EDITORIALS
Discredited Statesmanship TAWNEY'S defeat in the First Minnesota District removed from public life a faithful servitor of the System. It dealt a severe blow to the "regular" machine in the House....
...And for this reason Tawney's fight was of interest to the whole country...
...In the end it means independence—both economic and political—and a place on the earth he may call home...
...For instance, all franchises are safeguarded by the provision that in order to be binding they must be indorsed by popular vote...
...A year ago President Taft spoke in Tawney's district and gave him the presidential endorsement, at the same time saying that the Payne-Aldrich tariff law is the "best ever...
...If there be any who take Payne's assurances seriously, let them turn to ida M. Tarbell's article in the October American Magazine on "The Passing of Wool...
...Conservation thus comes directly home to the farmer...
...Will they keep going that way until the people are given what is promised them—and in such form that it will really restore representative government...
...All other city officials are subject to civil service examination before appointment...
...Already sixty-nine cities, including- Des Moines, Cedar Rapids, Galveston and Houston, have adopted it...
...If we are to have homes on the public lands, they must be conserved for the men who make homes...
...He was one of the men whom the "regulars" most wanted to save...
...Then we shall be in a fair way of becoming a nation of prosperous and happy homes...
...The farmers are the only great body of our people who remain in large part substantially unorganized...
...Here is an opportunity to make the platform what it should be— a political promissory note...
...And the voters repudiated it...
...The commission plan is bringing renewed hope for real popular government in our cities...
...Let government, state and national, be conducted in the interest of the American citizen rather than in the interest of the American monopoly...
...As chairman of the committee on appropriations he used his power to starve and emasculate legislation in the public interest...
...If this is done, Illinois may yet find it possible to shake herself free from the bi-partisan gang...
...Furthermore, publicity of all municipal transactions is guaranteed by law...
...But we have done little, and far less than many other Nations, for better business and better living on the farm...
...Others are considering its adoption...
...Read it and see...
...Hereafter we shall need in State and Nation not only the work of Departments of Agriculture such as we have now, but we shall need to have added to their functions such duties as will make them departments of rural business and rural life as well...
...The Dethronement of the City Boss, By John J. Hamflton...
...The merchants are organized, the wage-workers are organized, the railroads are organized...
...Conservation and Farm Life THE importance to the farmer of the conservation of our natural resources is emphasized by GlFFORD Pinchot in his new book, "The Fight for Conservation...
...And all the power of the Cannon machine was employed in Tawney's behalf...
...After we have secured better crops the next logical and inevitable step is to secure better business organization oh the farm, so that each farmer shall get from what he grows the best possible return...
...Last week the party wrote into its platform such progressive measures as the initiative and referendum, an improved primary election law, direct election of United States Senators, and a thorough-going corrupt practices act...
...It is now plain that the alienation was occasioned by a deliberate plan of the President's...
...He says it fulfills party pledges and does not affect the cost of living...
...Let equality of opportunity be brought about not only in the acquirement of land but also in the disposal of the products raised on the soil...
...In the issue between oligarchy and self-government, between special interests and the public interest, those who have stood for self-government and the public interest have been impeded by the sense of alienation from the Federal Administration...
...And in this connection Mr...
...But what is the case with the farmer...
...The initiative and referendum is resorted to in all matters of import...
...Unless the American homestead system of small free-holders is to be so replaced by a foreign system of tenantry, there are few things of more importance to the West than to see to it that the public tends pass directly into the hands of the actual settler instead of into the hands of the man who, if he can, will force the settler to pay him the unearned profit of the land speculator, or will hold him in economic and political dependence as a tenant...
...But the lands have in the past fallen into the hands of large corporate or individual owners whose object is always the making of profit and not the building of homes...
...Large holdings," he says, "result in sheep or cattle ranges, in huge ranches, in great areas held for speculative rise in price, and not in homes...
