A GREAT VICTORY
A GREAT VICTORY THE VOTERS of Wisconsin went to the polls last Tuesday and handed down a judgment of the utmost importance in the history of politics and good government in this state. The...
...The advent of his "department" or "column" as a syndicated feature was greeted with surprise and derision when the public discovered that he was peddling his words at three dollars each and that he was using his tale.nts to tell the public that the grass is green, the sky is blue, and that the Hoover administration at Washington still lives...
...Untold thousands of dollars were poured into the Kohler campaign slush fund and untold thousands were expended lavishly in a frenzied effort to bolster up the Kohler candidacy...
...And it is congress that should provide remedies for unemployment and other social defects In our present civilization.—Samuel A. Carlson...
...In the first place, the United States Supreme Court has never handed down a ruling that jurisdiction over primary Senatorial elections rests entirely and exclusively with the states...
...w. h. for additional current used...
...and about 3 cents per k.w.h...
...The recent ruling of the Supreme Court to the effect that labor unions may be sued at law for damages, it is pointed '>-¦' gives employers an opportunity for redress of real or L Cd wrongs at the hands of the workers, and removes any M ¦ or justification for labor injunctions...
...The United States Senate by Constitutional authority is the sole judge of the honesty and regularity of the elections of men who are named to be its members...
...I am doing this—not because I agree with all you say, but because I want to give ( encouragement to independent nnd minority viewpoints...
...for the next 125 kilowatt hours...
...In the statement quoted above...
...about 3I/O cents per k.w.h...
...Berman of the University of Illinois recently stated, "the time is not far distant when the courts, instead of being agents of the employers, will be agents of all honest citizens...
...To use his own phrase, Mr...
...In rural regions this same utility, in the rates pronounced effective May 1, 1930, makes two charges to its farm consumers, a regular service charge and an energy charge...
...Coolidge...
...IT isn't very likely that many intelligent people in the country today are giving any serious attention to this new newspaper "racket" of Mr...
...All through these tiring weeks- of his campaign, Phil La Follette demonstrated his splendid capacity for leadership and his devotion to Progressive principles and ideals...
...for the first 60 kilowatt hours used per month, and 3 cents per.k...
...U> i I am enclosing one dollar m renewal of my subscription to The Progressive...
...Over two months ago this-33-year-old son of the late Robert M. LaFollette, Sr., started out from his home with a deep determination in his soul to carry the real, vital issues of the campaign to the voters of this state...
...The former varies from $3.50 to $7.50 or more per month, depending upon the size transformer required, and where more than one farm consumer gets power from a transformer, this charge is divided...
...The people of Wisconsin ought not to need a better refutation of the old argument of the big utility interests that their first aim is to render "service" and promote the welfare of the local communities in which they are located...
...And, meanwhile, tin's big Northern States Power Company utility continues to send 75,000,000 kilowatt hours of power out of the state each year and sell it at a. juice of one cent per k.w.h...
...Unlike Kohler, he had no big financial interests or big business interests behind him and no huge slush fund to provide bands, billboards, buttons, and a thousand other whatnots to ballyhoo his name across the width and breadth of this state...
...Thousands of Wisconsin consumers in cities, towns, and villages would welcome the opportunity to use electricity for heating, cooking, and other purposes if the rates were not kept at the present high figures...
...about 8i/> cents per k.w.h...
...But locked up in this young man named Philip F. LaFollette was the will and the desire to fight the campaign out to a finish on issues and principles alone, and to carry his case for final judgment to the people of this state...
...With commendable wisdom and foresight they have chosen in Philip F. LaFollette and the victorious Progressive candidates all down the line, men who bo-Jieve in the Jeffersonian doctrine of democracy that control of government belongs to ALL the people and should be conducted solely to serve their interests...
...A BLOW TO INJUNCTIONS HP HE Supreme Court of the United States recently handed down a decision that, in the opinion of experts, prqmises to be of great importance in the struggle of organized labor against the unfair and unjust use of injunctions in labor disputes...
...for the first 3 kilowatt hours...
...This big utility is controlled by the huge Byllesby interests in Chicago, and since 1928 it has showed net profits of approximately $2,000,000 yearly...
...Throughout it all he remained calm, serene, and met every issue and every guestion with frankness and honesty...
...The voters of Wisconsin are to be congratulated in the choice that they have made...
...The question remains unsettled, for the Court was unable to reach a decision on the matter...
...AS THE final weeks of the campaign in Wisconsin came to a close, it became evident that the reactionaries and Conservatives of this state that had arrayed themselves solidly behind the candidacy of the present governor, Walter J. Kohler, had formed a conspiracy to almost literally buy the governorship of this state...
...He visited hundreds of communities and made hundreds of speeches in all parts of the state in a strenuous campaign that would have utterly exhausted most men...
...Their judgment as expressed in the overwhelming majority in his favor shows better than anything else could that the people of this state have been quick to recognize in him an able and willing leader in whom every trust and confidence may be placed...
...The President may be mistaken in his stand on Muscle Shoals, but I regard him as a capable, courageous, incorruptible executive...
...JPROM the foregoing it can be seen that electric energy pro-duced in Wisconsin is being sent out of the state and sold at a fraction of the price that is charged consumers in the state of Wisconsin...
...IT is encouraging to note that public opinion has definitely turned against the misuse of injunctions as weapons in the hands of the big manufacturers and industrialists against the rights of the workers* It is encouraging, too, that such decisions as the recent Supreme Court ruling can be applied in such a way as to illegalize the use of court injunctions against, labor and to hope that, as Dr...
...Secondly, the purpose of the investigations being carried on by the Senate campaign investigating committee is not simply for the purpose of future legislation...
...A discount of 10 per cent is allowed if bills are paid in 10 days...
