"pr
The ComtqQii0r
10
VOL20,m9
pswva,--!
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cubg, One man says tliat ho had 'a Httlo work
to do and could not sffaro the thnoj another
went to visit his wife's relatives and a family
dinner made it inconvenient for him to return,
I met a man on the train a few years ago who
said that ho had not voted for ton, years and gave
as his roason that a neighbor for whom ho
voted gavfc a dinner to dblobrato the victory,
and did not invito him. Ho said, "I concluded
that, if 1 could make-a mistake like that about
one whom I knew personally, I did not have
Settle enough to vote and I have not voted since."
Think of a man rofusing to voto-becauao he
made a mistake at the pollsl The Republicans
are not that sensitive about the mistakes they
mako; I know Rbpublicans who have made
thrcel mistakes to my personal knowledge and
they go on voting just as if nothing had ever
happened. No one should be discouraged be
cause of a mistake; ho should vote earlior next
time and correot the mistake. I look back with
some amusement to an opinion which I hold
when I was a young man. I thought that my
party, if it could just got into power it had
not been in power for a long time would do
everything that it ought to do and nothing that
it ought wot to do I even thought that it would
do so much that, when it got thrdugh, there
would bo nothing left for any other party o
do, but that was a long time ago. I sixm
learndd that there wore somo bad men in the
Democratic party and some good men in the
Republican party. ,Whon I found that fho
wheat and the tares grow togothor in both
parties, I entered upon my life work, viz., to
get all the good Republicans out of the Repub
lican party into the Democratic party and all
the bad Democrats out of the Democratic party
I return to th other amendments recently
adopted in order 'that I may use them to illus
trate how the apathy and indifference of citi
zens prolongs the struggle for reform. It re-'
quired twenty-one years to secure the popular
election of senators the change would have
been made in twenty-one months if the ppoplo
had been as alert as they should hava boen. The
resolution submitting the amendment passed the
House six times before it could pass the Senate
once. Now the people appreciate the importance
of the ohange, nine-tenths of the voters of all
the parties Would oppose a return to the old
mothods of electing senators by legislatures.
It required sevontoen years to secure the
amendment authorizing nn income ta x it would
not have required seventeen months it the peo
ple had boon as vigilaht as they should have
been. During the period covered by-this strug
gle the government could draXt a citizen bdt
could not draft a pocket-book it was omnipo
tent when it dalt with man but impotent when
it dealt with property. Now ..that We have an
income tax no party would dare to propose its
abandonment. x
And SO withvlhe fight for National Prohibi
tion; it has required many years to win the vic
tory. If you read the New York papers you
might suppose this a new issue thrust upon the
people without notice and decided without op
portunity for deliberation. But do not allow
the New York papers to mislead you. Reforms al
ways surprise them; they have no political
weather signals down there to give notice of the
economic and moral movements that sweep
northeast from the west and south.
I have been KOttinc: acnuainted with the New
into the Republican party. After thirty years. York editors, off and on, for some twenty-five
of earnest effort I am compelled to admit that
I have not succeeded as well as I had hoped to,
but 1 am still at work. When I attended the
Republican convention at Chicago I was con
vinced that .there are still some good Republi
cans, and, when I wont to San Francisco I was
convinced that there still are some bad Demo
crats left in our party. If I am permitted to
select the Democrats to be exchanged and the
Republicans tdsbe admitted into full fellowship
I am willing that the trade shall be made-on
the basis of sixteen bad Democrats for one good
Republican.
We must not expect the government to be
perfect, no matter what party is in pawqr. When
the Democrats aro in power I can prove by all
the Republicans that the government is not
perfect; when the Republicans are in powers
no proof 1s necessary. If the government were
made perfect today it would' be imperfect to
morrow. New laws are necessary to meet new
conditions; even tho constitution requires
chattgo occasionally. We boa at of the wisdom
of those who wrote the constitution but the
wisest provision they framed was that 4n which
they reserved to their 'doscondents the right to
change what they had done. A constitution
belongs not to the dead but to the living; each
generation has tlio right to protect, itself and
advance ts welfare by any constitutional
changes that may be deemed necessary; , .
