put the question of
drink upon an economic basis.
Can you imagine an American government
bond bearing a 6 per cent interest rate selling at
a discount? How would you like to see that
quotation in your stock market reports? Yet it
is just as inevitable that the value of our gov
ernment uonas wm depreciate u we put a strain
upon our credit by adding many millions to our
annual expenditure for giant military arma
ments as that the value of the European govern
ment bonds have fallen under the pressure of
their vast expenditures. If wo dance tho pay
ment oft the piper will be exacted.
THE DOLLAR ABOVE THE MAN
A correspondent asks:
"What effect would follow, as regards a trend
towards peace, if property were placed on an
equality with life and service? The nations en
gaged in this war, except England, conscript ser
vices and life. If they should decide to conscript
property and refuse to pay the war debts would
or would not such a course make peace advo
cates of every banker and every holder of secur
ities? "What is the ethical argument against plac
ing property on a par with human life and hu
man service? Is the average service compen
sated by the average pay of the soldier?"
Yes, it might havo a good effect if man was
raised to the level of the dollar, but when that
time comes there will be no war. Governments
DRAFT men, but NEGOTIATE for dollars; men
are secured if necessary by COERCION, loans
by CONSENT. The loans are scrupulously re
turned with interest, but the men do not always
come back. Franklin declared that trade bought
with blood was not worth what It cost then
why purchase it? Because the influential get
tho trade and the obscure furnish, the blood.
The spectacle of three great nations like Eng
land, France and Russia, after having raised bil
lions at home for paying the expenses of the war,
coming to the United States and seeking to bor
row a billion, ought to be a striking object lesson
of the folly of war to the people of the United
States, and halt the mad rush of the militarists
who would put us on the same costly war footing
as those nations. For if we follow in their foot
steps in getting ready for war, we follow still
further and actually engage in war and then
after draining ourselves of our own fluid cap
ital, we must hunt elsewhere for more. The fact
that it is not to be found elsewhere would snell
bankruptcy for us, and defeat.
Some of the journalists who are spreading the
propaganda for greater preparedness for war in
the United States are very frank. Here comes
Richard Washburn Child to say: "To your cZ!
mon sense is submitted the proposition that pre
paredness for war must not be considered as
preparedness for fighting, but as preparedness
for victory." In other words, we must create
and maintain a fighting force that would enable
us to defeat any nation or combination of J
tions that might attack us. In its essence that
is what the program of the militarists in this
country is. It Is well to know how wide the
chasm is before we try to leap it.
The ready-to-fight-the-world groun thnf f
tempting to force the United BtSStato the old
competition of greater preparedness for war has
SoLm Ura?? t0. tel1 coness what iT realty
desires this nation to do in the way of increasiJ Z
et &onT8 sJEZ
r
Referendum on War
If governments derive their just powers .
the consent of the governed, there wTui I IT
to be no valid objection to making6 sure 0f
sent by submitting important questions for tE
decision; and what more important question than
Congress, under the constitution, is the omv
body that can declare war. The president with
the consent of two-thirds of the senate? can 3
gotlate a treaty of peace, but the house of rZ
resentativea the body nearest the neonS
must be consulted about a declaration of L
and about every appropriation necessary to carry
on a war. At the time the constitution wa
written that was the nearest approach to con
suiting the people, but since that dato the ini
tiatlve and referendum have been devised to
popularize government, and In many of the
states the people can not only veto laws passed
by the legislature, but can also initiate legisla
tion. Why not apply the principle of the ref
erendum to tho question of war, and let the peo
ple decide at an election whether the matter
in dispute justifies a declaration of war?
It 'would not be difficult to arrange the neces
sary machinery, and as for the cost, it would be
inconsiderable compared to the cost of a week
of war. France is now spending more than ten
millions a day on the war, and Great Britain
more than fifteen millions. A referendum gives
us the only way of ascertaining with certainty
the wishes of the people. The representative
does vwhat he THINKS his constituents want
done, but tho constituents know better than
their representatives what they really want.
But just. suggest a referendum on war, and see
how the jingoes will fight it, and, by so doing,
prove the value of the referendum. It will not
only go far toward ensuring peace for this coun
try, but it will set an example to other countries
where tho people need tho referendum even more
than here.
W. J. BRYAN.
THE GRAND REVIEW
The recent G. A R. encampment brought forc
ibly to mind the ravages made in the ranks of
the old soldiers by the passing of the years. It
is related in the press dispatches, that President
Wilson, while witnessing the annual review, was
moved to tears at the sight of an old soldier on
crutches, holding his place in the line of march
with difficulty. Commenting on the probability
that the old soldiers have made their last an
annual march, the Milwaukee Journal pays this
fine tribute:
"Once again they marched up Pennsylvania
avenue. One more time, and this probably the
last, they repeat that grand review of fifty years
ago when 2GG,00G strong, the Grand Army of
the Republic that was to remain one nation
marched by in triumph. Now there are only
a fraction of those who marched. And they are.
not strong, now. There are bent shoulders and
many wearied ones fall out of step.
"Yet these men march' to remind us, not of
their own triumph over their brothers, for since
those days they have met again, and some of
them have marched side by side in defense of
the nation that was saved. But they march to
remind us that when the nation called, there
was one spirit in her sons. They march to re
mind us that home and wife and kindred were
left behind and they counted not their own lives
dear unto themselves. They march to remind
us that a nation that had been thought divided
and weak could marshal In that day 1,000,000
seasoned veterans of one mind, beside those who
had already made their last great sacrifice, while
on the seas the strongest navy the world had
ever seen flung out the Stars and Stripes.
'They march to remind us after fifty years
that we are a nation, that we are such a nation
as the world never knew, that we did not know
our own strength until the testing came.
"We shall do well to think of them, these vet
erans. We shall do well to ponder how we guara
the trust they handed on to us. For if tow
we have the spirit that drove them forth to dot
tie and to die, we need fear nothing. For tney
remind us that when need or peril threaten,
there has been one mind in the republic.
Morevfthan one thousand national banks
eraglng over ten per cent possibly these Dan
ers are the ones- who insisted so strenuously
hayingthe banks select the directors of tne -
tral reserve board.
W;
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