...In those cities at present under a commission form of government the public works have been more honestly and cheaply constructed, economies have been made in the administration of public finances, and impartial government upon business principles has taken the place of the old haphazard system of the "machine" frought with wire pulling and crooked politics...
...Besides marking the downfall of one of the most conspicuous exponents of a brand of statesmanship that is fast being discarded, Tawney's defeat serves to emphasize the futility of "pork barrel" politics in this enlightened day...
...Along the line of better crops we have done more for the farmer, and have done it more effectively, than any other nation...
...The nation congratulates the people of the First Minnesota District...
...Referring to Secretary Norton's letter, announcing that President Taft had decided to withhold patronage no longer from Progressive Senators and Representatives, The Outlook says: "By this letter the President has not enhanced his reputation as a leader...
...Some of the "mysteries and cruelties" of the woolen schedule are told so plainly by Miss Tarbell that every man—and particularly every poor man— who reads it will be made to tee how very vitally it affects his living expenses, eren to the extent of taxing woolen clothes off his back and the backs of his family...
...Under the Des Moines charter, the business of the city is conducted by the heads of five administrative departments, who are directly responsible to the people for all their actions...
...Pinchot points out the value of organization among farmers...
...Price $1.20 net...
...Published by Funk and Wagnalls Company, New York...
...In the second place, under the new regime the city officials themrelves, brought to realize that as servants of the people they mu&t perform their duties honestly and faithfully, are doing efficient work with the best interests of the people always in view...
...Let the public lands be administered in the interest of the home-maker, says the Conservationist...
...The men with whom the farmer competes are organized to get the best results for themselves in their dealings with him...
...Governor Deneen and his supporters made a start in the right direction at the convention...
...Along with this home-making idea goes the idea of betterment of farm life...
...It seems to me clear that farmers have as much to gain from good organization as merchants, plumbers, carpenters, or any of the other trades and businesses of the United States...
...These commissioners are placed in office by a system of double election and are subject to recall if their work becomes unsatisfactory...
...To quote: "The practical value of organization and cooperatian is obvious, and they are being utilized very widely in nearly every branch of our national life...
...It is a story of the breaking up of municipal political machines, of the elimination of the local boss, of the abolition of partisanship in city politics, of the substitution of business management, under direct control of the people, for the old spoils system, under the direction of magnates...
...This is the meaning of conservation to the farmer...
...Platform pledges, as the American people have learned from sad experience, have not always insured legislative fulfillment...
...Dethroning the City Boss IN HIS book, suggestively entitled "The Dethronement of the City Boss," John J. Hamilton gives an account of the commission form of city government...
...But his own record defeated him...
...Thus the farmer, the man on whose product we all live, too often contends almost single-handed against his highly organized competitors...
...Tawney was one of the 'big five" in the House organization, and Speaker Cannon's right-hand man...
...High Tariff and Living Expenses CONGRESSMAN PAYNE now comes forward to eulogize the Payne-Aldrich tariff law...
...In the first place, the average citizen, who under the old system maintained a stolid indifference to matters politic, either through lack of interest or through the knowledge that his ballot was of little value, no matter how it was cast, awakening to his civic duty under the new system, has become an active participant in municipal affairs...
...It is not our purpose to discuss the charter in detail, but the principles which it indorses insure the reestablishment of popular supremacy on a high plane...
...Deneen's Opportunity GOVERNOR DENEEN is at the head of the dominant element of the Republican party in Illinois...
...Pinchot says the prime and only object of the public land system of the United States is that of home-making...
...It was presented to the voters of the First District ably and convincingly by his progressive opponent, Sydney Anderson, and by progressive leaders who have the confidence of the nation...
...The farmer is engaged, usually without the assistance of organization, in competing with these organizations of other groups of citizens...
...A atudr of the commission lan of civic government, as begun in Galveston developed and extended in Des Moines, and already taken up by many other cities in the east and west...
Vol. 2 • October 1910 • No. 39