...V * * * IT ¦•• t necessary to find examples to illustrate the ridiculous *• ain utal use of labor injunctions by anti-union employers...
...for the next 3 kilowatt hours...
...In investigating senatorial campaigns, the Senate and its committee are no more than performing a solemn duty, * * » "JY^R...
...Hit* Is neeer-sary In a democracy like ours...
...In Wisconsin, the Northern States Power Company charges its small consumers in the towns and villages it serves the following rates: from 9 to 11 cents per k.w.h...
...In spite of the expenditure of a campaign slush fund in behalf of Walter J. Kohler of $250,000, in spite of the combined efforts of wealth, special privilege, and monopoly as typified by the chain banks, the big manufacturers, the power trust, and the big business interests of this state to buy Kohler's re-election, they have repudiated the whole Hamilton-ian political philosophy of monopoly that government should be in the hands of a favored few...
...COOLIDGE'S actions and expressions since he retired from the high office of President have been anything but fitting for the dignity and prestige that ought to cling to any man who has been honored to that great position...
...The nomination of Philip F. LaFollette as the Republican candidate for the governorship by the tremendous majority of more than 110,000 is a victory for the Progressive cause and for good government that has few parallels in the political annals of this nation...
...Coolidge not only shows his subservience to Old Guard slush fund tactics, but he reveals an extraordinary ability to muddle the truth...
...The - -irience with striking workers with the courts in this omit n the last decade is full of instances where judges have : liliz he power entrusted to them to serve the big employers ' '¦• ?«ist discriminations against American working-Trie public is rapidly learning the truth about ; and changing its attitude toward the courts ready and willing to place this deadly weapon -;i nrts oi the big, slave-driving employers...
...SAYS HOOVKR NOT TO HI A Mi: iJamestown, N. Y., Sept...
...And it congratulates the voters of Wisconsin on their choice of a candidate who is, worthy of their trust and confidence...
...Reading his three dollar a word banalities in the newspapers, or observing his conduct as a willing servant to wealth and monopoly, one is tempted to wish that there were a pension system for Presidents that put them in a nice quiet place when they retired from office and kept them from making themselves quite ridiculous...
...The Progressive congratulates Philip F. LaFollette on his splendid victory at the polls last Tuesday...
...to a.big subsidiary utility in Minnesota...
...for additional power, all these rates being on the per room per month basis!' A discount of five per cent for prompt payment within 10 days is allowed...
...Thousands of Wisconsin farmers are unable to pay the high service and energy charges that arc required, and as a result they are deprived of electricity entirely and must get along as best they can without it...
...They have demonstrated in action that speaks louder than any words that they have every faith that Phil La Follette, as governor, can be depended upon to work tirelessly and honestly in the public interest and that special privilege and favoritism to a few at the expense of »the many will not be tolerated in his- administration in the highest executive office in Wisconsin...
...In addition, a mileage charge at the rate of $1.00 per month for each one-tenth mile of excess farm line is charged, and to this total must be added the energy charge at the rate of 7.5 cents per k.w.h...
...SELLING POWER OUT OF THE STATE A SIGNIFICANT illustration of the sort of treatment farmers and other small consumers of electric energy receive from the big utility interests is afforded by the present situation in north-western Wisconsin in the territory served by the Northern States Power Company...
...1 ( have, been instances where the application of the injunction has resulted in a virtual enslavement of thousands of workers...
...THE SPECTACLE OF CAL IN one of his recent syndicated sermonettes, Calvin Coolidge, who will be remembered as having been President of the United States in the middle years of the "do-nothing decade," comes to the rescue of his big moneyed friends with an evasive thrust at the Senate committee investigating campaign expenditures...
...After the Supreme Court decision that jurisdiction over nominations rests with the states, an investigation df them under the fiction that it is for the purpose of future legislation is a questionable use of authority...
...A contract between the Northern States Power Company of , Wisconsin, and its Minnesota subsidiary of the same name was recently increased so as to provide that the Wisconsin utility will send into Minnesota 75,000,000 kilowatt hours of electric power yearly...
...In every state where there has been huge expenditures of money for election purposes and where slush funds have been lavishly thrown around to buy Senatorships and other public offices for the darlings of the big interests, the Senate investigating committee has been bitterly attacked by the money crowd...
...Coolidge as a newspaper hack writer is not a very "dignified spectacle...
...And now, at the rate'of three dollars a word, Calvin Coolidge sycophantieally licks the boots of the Old Guard crowd that believes that money, not ability or merit, should be the determining factor in elections, with the following words: "The Senatorial committee investigating campaign expenses is not a dignified spectacle...
...I do not agree with your attack uy>-on President Hoover...
...It Is Congress, not the President that frames the lr.ws under which thei'2 conditions exist...
...The price which the agreement calls for to be paid by the Northern States Power Company of Minnesota for this electric energy is one cent per kilowatt hour...
...The returns from this week's primary that give Phil La Follette a victory that has staggered and bewildered the forces of wealth and monopoly that fought against him, indicate how ably he carried these issues and principles to the people of Wisconsin...
...Unable to strike or bargain collectively with their employers, in debt and existing on the lowest of starvation wages, living in "company towns" and in shanty houses owned by their employers, thousands of American working men and women have been enjoined by the courts from doing anything to better themselves or their working conditions by the arbitrary action of wealth-serving judges in issuing injunctions at the requests of the big employers, Picketing has been forbidden, and workers thrown into jail for the violation of ridiculous court injunctions that never should have been issued...
...Throughout one of the hottest and bitterest campaigns in the history of Wisconsin, Philip F. LaFollette never wavered from this steadfast purpose...
...The legal justification of injunctions is that they are necessary and may be obtained when there is no other remedy at law...
...He should not be blamed for present economic conditions...
Vol. 1 • September 1930 • No. 42
