NEWS WORTH REMEMBERING
News Worth Remembering WITH the opening of Congress on the 6th, public attention turned toward the capitol at Washington. And it is likely to be fixed there without wavering until the close of the...
...Continuing, he said "I have never seen a time when the men were as ready for concerted action as in the present instance", and predicted success for the switchmen...
...At the close of the session on the 4th, Mr...
...Many observers see in this action a move which will ultimately mean a curtailment of the power of the House cf Lords...
...He believes that the reforms announced by Belgium with respect to the situation in the Congo are "an augury of better things...
...New elections will be held and a new Parliament will assemble about the middle of February...
...And it is likely to be fixed there without wavering until the close of the session...
...Charles H. Richards of New York was chosen president, Theodore Robinson of Chicago, vice president, and Frederic V. Pratt of Brooklyn, Treasurer...
...Urges Postal Savings Banks Referring to the postal deficit, the President states that the loss incurred in transmitting second class mail matter amounts to about $63,000,000 a year...
...The campaign has already opened in earnest and the outcome will determine to a large extent whether or not England is to continue under the rule of Privilege and whether the land and liquor monopolists will be made to bear their just share of the burdens of taxation—burdens which now rest almost entirely upon the backs of the poor...
...He declared that a majority of ninety members in the Senate, who were overriding the will of the voters of the party, could not lay down for him the test of loyalty to the Republican party...
...This company, with its $472,000,000 of assets, was controlled by Thomas F. Ryan, who had acquired the company from the Hydes, after the insurance scandals of four years ago...
...Senator Moses E. Clapp of Minnesota spoke in Milwaukee on the 2nd to a large audience that frequently interrupted with applause his declarations of opposition to Aldrich rule...
...President Taft recommends reform in the administration of justice...
...He points out that this great difference between wholesale and retail prices on this one commodity, is largely due to the fact that there are so many small retail meat shops, each one finding it necessary to maintain delivery wagons and other equipment, the cost of which must be borne by the consumer...
...He recommends a civil pension for superannuated government employees...
...He said a political party to be enduring must have something more than "solidarity,"—it must have "vitality and integrity...
...Senator Jonathan P. Dolliver of Iowa in an interview at Chicago on the 4th strongly condemned the character of the present leadership of the Republican party in Congress...
...In theory, at least, the government can not now legally collect taxes to pay its expenses...
...Farmers More Prosperous Than Ever That the farmers of the nation have enjoyed the most prosperous year in the history of agriculture is stated by Secretary of Agriculture Wilson in his thirteenth annual report He places the revenue received fey farmers for their products for the year just passed at $8,760,000,000...
...On the 1st, a Washington dispatch announced that an investigation of the Sugar Trust will be urged upon the Senate by Senators Cummins and Bourne, supported by other progressive Senators...
...Clapp and Dolliver Speak The struggle of the Progressive senators to free the Republican party from the domination of the great special interests continues unabated...
...On the other hand, President F. 7. Hawley, speaking for the switchmen, said "The switchmen have been fair in their requests...
...He says, "I do not doubt for one moment that much of the lawlessness, violence and cruelty exhibited in lynchings is directly due to the uncertainties and injustice growing out of the delay in trials, judgments and executions thereof by our courts...
...There are big issues to be fought out—issues in which the people have a keen interest— and every move in the great struggle for party control, will be followed closely...
...By refusing its formal assent to the Budget and referring it to the people for judgment, the Lords created a situation almost unprecedented in English history...
...Meanwhile, a number of cruisers and gunboats with marines have been dispatched to Nicaragua for the protection of American interests...
...Naturally, the attitude that will be taken by President Taft in this contest is a subject of considerable speculation...
...Sugar Scandals Aired How the discovery was made of the alleged conspiracy among members of the Sugar Trust to swindle the government by un-derweighing imported sugar, was told on the 3rd by Richard A. Paar on the witness stand in the criminal branch of the United States Circuit Court in New York...
...Other speakers were Dr...
...He says that a change is needed in judicial procedure with a view to reducing its expense to private litigants in civil cases and facilitating the dispatch of business and final decision in both civil and criminal cases...
...He declares that the Zelaya government of Nicaragua has kept Central America in constant tension or turmoil and adds "at the date when this message is presented, this government is proceeding with deliberate circumspection to determine the exact truth in relation to these reports and on the course in the premises most consistent with its dignity, its duty to American interests and its moral obligations to Central America and to civilization...
...News Notes On December 1, Secretary of State Knox issued a note to the Nicaraguan charge d'affaires at Washington, terminating diplomatic relations between the two countries...
...Morgan's office and the price paid for the stock was kept secret...
...When cross-examined, Paar disclosed the fact that it was President Roosevelt who had ordered the sugar investigation...
...With certain exceptions, he urges previous notice and a reasonable opportunity to be heard on behalf of the parties to be enjoined...