We. have already amended our constitution'
nineteen times, four times within the last ten
years. The Nineteenth amendment is still in
'-the courts but its adoption, if not completed-now,
is only a question of a short time. Before
speaking of the other throe recent amendments
pormit mo to say a word about the Nineteenth.
No one In the country is happier than I at the
coming of Woman's Suffrage. I believe in
woman's right to vote and am willing to en
dorse, without reading, it, any argument that
anyone will frame in favor of Woman's Suffrage,
but stronger than any argument based upon
right is tho argument based on duty, Duty is a
larger word than right; we can waive our rights
but we cannot evade our duty. The world need3
woman's conscience, at tho polls even more than
woman needs the ballot, I am counting on
Woman's Suffrage to effect a final settlement of
two great problems! alcohol and war twin
enemies of the home alcohol drags men down
to premature graves and war offers them as sacri
fices on the altar of Mars. Woman, the guaj-dlan
years, and the better I know them the moire Sure
I am that the passage in tho Bible that has most
profoundly impressed them is the. passage that
tolls of the wise men coming from the east nine
teen hundred years ago- the New York editors
seem to think that the wis men have come from
that direction ever since. Therefore, unless, re
form starts in New York they cannot have any
faith in it and, as no great reform 'ever starts, In
-Now York they do not have any faith in any re
form. " ' - '
It is nearly fifty years since the Woman's
Christian Temperance Union was organized. A
few women, at Hillsboro; Ohio, prayed In fr"ont
of a saloon and then rose up and organized the
greatest association among women, I think, that
the world has yet1 known. For almost half
a century these noble women, increasing in
number, have attended the meetings of theor,
gaulzation in bad weather as well as in good;
thoy have saved their money, paid their dues
and contributed to the cause. Without their
patient and persistent efforts we never could
have won this victory, and yet they havenever
had as many as one in twenty-five of the women
of the country as membors of the organization.
The burden has fallen on a few; the sacrifices
have been made by a few,, while all enjoy the
benefits. 7
The same may be said of the Anti-Saloon
League. It is twenty-seven-years old, and yet l
never- nave as many as one In twenty-five of the
adults of the country contributed to tho fund
that supported its worfi. For many years the
Presbyterian church has had a temperance com
mittee as have the Methodist church and many
other churches; the work has grown until all
the moral forces of society finally united in the
overthrow, of the saloon. -And, now that the
amendment is in the constitution and an en
forcement law on the statute books, will the
friends of prohibition be vigilant enough to hold
by the ballot that which has been secured after
so prolonged a struggle?
Within the last year I have suffered the most
bitter disappointment of my life. Twelve months
ago when I spoke to audiences 'like .this I told
them that this year the two great parties that
had shared together, and in about equal propor
tion, the glory of this the greatest moral tri
umph in our nation's history, would stand to
gether and, by the adoption of dry platforms
and the nomination of dry candidates, remove
the liquor question forever frnm w o,.
American politics. I honor! nmi t j,0iin .!,.
of the home, can, be relied upon to stand guard the two parties would s,tand together victnrv
at the grave of John Barlayporn and see to it as they had stood together in the Conflict so that
that ho has no resurrection hlorn, and he-can
be relied upon to find a substitute for war as a
settlement of international disputes. If we can
- secure a referendum on war except in case of
actual invasion), reason 'will oon be substituted
Ior-force . v . . - s , .uhjr
WVMVa 213 41 am. ... j, 1 3 v M V tlfUMft
..tiiuuiw.wiuu wumu ue safeguarded no matter
which party won. ,
I was amazed when, last January, Governor
Edwards announced himself a candidate,, for
president on a wet platform,; I at once warned
our party of this sinister announcement .atfd de-
..'.. - ;: "i ' -s
clared that.it was an insult to the party for any
one to think of being its candidate on a wot
platform. I pointed out that it was a Domo
, cratic Senate and House that made the Dis
trict of Columbia dryland raised the white
flag of prohibition over the nation's capital
never to be hauled down; that It was a Demo
cratic Senato-anfl House that passed tho res
olution (three-fourths of the Democratic sena
tors voting for it and more than two-thirds
of the Democrats in the House of Representa
tives) submitting national prohibition, and that
every Democratic state ratified excepting New
Jersey which refused to ratify while under Re
publican control before it refused a second time
under Democratic control. It seemed absurd
that such a party could be influenced by an
..outlawed business.
