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About The Omaha morning bee. (Omaha [Neb.]) 1922-1927 | View Entire Issue (Oct. 21, 1923)
KU KLUX KLAN SHOWS POLITICAL POWER IN INDIANA VOTE « ___ ^__ —<! ild and oolyTime In Politics Activity of Ku Klux Threat ens to Obscure More Vi tal Issues, Sulli van Says. Beveridge Was Victim By MARK SULLIVAN. One of the Influence# that will af fect the election# next year Is the Ku Klux Klan. It Is not necessary to Infer that the Klan as a nation wide organisation can or will try to throw lta Influence In favor of one of the presidential candidates as against the other. Ther# la practi cally no probability that the person alities of the two candidates will be such as to give occasion to this kind of prejudiced discrimination. It Is conceivable that the platform' of one party or the other may contain a plank either denouncing the Ku Klux Klan specifically or denouncing the kind of thing It Hands for. Such a plank In either platform might lead to the lining up of the adheren*s of the .Klan one way and those who disapprove the Klan the other way But it ie not necessary to anticipate this sort of thing. Quite aside from anything like this, ths Klan will un doubtedly figure largely, sometimes on the republican side and sometimes on the democratic side. In local elec tions for congressman and senator. Some of the states In which the Klan Is particularly powerful are doubtful ones. Indiana, for example. Indiana last year the Klan was (^partly responsible for defeating one of the best men who ran for the senate In any state that year, name ly, Albert J. Beveridge. It was not that the Klan disapproved of Bev ©ridge. Nothing In Beveridges rec ord or associations Incurred their prejudice. They had nothing against him. If the election had been held over again a' month later the Klan might as readily have voted In fa vor of Beveridge. What the Klan happened to do was a haphazard fluke. But. combined with other things, it was Just enough to defeat Beveridge. The circumstances were these: Just a few days before the election Got. Henry J. Allen of Kansas, an old progressive party associate of Bev eridge, came Into Indiana to deliver some speeches In Beveridge's behalf. It happened that only a little while before Allen, as governor of Kansas, tad denounced tha Klan, using the /lgoroue language of which he Is :apable, In the same manner In which nany other governors and other pub lic men have expressed their disap proval of the menace to some funda mental American conceptions of gov ;rnment Involved In the Klan’s activ ity It Just happened also that the ^■t!fc.icular Indiana towns where Gov ernor Allen was booked for hla speeches were towns In which the Klan had recently organized and had secured considerable bodies of adher ents. In these Indiana speeches Gov trnor Allen aga n denounced the Klan, aking it as one of his topics, just aa he took up other public matter* then current. The Immediate reaction of the Klan member* In these communities was to take the first opportunity to show their resentment. Aa often happens when action is determined by a tem porary emotion the expression of re sentment was erratic. They wanted to vent their resentment against Al ien's speech on somebody and they took It out vicariously on Beveridge. It was all quite without relevance to Beveridge or any issue with which Beveridge was associated. But the thing happened so clese to the elec tion that It was lmposslbl* to over come its effect. In the election* next year there will undoubtedly be cases like this and other cases worse—cases In which the Klan will deliberately and avowedly vote as a body against some candi dates and In favor of others. All this la as unfortunate as possi ble. The activity of the klan. Its very existence—and, let us not omit to add, the things, some real and some Imag ined, which give rise to those preju dices on which ths klan thr.ves—all fcjhis constitutes one of the least happy ^TPSpecta of present-day American life. Where ths situation raised by the ex istence and activity of the klan la clear, where It Is a simple Issue be tween the klan and the fundamental organlzat.on of our democracy, there ; i no duty on the part of the conscien tious citizen except to put h!» voice and hla vote on the antl-klsn side. And yet, If you find any good man who is m member of the klan or an advocate of It or an apologist for It— and In some commun.tles you can find good men who either are mem bers of the klan or have sympathy for some of Its principles—If you talk to such a man and If you practice toward him the spirit of toleration which we all demand he shall practice toward the rest of us. you will be led to feel that It would be useful to make an expsrlment in frankness and clarification. It la clearly wise to accord to such men the spirit of tolerance we de mand from them. If they are In any degree Intolerant the best antidote and disinfectant for Intolerance Is tolerance. Clearly the most of the newspapers and magazines, as well as most others which have discussed ths klan at all. havs gone at it rather too hammer-and-tongs. The fact that the klan has gone on and grown In some proof of that. It la proof also, or at least It suggests that there may be something vital and appealing somewhere In an Institution which has been able to survive such severe onslaughts from ths outside, as well aa such obviously detestable condl -' -Tone as thers have been In some t parts of its own organization. If you talk to a man who tends to be sympathetic with the klan, or at least who Is moved tp refrain from outright denunciation of It, he will tell you that, ststert broadly, one of Ita main purposes ia ta maintain I ' 1 - - —. -. ■ ——..