...On the 3rd Parliament was prorogued...
...Unwise" to Revise Tariff at Present The President says he hopes and believes that no tariff wars will arise as a result of the power imposed on the executive in the minimum and maximum clause of the tariff law...
...He suggests that Congress may well consider whether radical steps should not be taken to reduce this deficit and hints that a higher rate of postage imposed upon magazines and periodicals might help to accomplish this...
...A dispatch of the 3rd contained the information that Zelaya nad sent emissaries to the United States, who will endeavor to secure a Congressional investigation of the whole affair...
...None of the details of the transaction were given out from Mr...
...The ensuing campaign will be followed throughout the world with keen interest...
...Raymond Robins of the Woman's Trade Union League of Chicago said that industrial education must be given to the young girl as well as to the young boy...
...Briefly stated, the President's message is as follows: With regard to foreign affairs, President Taft says "The relations of the United States with all foreign governments have continued upon the normal basis of amity and good understanding, and are very generally satisfactory...
...George H. Martin of Boston and Alexander C. Humphreys, President of the National Society and head of Stevens Institute...
...English Lords Reject Budget Disregarding the advice of some of the most distinguished of its members, such as Roseberry, Morley, Lord James of Hereford, Cromer, Lord Balfour of Burleigh, the Earl of Lytton, Lord Courtney and the Archbishops of Canterbury and York, the House of Lords on November 30 rejected the Lloyd-George budget...
...The company has agreed to obey the order...
...Trade Schools Demanded That the trade school must be developed upon a far-reaching scale and that the rapid advance of applied knowledge in the world and the absence of trade schools in the United States have made it advisable for universities to give aid in industrial education was stated by President Charles R. Van Hise of the University of Wisconsin at the third annual convention of the National Society for the Promotion of Industrial Education at Milwaukee on the 2nd...
...He recommends a commission to consider reforms along these lines...
...He recommends a continuing annual appropriation for the new tariff board, stating that its work will probably take two or three years...
...That the strike may spread is suggested, and President Hawley announced that switchmen throughout the East were prepared to go out on a moment's notice...
...He refers to the criminal prosecutions now proceeding against government officers involved in these frauds and the officers and employees of the companies who have also been privy to the fraud...
...He strongly urges the establishment of postal savings banks...
...He condemns the guarantee of bank deposits which he says "seems to me to have in it the seeds of demoralization to conservative banking and certain financial disaster...
...Paar is Deputy surveyor at the New York port in charge of the weighing of sugar...
...Sugar Frauds to be Probed Referring to the customs frauds of the sugar trust he says: "The government has recovered from the American Sugar Refining Company all that it is shown to have been defrauded of...
...Some say the President will side with the Standpatters...
...Labor organizations generally side with the switchmen although some of the railroad brotherhoods have refused to aid them...
...He paid tribute to Senator La Follette, saying, "We need men like him...
...As compared with the average for the period from 1896 to 1900, the relative price of all commodities, he says, in 1909 was as 122.6 to 100...
...Morgan's idea in acquiring this stock, according to a statement issued on the 4th, is to make it impossible for this great interest to be used to the detriment of the policy holder, and to place the control of the Equitable stock outside of the realms of financial juggling...
...When I am asked why I do not vote with the majority I say: 'Not until I have made a chemical analysis of it.'" "The real insurgents," he continued, "at the extraordinary session of Congress Were not the few men who tried to represent the public interest faithfully and carry out the pledges of the party platform, but the interesting group of private interests before whose threats to defeat legislation the leaders of the party bowed down for the sake of harmony...
...J. Pierpont Morgan in Big Deal On the 2nd announcement was made that J. Pierpont Morgan had acquired control of the Equitable Life Assurance Society...
...The railroad managers isued a public statement in which they outlined the demands of the switchmen and charged that the strikers broke faith by refusing to arbitrate...
...He urges the establishment of a national bureau of health...
...He says he is cenvinced that the people want such banks and that they will be productive of the utmost good...
...He says the Panama Canal will be completed January 1, 1915...
...it has established banks...
...One of the most interesting sections of Secretary Wilson's report is that dealing with the increases in prices of foodstuffs...
...I believe," the president continues, "that the work of this board will be of prime utility and importance whenever Congress shall deem it wise again to adjust the customs duties...
...It will be a queer state of the public mind when representatives of the people are successfully read out of the party in order to secure a solidarity organized arcund merely private interests...
...The envoy was given his passport and the causes for the action were stated...
...Secretary Knox asserts that President Zelaya has been the cause of much disturbance in Central America, that he has violated the agreement between the republics of that portion of the continent, that he has ruled the people of Nicaragua tyrannically, and that American citizens and interests have been unsafe...
...He recommends additional legislation to assist in the suppression of the white slave traffic and says there is urgent necessity for greater executive activity to suppress it...
