THE PERIL OF MONEY IN POLITICS
Borah, William E.
The Peril of Money in Politics (By WILLIAM E. BORAH (United States Senator from Idaho) The following is a passage from a recent speech of Senator Borah at Ferefield, Idaho. It points out the...
...He could not pay it...
...IT IS CLAIMED that these startling revelations as to the expenditures of money in elections are nothing _ more than an impeachment of the primary...
...Another gentleman was recommended...
...F. S. SNELL, Mill-edcevillp...
...It is against the rules.—From Dearborn Independent...
...When a presidential campaign is on these political brokers carry their wares to the market...
...Why, Henry, you don't mean to tell me that your beard is tougher than the oilcloth...
...I have ho doubt the men of Wealth, to a large extent at least, would have been glad to be let alone...
...But that is only one phase of the evil...
...I told the story almost two years before he was nominated, but nobody could believe it because it was impossible for me to disclose the source of my information...
...Outlook...
...Let us hope that this exposure will arouse the whole country to the necessity of dealing with a problem which has assumed the proportio nof a great national evil...
...The article fell dead from the press, twenty-two years ago, because I was unable to state that President Roosevelt was the authority for it...
...I was in the South a few days ago and learned first-hand of an incident which illustrates what I mean...
...Let us not be deluded by the fallacious proposition that the late expenditures are due to the primary or confined to one or two states...
...Anyone who has been in Washington during the making of a tariff bill will not doubt this proposition...
...United States District Attorneyships, Marshal-ships, Postmasterships should be taken off the market...
...It points out the peril now threatening this nation from increasing corruption in politics, and more particularly answers the statements of Senator Reed (Pa) and others that the direct primaries are the source of the evil.—Editorial note...
...He had made a good official...
...But the office seekers would not let them alone...
...10 lb...
...It is a fearful national evil and will in the end, if not controlled, destroy the government of the people and substitute therefor a government of the few—the few who have sufficient money with which to buy government...
...The political boss, the national committeeman, stated to him, however, that his reappointment would cost him $1,000...
...He desired reappointment...
...That was a convention that they were controlling, not a primary...
...stable...
...But the lawsuit which grew out of the pre-convention campaign brought out the real facts...
...But not until the whole English people became aroused and the public conscience stirred to a depth were they able to control the evil...
...pail, $1.60...
...A young man was postmaster...
...No writer who knows his groceries ever quotes the President...
...can, $8.50...
...Some years ago politicians got into the habit of seeking contributions from men of great wealth...
...60 lb...
...The Peril of Money in Politics (By WILLIAM E. BORAH (United States Senator from Idaho) The following is a passage from a recent speech of Senator Borah at Ferefield, Idaho...
...Pennsylvania and Illinois are but out-croppings of a malady, nation-wide and long-existent...
...That is corruption at the very source of power...
...The whole body politic seemed rotten from center to circumference...
...It is a difficut task but the Republican party is big enough and strong enough to do the work...
...WHEN MORGAN PICKED A PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE The Presidency of the United States is a blinding white light set upon the highest political peak in the world, but the paths that lead to it are often hidden in shadows...
...I wish that was all there was to it...
...Exposes Use of Money IT IS ALL RIGHT to expose the use of money in the primary...
...Whenever there is a real contest in the national convention for the nomination of the Presidency, the delegates from the South are sought to be controlled and managed by shameless use of patronage and money...
...What queer pranks fate plays...
...We should also deal with this shameless traffic in public questions which goes on under the very eyes of those in power...
...Here was the greatest newspaper story of its kind that I ever handled during all the years I was engaged in newspaper work, yet the press association that served our newspaper would not touch it and the readers of our paper were perhaps justified in regarding it as a fake...
...She Had Tested It,—"My razor doesn't cut at all...
...But, after all, this peculiar kind of evil will yield to nothing less than the aroused conscience of an entire nation...
...It was inevitable, if large sums were to be given, that large sums would have to be returned in some Way...
...I do not know of a greater task or a more eminent task before us as a people...
...Being without issues, they substituted dollars and cents—that is too often the case...
...They have done so to a marked extent...
...Years ago, men, political cashiers, stood in the gangway of the House of Commons and paid off the members as they filed out for the votes which they had cast...
...Must Arouse Nation WE CAN DO something, of course, in the way of legislation...
...That is general practice in the South...
...Tried to Buy Presidency WE ALL REMEMBER how in 1920 there was a cold-blooded, deliberate scheme to buy the nomination for the Presidency...
...The Republican organization of the South is held together and sustained by the worst kind of corruption...
...But what it reveals is that money has come to be the moving power in American politics...
...If Senator Heed and his committee in the fine work they have done succeed in arousing the people to the real •problem before us, they will have performed a service of incalculable worth...
...pail, 90o...
...We would all be- happy if we could get rid of money in polities by repealing the primary laws...
...WHITE GLOVER HONEY—Pure White Clover Honey, 5 lb...
...This was partly revealed before the convention took place, sufficiently so perhaps to prevent the realization of the scheme...
...Alton B. Parker, who died in New York last May, was once on a path that led to the Presidency, but the story of how he got there has never been told in such a manner that anybody could believe it...
...Your postmaster will furnish you parcel post rates on small pails to your postoffice...
...One virtue which the primary has is that it does enable us to expose the use of real money more successfully than in conventions...
...If Sam Jnsull gave money in the campaign in Illinois, as it is claimed, in expectation of being favored, he did exactly the same thing which many a tariff beneficiary does in every political campaign...
...We have political brokers in patronage who are experts in the game...
...The Republican party owes it to itself to clean out that Augean...
...It showed beyond question that they proposed to buy and pay cash for that high office just the same as they would buy gold mines and for the same reason—for what they could make out of it...
...There are some things which we should strive to secure, and that is, absolute publicity as the campaign proceeds and the arousing of the people to the necessity of dealing with those who run for office on the strength of money rather than upon issues...
...It is poisoning the stream at the very well-springs of national influence...
...The English people legislated upon the subject...
...Let us hope that we will throttle the practice which not only has its say in elections but also its influence and effect through-cut the field of legislation and the whole fabric of government...
...Hence, money and politics joined forces and money has its say in shaping legislation and in administering the laws of the country...
Vol. 18 • September 1926 • No. 9
