"GETTING RID OF THE DARNED THING"
Quick, Herbert
" Getting Ridof the Darned Thing" From "The Late Lamented" in The Saturday Evening Post By HERBERT QUICK THE HISTORY of the blow up of the Progressive Party is nearly told when one has related...
...It was a situation that was admirably adapted to The Colonels uses...
...tionate and trustful...
...Let us first dispose of the Byzantine logothete, the schoolmaster, the debaucher of our collective soul—Wilson...
...Reform, said The Colonel, is a fine thing, and we'll certainly take it up when we can do so without degrading ourselves to a level lower than the beasts...
...The Mexicans must be made to crawl too—and crawl instanter...
...but its soul had departed and everybody knew it...
...Why couldn't the thing go off and die alone, and not bother us, busy as we are, getting back in line...
...One forlorn hope for The Colonel was an elegant sufficiency—and why couldn't they see it...
...It was a new condition...
...In short, The Colonel, within three months of the outbreak of the European War, was in...
...Disgusting...
...It was so affec...
...It was too much like the task of disposing of the faithful dog of the family when that necessity confronts the household...
...Yet that was the thing the noble creature would not do...
...and still, losing sight of their ancient radicalism, they insisted on follow-follow-following whenever he would lead...
...Finally the European war gave him his chance...
...but just now we must rescue the perishing soul of the nation from the yawning hell beneath it by making the Kaiser crawl— and crawl right now...
...It wagged its tail, looked up into The Colonel's face, and in eloquent dog language said: "Let's go out and die some more...
...a position stormily to accept and heartily to support any man—absolutely any man—whom the Republican Party might name for the presidency...
...It offered the chance to ask the question, "Are you heroic...
...and to use the "We'll follow, follow, follow" motif for a march back into the Republican Party...
...Getting Ridof the Darned Thing" From "The Late Lamented" in The Saturday Evening Post By HERBERT QUICK THE HISTORY of the blow up of the Progressive Party is nearly told when one has related the course of events from the time of Roosevelt's return from Africa to the day of election in November, 1912...
...Perkins...
...It insisted on asking The Colonel to lead a forlorn hope, when anybody could see that he had arranged for service in the opposing trenches...
...Let us not fritter away our time on the Charter of Reform we put into the Progressive platform four years ago...
...And yet there was something provocative to wrath in the oU/-uation...
...The Colonel knew it better than anyone else, and from election day in 1912 to June 26, 1916, his whole course seems to have been steered with the intention of finding a way back into the fold from which he did not stray but bolted frantically, carrying on his horns a panel of the fence...
...And, at last, he absolutely refused to lead—and they blew up...
...And the Old Guard knew it—make no mistake about that So, when the Progressive Party met in convention assembled in Chicago the other day, getting rid of the darned thing must have been a sickening thing for The Colonel and Mr...
...For the last three and a half years a thing has existed called the Progressive Party until the Coloned killed it for the last time on June twenty-six ultimo, by refusing its nomination...
...By offering to the Republicans the name of Henry Cabot Lodge as his candidate Roosevelt gave the Progressives the kick that it seemed was required to go with the hint...
...and, in case of an affirmative answer, to put on a great revival of the Onward-Christian-Soldier pageant...
Vol. 8 • August 1916 • No. 8