When I was accused by .some of the wet
papers of disturbing the harmony 0f the party
I explained that I was standing by the splendid
record of my party, and that the wots were
making the disturbance. When I was told
that I would have trouble at San Francisco I
called attention to the fact that the Republi
cans would act first and I felt sure that they
would nominate a dry candidate on a dry plat
form, and I intenjidd to use their endorsement
of prohibition as an inspiration and 'an example
A have" never been able to usfe the Republican
party as an Inspiration or an example before
but I looked forward with pleasure to doing
so this time. . ;
I was surprised to hear the temporary Chair
man of the Republican Convention omit pro
hibition when he recited the achievements of
the party; I was still more surprised when I
listened to a platform that "pointed with pride
-to all the other great deeds ofHhe Republican
party but omitted prohibition; I was amazed
pvhen the delegates from thirty-seven dry states
made no protest against a platform silent on
prohibition, and was disgusted when the con
vention nominated a wet candidate on a silent
platform. .-.....- L .
Thim I went to San Francisco, 4iappy in the
hope of using the Republican mistake as a
warning, when I could not use its" action to stim
ulate our conventions I prepared :a dry "plonk,
-notiaharsu; one hut plank heaVtily Congratu
lating the. party upon its splendid leadership
in submitting and ratifying prohibition and
pledging it to enforcement, honestly and in good
faith, "without any increase in tho alcoholic
content bf permitted beverages and without any
weakening of other provisions of the Volstead
law. The committee rejected my dry plank and
I carried the fight into the convention where
it was voted down it received only1 one hun
dred and fifty-five and a half votes out of near
ly eleven hundred. . - i
- Htho wets had been wise they ivould have
allowed the, matter to rest there; they might
have misled- some into believing that the
Democratic party was -wet by; counting as
against prohibition all who refused to vote for
lh dr pJank- But sreed is nev,ei intelligent;
it it was it would o,wn the world. The wets de
manded a roll call on the plank that ;they pre
pared the weakest wet plank 'aver offered in a
convention arid their plank was defeated by
a voteof ,niore than two to one. Yes$the drys
Went down to defeat at San Francisco, but when
they fell they, carried down with them a bigger
S?ii , than Samson did when he slew the,
Philistines in his own fall. The vote against
the wet plank made it certain that no Democratic
congress hereafter will be Wet.
' '?? ?? Joy over tue defeat of the wets did
not last long. The convention proceeded to fol
low the example of the Republicans and nomi
nate a wet candidate on a silent platform. Let
no Republican boast that his candidate is wetter
than ours; I will guarantee tha't, by any stand
ard qf moisture ever invented, they will both
register one hundred per cent wet, if not. more.
Both have stepped off of their platform tp assure
the wets that congress, has the right to change
the enforcement law. What purpose could they
Have had in doing so except to pledge executive
apL0Val t0 any wet hill passed by congress.
The failure bf the two conventions to. take a
position on the prohibition question, coupled
with the invitation extended to the wets by the
two candidates, makes the liquor question an
issue In every congressional district and in every
tate in which a .senator is to be elected, The
drys must see; to it that their full strength 'is
polled for a dry candidate for the House and
. Senate, even, if .they have' to go outside of their
party to. secure,: one. Party lines do not divide
4.he enemies qf the home;- until organized op-
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