— ■ - ■ - -- Banquet of Union Outfitting Company Employes ! More than 100 officials and employes of the Union Outfitting company were entertained at a “get-acqualnt ed” banquet Thursday night. Music and vaudeville sketches were presented during the dinner, after which speakers reviewed the store's growth in a period of 36 years. Principal speaker was C. E. Corey of the Corey-McKenzle Printing com pany. Henry Rosenthal, vice president of | the Union Outfitting company, spoke I briefly, David Devine, general man i ager of the company, was toastmas ter. American tradition* against alien In fluences—alien Influences in business, In art. In literature, on the stage and In the movies, In religion. In poli tics and in the schools. The south ern or western smalltown sympa thizer with the klan has got the Idea —In wjjlch he has not the Information to distinguish among the truth, the half-truth and the no-truth—that the American stage Is almost wholly In spired, managed and dominated from New York, and that New York Is not an American c ty and does not reflect Americsn Ideals or traditions. He has the same Idea about New York fur nishing the models and leadership of the country In ths world of the movies, of nrt, of fiction writing and fiction publish ng, the world of the newspapers and magazines, the world of finance and business. In support of this sort of loose thesis the klan sympathizer will quote to you a recent warning uttered by Secretary of Labor Davis to the ef fect that "American Ideals and Insti tutions threaten to be submerged be neath a tidal wave of old world Im migrants, bringing old world Ideas." To the persons who read this utter ance from Secretary Davis It sounds pretty convincing. Especially does it sound convincing to people In smaller towns and cities In the south and west, where the population Is prevail ingiy native American in greater pro portion than It le In the large cities of ths east. It Is In these native American'communities that the klan has had Its greatest growth, and the chief reason for that growth Is the sense of alarm about American Ideals and Institutions which Is voiced by Secretary Davis. To the man on the country road this expression of senti ment from Secretary Davis carries conviction. He knows that Secretary Davis Is the official In charge of im migration and Is therefore In the best position to have the greatest quantity and the most accurate kind of Information about the aliens who are coming Into America and the ef feet they threaten to have on Amer ican life. Further than this, he knows that Secretary Davis Is him self an Immigrant, having come ns a boy from Wales, and Is therefore pre sumably the less susceptible to be moved by a'sense of danger or to give expression, to a sense of danger un less he sees It clearly and feels It strongly. (Perhaps It should be added that neither the Ku Klux Klan speci fically nor the' antl-lmmlgratlon senti ment generally has In mind the sort of Immigrant Secretary Davis was. The prejudice against Immigration and the alarm about i alien Influence on America are not directed against the older Immigration that came from England, Scotland, Wales, Ireland. Scandinavia or even from Germany. If all our recent Immigration had been coming from those countries we would not now have any Ku Klux Klan In the form In which It exists nor any considerable antl-lmmlgratlon senti ment. Everybody familiar with the present state of feeling In America who can be frank with himself and with others knows that our present anil alien sentment Is directed against other races who corns from eastern and southeastern Europe,and who in recent years have corns enor mously to exceed the older Immigration with which we were familiar In the past and which we have assimilated ; so successfully that we hardly ever distinguish between It and the native American stock.) The man with whom you talk, the man who has come to a mood In which ha refuses to denounce the Ku Klux Klan unreservedly, if he Is a man of Intelligence, of Ideas and large Information, will throw a good deal of light on that oddly assorted body of prejudices, suspicions and half truths which animates many who Join the klan. He will tell you among other things that the sentiment which sets up the Klan as an irregular ve hide for the extra-legal, and some times dangerously Illegal, expression of opinion may lie In the feeling that the political parties, the newspapers, the courts, the legislatures and other Institutions which constitute the regu larly accepted vehicles of American public opinion sometimes give a sense of falling to function adequately enough to make up ths Ku Klux Klan, and even to others who would never Join that kind of organization, but have emotions not dlssimllai about soma things that go on in America. When that Kabotschnlck family In Philadelphia, having a wholly legitl mat* desir# to shorten their name to a form easier for Americans to under stand and spell, honored the Cabot family of Bofcton by asking the court recently to let them assume that an clent Boeton name It wss, ns reported In the newspapers at the time, an ob servable and possibly not negligibly significant phenomenon of present American life that the court dismissed the objections of the Cabots tor rathei the objections of the Society of Som of the Revolution, for apparently It was this old American institution, and not merely the Cabot family, which set up the objections in court). Also it was observed that the reaction ol the newspapers in the eastern cities took the form of humorous Jibing at *he Cabot