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About The Conservative (Nebraska City, Neb.) 1898-1902 | View Entire Issue (Nov. 17, 1898)
s > Conservative. like this govennncnt ; and then the czar or nil the Russias , with fear of Uncle Sam tugging at his hearb strings , ad vised the whole of Europe to put itself on a peace footing and to everlastingly abandon arms , forswear war and forever avoid battles because Major McKinley had mounted the American throne ! The vivid portrayal of the quaking and shaking of the crowned pates of Europe when the lusty importance of the election of a tried soldier like Major McKinley dawned upon the charcoal darkness of their despotic understand ings captivated a large and very enthu siastic partisan portion of the assem blage. The description of the hot haste which Great Britain made to form a friendship and even an alliance with the United States just as soon as the news of Mc- Kinley's success reached London aroused patriotic pride to the yelling point and the speaker was encouraged to picture the potentates of Europe generally as trembling and paling because Major McKinley - Kinley was to be the commander-in-chief of the army and navy of this republic. The bubonic plague , the Asiatic cholera , the smallpox , leprosy and diph theria combined and amalgamated in one dread disease , contagious and in fectious , sweeping through all European countries , could not have inspired the dread and developed the shudder which the election of McKinley developed in England , Russia and Germany 1 Such eloquence and such truthfulness and logic refresh the mind of the voting man ! To those of us SKXATOR TIIUKS- who remember the TON OX SII/VER. fluency and flaccidity - ity of Orator Thurston when ho poured out his soul in behalf of the free and nn- limited coinage of all the silver product of American mines at the ratio of 16 to 1 , his post-election interview of a day or two ago is exceedingly refreshing. The eloquence of Senator Thurston has always been rather of the soft summer- drink style of sparkle , fizz and foam than of the more substantial brandy and soda or straight-whiskey variety of pub lic speaking. In other words , ho has been more ornate than logical , more flamboyant than practical , more given to cornices , frescoes and decorations in general than , to solid and substantial foundations. In view of the foregoing , Mr. Thurs ton , in this last interview , when he de clares that "The battle was fought on the straight gold standard platform and the result , in my judgment , absolutely eliminates free silver as a national issue in 1900 , " is charmingly unconscious of his own inconsistency upon the question of finance. An outsider unacquainted with the self-adjusting monetary views of 'Sena tor Thurstou , might conclude from this that this practical statesman , who has filled the fetatutp books of his country with the impress of his constructive genius , had always been a gold standard advocate. But the members of the leg islature who elected him to the United States senate must certainly recall the fact that even after his election , in re turning thanlcs for the honor thereof , Thurston proclaimed his faith in the free coinage , in unlimited quantities , at the ratio of 10 to 1 , of the product of all the American silver mines then discov ered or hereafter to bo discovered. However , all new converts arc zealots and all now converts have a happy facul ty of forgetting their sayings and doings before they met with a change of heart. It is to bo hoped that Senator Thurs ton will remain true to the gold stand ard iuring the balance of his statesman like career. Few publicists have shown so much capability for soaring along the mountain-tops of verbosity and fewer still have so often and deftly made sonorous melody out of mere breath. The flights of Mr. Thurstou have been wonderful but one who flies so high must understand the art of lighting and it is generally conceded that Mr. Tlmrs- ton's flights have been more brilliant than Mr. Thurston's lights. THE CON SERVATIVE is an admirer of Mr. Thurs ton and can not at times refrain from expressing its enthusiasm for his fluffy and feathery rhetoric and his rotund oratory which is always so innocent of premeditation , so perfectly guiltless of thought. PROSPERITY. A great'many old-fashioned people ple believe that disaster and prosperity are alike attributable more to natural than to political causes. Corn crops and wheat crops have been known to flourish and to produce well even before the McKinley administration was in augurated. And God , in his fatherly goodness permitted the rains and the sunshine , the dews and the fertile earth to render consummate satisfactions to the farmer in the way of fruits and foods even be fore McKinley was born. But in recent republican oratory the source of all good , all fertility , all pros perity , was depicted as domiciled in McKinley. Never before have speakers presumed so much on the credulity and ignorance of audiences. On the other hand the populists have demonstrated that the drouths , chinch- bug , grasshopper and cut-worm are the direct and logical results of the gold standard and the republican adminis tration. Nevertheless a large and re spectable percentage of Americans hold that disaster and distress in affairs come generally from extravagance , in dolence and mismanagement. And the same people really think that prosper ity is born of industry , frugality and good management. Politics and pros perity are not partners. . Many organs of PARADOXICAL the populist party in Nebraska are explaining the diminu tion of the calamity vote at the recent election by stating that the populists were all so industriousl3r at work in fields and factories that they could not spare the time to attend the election. This is a queer excuse to bo unani mously circulated by a press which for months has unanimously declared that the unemployed wore all over Ne braska and that relatively very few citi zens had anything to do. The paradoxes of populism are many and this is one of the most stalwart. The defeat of Ata-tamLIn- - coin by Stephen A. Douglas in the senatorial campaign of 1858 made Lincoln a presidential can didate and elected him in 1860. Doug las and Lincoln held relatively the same position then in Illinois that Bryan and Allen now occupy in Nebraska ; one had been for a long time , pronouncedly , in candidature for the presidency. The other , Mr. Lincoln , had served one term in congress and was not then nearly as well known as Senator Allen is today. And Allen's defeat for the senate may make him the most prominent and available , as ho is the most force ful and able , among all the popu- listic candidates yet mentioned for that high office. Of course Mr. Bryan , nominally a democrat , could not and would not accept the nomination of a strictly populistic convention in 1900 any more than Mr. Douglas could have taken a republican nomination away from Mr. Lincoln in 1860. THE CONSERVATIVE still asserts that "William Vincent Allen is the biggest , brainiest and most dangerous populistic candidate for the presidency in the United States. NOT AIXBN. returns that the legislature of Nebraska will not be a populist legislature and that the United States senator whom it will elect to succeed William Vincent Allen will not be William Vincent Allen. And upon this point the commonwealth is congratulated by all conservative citi zens. Senator Allen is an able man. Ho is a man of strong prejudices and tremendous will. There is nothing which Allen would not do , that could be done with impunity , to accomplish a political end. His genius and his ambi tion for public office are vigorous and self-assertive. Senator Allen is by na ture and by intellectual training and de velopment an intellectual athlete with whom his colleague , Senator Thurston , ought never to wrestle. Allen was born with more physical and mental stamina than Thurston and while both men have often changed views upon political or economic questions Allen has