Evening Republican, Volume 16, Number 189, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 8 August 1912 — ROOSEVELT AND JOHNSON HEAD PROGRESSIVE PARTY. [ARTICLE]

ROOSEVELT AND JOHNSON HEAD PROGRESSIVE PARTY.

Ex-President and California Governor Named in Chicago—Delegates Approve Platform. The new national progressive party completed its labors in Chicago Wednesday after nominating Theodore Roosevelt for president and Hiram Johnson, of California, vice-president, and adopting with unanimous vote the platform as submitted by the committee. The platform is constructed on the broad plan of the greatest good to the greatest number, so it implies, and if taken literally it holds: out hope of prosperity where men have built up their own failure. It is a socialistic platform and shakes the very foundation of constitutional government, advocating changes in the constitutional provisions of our forefathers that were placed there as a safeguard to our bommon rights. It can not be denied that viewed from the standpoint of social and economic equation the platform is worded to secure great things. But this is a pledge of socialism against which our people have rebelled when advocated by Eugene V. Debs. It is a proposition that destroys ambition and that' has not proved practical any place in the world. It is unselfish in declaration but its inspiration was selfish. It is humanitarian but many who have declared sot it have never lieen devoted to its principles as traits of individual character. It is filled with brilliant promises planned to entice support for the sentimept it contains. The high cost of living is to be inquired into, along with a plan of raising wages to a certain standard by legal process. Two inharmonious propositions. The conservative plank starts out with a declaration, of the use of resources for the good of the people and closes with a statement that the natural resources should be owned and controlled by the nation, but it makes no square-toed promise to do it. s . On the tariff question the platform becomes very clear and in a part practical. It announces a belief in the protective, tariff. The farmer will look at the declaration with some doubt, for it advocates equal conditions of competition between the United States and foreign countries, ‘‘both for the farmer and the manufacturer.” Thus, it proposes a reduction of revenues or a removal of them on farm products corresponding to the cost of production in this country and all foreign countries. Not only Canada but all foreign countries, which would make Canadian reciprocity look like a real protection. But it concludes with a demand for the repeal of the Canadian reciprocity act. We have here a sample of ambiguity as rare as a platform of platitudes ever pronounced. You can not tell what is proposed, but can see clearly that your vote is urged as a means of victory for the ticket named. While distrust is engendered for big business at home, the power of organization and management of our business men is commended for the opportunity thus afforded for building Up foreign trade. All in all the platform is a vision of the ideal with a suggestion of the conservative and behind both a shade of insincerity. Thus the national progressive party is launched with the support of many* men as good as the purest motive in the platform, and with the inspiration of a man who never advocated such principles throughout his life of office holding and whose motive now is the gratification of his own agibition.