famllr. One wondered, in the first place, whether the Kabot schnicks might not have been at on* and the same time more conslderat* of the rights of others and more con scious of self-respect In themselve* if they had spelled it with a “K.' More deeply than this, one wonders what may have been the reflections of a good many American* on the de rlslon of the court, and especially on the attitude of the newspapers whether these reflection* may have included the thought that perhap* th« r„.. ,,r,«-^rs and other Institutions of the larger eastern cities reflect the i v*i.a those cities are prevailingly alien more truly than they express o'-’de in American traditions. Since Ibe action of the court presumably .. * ow u.,xiued l>y me law—or more accurately poeslbly by the absence of a law covering the ettuatlon—per hap* the kind of man who sees some Justification for the klan reflected that some lawmaking bodies, out of deference to the presence of bodies of alien voters, fan to pass precisely those laws which the members of the klan think ought to be passed. From many angles this episode, though small In Itself, Is Illustrative. I bus pect that the majority of native Arner leans have almost as much pride In these old American names, long and honorably prominent In our country's history, and In the American tradl tlons with which they are Identified as do the bearers of the naanes them selves. One may be permitted to guess that this Kabotschnlck episode did not help much toward suppressing the Ku Klux Klan. Indeed, any one familiar with the resourcefulness and Ingenuity of the salesmen might as sume that those agents who sell membership In the Klan at SO many dollars commission per membership pasted these clippings In their pros pectuses as, to use the vernacular of salesmanship, ‘‘a fine selling point,” and counted It a good day. If soma of the principles and many of the practices of the Klan were not so clearly of a sort that they cannot be countenanced with safety to democ racy and the orderly process of law —If It were not for that, one m ght listen with some patience to the Klan sympathizer who argues that a man who wishes to Impress hts ideas on the community has as much right to organize a group who believe with him as any other citizen has to start a newspaper or to organize a good 'government league or to make him self head of the local precinct re publican committee. It Is quite true that there Is al ways a field beyond the field of stat ute law, a field of common custom and commonly held beliefs, In which there la recogn zed propriety In or ganizing for political action or other wise for the Informal expression of widely held standards about the cots duct of men in their relation to others, for the maintenance of traditions, for a kind of Informal censorsh.p or reproval of any sort of conduct that is • pugnant to the community gen erally. Bui when the Klan sympathizer ar gues this way the obvious answer Has In two aspects of the Klan which are not common to other organizations that aim to impress themselves on the ! community. One is tha aecrecy; the other Is the wearing of the hood, the cover.ng of the face. As to the latter, the honest Klan member tries to e* plaln that it is immaterial, that It waa of the devices of the old Klan of 60 years ago In ths south to lm press tha Ignorant or superstitious negro, and that this feature of tha ritual Just happened to be taken over with the rest by the organizers of tha present Klan. Bui the fact Is, tha wear.ng of the hood Is material In practically all those present local ac tlvlties of the new Klans which are Illegal and not to be condoned. It la the wearing of the hood that helps In dividuals and local Klans to commit crimes with the minimum danger of detection. It Is the wearing of the hood that enables Individuals and groups to use the cover of the Klan for the prosecution of private ven geances. As to tha aecrecy. as to tha objec -i-1! fhe gets relief from DR. CALDWELL’S SYRUP PEPSIN i And so do the children Some Families Are Never 111 FORTUNATE are the children whose par ent^ fully realize the seriousness of con stipation. Hospital records prove that 75 per cent of all disease originates in bowel obstruc tion, or constipation. _ Young children cry because of it; school children are hampered in their studies; grown people are made 25 per cent less efficient; elderly people's blood pres sure increases 28 per cent. Realizing this Mrs. Carrie Moss of 1714 Church st., Lynch burg, Va., Mr. Louis C. Grahl of 1569 Win ton ave., Lakewood, Ohio, and innumerable others, give a spoonful of Dr. Caldwell's Syrup Pepsin at the first sign of constipation, and nave no sickness among their children. Largest Selling Laxative Every up-to-date family medicine chest should contain a bottle of Dr. Caldwell's nyrup repsin, a compound oi Egyptian senna with pepsin and palatable aromatics, a pre scription written 30 years ago by Dr. W. B. Caldwell, who practised medicine 47 years. You can buy a bottle in any •tore where medicine* are sold, and the cost is less than a cent a dose. We guarantee that if ft you will give Dr. Caldwell’s Syrup Pepsin to a child or for a few nights to an ad ult it wMl relieve any case of constipation no matter how chronic, or your money will be refunded. 