...His recommendations to Congress will determine to a large extent the program to be followed by both Progressives and Standpatters in Congress, and will be the central theme of popular discussion for weeks to come...
...For these reasons the United States will give its moral support and perhaps material aid to the insurgents, to the end of restoring order and deposing President Zelaya...
...But the press of the country seems to reflect a disposition to wait and see, to give the President an opportunity to act before attempting to define his position...
...Nothing, however, halts business and interferes with the course of prosperity so much as the threatened revision of the tariff and until the facts are at hand, after careful and deliberate investigation upon which such revision can properly be undertaken, it seems to me unwise to attempt it...
...On the 3rd, other speakers urged the establishment of trade schools for the industrial education of the youth of the country and Mrs...
...The time when a skin game can be worked on the people with the unanimous consent of Congress will never come again," he said...
...it has helped to make the farmer a citizen of the world...
...The state corporation commission of Oklahoma issued an order on December 4th, reducing the rates the Pullman company may charge...
...Paar gave sensational testimony to the effect that he had been offered bribes to withhold his information concerning the alleged frauds...
...and still others that he will throughout maintain a neutral position, and endeavor wherever possible to harmonize the discordant elements of the party...
...On the 2nd it was reported that additional evidence and more witnesses of importance to the government's case against the American Sugar Refining company have disappeared...
...It would seem to me," adds the President, "that an investigation of the frauds by Congress, at present, pending the probing by the treasury department and the department of justice, as proposed, might, by giving immunity and otherwise, prove an embarrassment in securing conviction of the guilty parties...
...He refers to his meeting with President Diaz of Mexico which he hopes signalizes the close and cordial relations with that republic...
...He "earnestly recommends" the passage of a ship subsidy bill for the establishment of lines between the Atlantic seaboard and South America, as well as lines from the Pacific seaboard to South America, Japan, China and the Philippines...
...On the 3rd, it was pointed out in a New York dispatch that this purchase of the Equitable may be the first step in a giant merger of the Equitable, the New York Life, and the Mutual Life—which are known as "the big three," of life insurance...
...It was shown that its profits for last year were 37 1/2 per cent...
...He says, "Our traditional relations with the Japanese empire, continue cordial as usual," and that the revision of the existing treaty between the United States and Japan which is to end in 1912 is now being studied by both countries...
...The vote was 350 against the budget to 75 in its favor...
...it has provided him with means for improving the soil and making it more productive...
...Meanwhile, railroads are preparing to fight to a finish and are rushing non-union men to the deserted yards to take the place of the strikers...
...But," he adds, "there was an express provision in the contract of settlement by which the settlement should not interfere with or prevent the criminal prosecution of everyone who was found to be subject to the same...
...It is pointed out that this transfer of the control means a change from the old order when insurance companies controlled the destinies of banks and trust companies, since now one banker will control one of the largest of the great insurance companies...
...He says that an investigation was made of the retail price of beef in fifty cities and that the average increase of the retail price over the wholesale price was found to be 38 per cent...
...He states that the government budget in all departments has been "cut to the quick...
...Economy is Urged "Perhaps the most important question presented to this administration," says President Taft, "is that of economy in expenditures and sufficiency of revenue...
...Big Rail Strike On On November 30, after fifteen days of negotiations between the switchmen and managers of thirteen railroads of the Northwest, a strike involving 2,300 switchmen went into effect...
...With regard to the financial condition of the country the President says, "So far as the Secretary of the Treasury is able to form a judgment * * * there will be no deficit for the year ending June 30, 1911, but a small surplus of $712,000...
...If the facts secured by the tariff board are of such a character as to show generally that the rates and duties imposed by the present tariff law are excessive, under the principles of protection as described in the platform of the successful party at the late election, I shall not hesitate to invite the attention of Congress to this fact and to the necessity for action predicated thereon...
...The underlying thought of his talk, however, was "the proposition that the American people have a right to govern themselves and that political parties, the rank and file of the parties, has the right to govern and control the party's policy...
...He discussed the tariff and explained the manner in which it was jammed through Congress during the special session with but little regard for the consumer and with a great deal of political trading and juggling...
...No one," he says, "is seeking a tariff war or a condition in which the spirit of retaliation shall be aroused...
...At present it is a matter of uncertainty...
...This revenue" says Secretary Wilson, "has paid off mortgages...
...He recommends legislation relating to the issuance of injunctions...
...Taft's Recommendations to Congress Meanwhile, the question of most immediate importance concerns the President's message...
...Whatever the President may decide to do, however, it is certain that the Progressives will continue their fight against Cannon-ism in the House and Aldrichism in the Senate...
...others that he will champion the cause of the progressives even at the expense of antagonizing the great corporations of the East...
Vol. 1 • December 1909 • No. 49