10 Million Bottles a Year Use it once and you will never again take coal-tar drugs in candyform, calomel or salts. Dr. Caldwell’s Syrup Pepsin is a vegetable lax ative free from opiates and narcotics. It can be safely given to infants, yet it effectively moves the bowels of adults. It acts gently; does not cramp or. gripe. Keep it in the house and use it for any indication of ltowcl obstruc tion such as constipation, biliousness, torpid liver, dyspepsia, pimples and like skin erup tions. Give it early and it will break up a fever or a cold overnight. A spoonful proves it. ... II Th Waal la Try tl Vkaa hhn Buying ••••■•■•giraaoti “Syrup Pepsin,” 516 Warfling ton St., Montlcello, llllnoia. I nitrf a pood lamaltn and would tit* to peon what yon pay mbrml Dp. Caldmirp Jfymp Pap»tn ky actual IppI. And mi a frn trial bottU. Addrnt b Album- _ -^- -- - - - ____ — Nut moca lhaa «wa traa trUI hoUla to a family y. tlon that the klan tries to carry out even those of Its purposes that are justifiable, or at leaet no wore* than debatable, anonymously—to thla ob jection the klan member makee the Ingenious answer that he In hie at tempts to Influence public action is no more anonymous than the writer of newspaper editorial#, nor that fig ure who Is so often alluded to as "the man higher up" or the man In the background of many bodies organized for political or social action. In this as In many aspects of any argument you have with a man who seeks to Justify the klan there la some alight amount of half-truth. It all throws light on the nature of the minds and on the motives of some who join the klan wdth sincere though only partly Informed motives. In all that Is said here there la no Intention to deal with the essential principles of the klan nor with the men at the head of It. Some of them may be good men; soma others of them may be decidedly otherwise. One of the early organizers of the klan was a rather venerable old fellow who in hla vague-minded, narrow-minded, long-haired way had motive* entirely sincere and completely unwordly. One of the others who had a good deal to do with the energetic spreading of the klan appears to have been a de cidedly less attractive type—In fact, his name has been appearing In the papers pretty frequently In rather markedly odious connections. All that however, Is a different story. The present article does not concern Itself with the leaders of the klan, nor with Its methods of organization, nor with those men—frequently very commer cial-minded, one Is compelled to sus pect—who make money through the organized selling of memberships In the league, who practice what has been called the commercial exploita tion of hate. All that, let It be re peated. la another story. The present article has In mind only the Individu als who Join the klan—and only aotne of them. Borne who Join the klan do so because they eee In It an oppor tunity for the prosecution of private feuds In an Illegal and odious way. Borne Join It In a spirit nothing short of the most deplorable bigotry. But the clear fact that must be conceded. If we are to make any headway through dealing with this widespread prejudice In a spirit of calmness and tolerance. Is that some others who Join It are good men with motive# that are sincere, even exalted. The writer has been told by sources which compel him to believe It that tn many local communltbs, especially In the south and west, the very best men in the community belong to the klan And It is with the attitude of mind of this sort of man that the present article deals. Such a man In the eoursf of any long conversation with you will tell you, and will easily convince you, that his motives personally are at least unselfish. The salesmen of memberships and those who organize the salesmen and direct them may be In It partly or wholly for the com missions they earn and the various financial “rake-off*’' incident to the commercial side of the organization. But the good man who pays his money to these talesmen is obviously quite without any selfish motive. Such a man Indeed will tell you, and will marshal a certain amount of proof, that among all the organized forces now aiming to have Influence in American politics the Ku Klux Klan Is almost stone in having no selfish, material object. He will tell you that the object of the farm bloc, for example. Is to get more money for Its members In the shape of high er prices for crops, government credit and the like. He will tell you that the purpose of the labor unions In trying to exert political pressure Is to get higher wages. He will tell you that even the American Legion haa among the objects of It* political action a cash bonus for Its member*. He will cite other similar examples until you And yourself almost tend ing to admit that among all these blocs and organized minorities the two which have conspicuously an im personal motive free from. material consideration* are the Ku Klux Klan and the Anti-Saloon league. In this, as in any similar broad generalization, there Is, of course, a certain amount of specious half-truth. Nothing of this kind should blind any one to the fact that eome of the principles of the klan are Inconsistent with the American theory of democ racy and government, and the fact that some of the actions of some of it# local groups are even more con cretely odious. The Important point Is that to the degree that honest men with good motives are attracted by some aspects of the klan they ahould be provided by the political parties, by the newspapers, by the courts and legislature* and by the other more orthodox vehicle* for the expression of organized opinion with less excuse for taking to this kind of group action In order to get consideration for those of their purposes that are legiti mate. (Copyright. Catholic Pastor Quits. West Point, Neb., Oct. «0.—The Rev. John Puachang, who ha* been pastor of the Catholic church at Hooper for the past two years, has resigned and will leave for Washing ton, D. 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