Evening Republican, Volume 16, Number 253, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 October 1912 — TURNS SEARCHLIGHT ON A. J. BEVERIDGE [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

TURNS SEARCHLIGHT ON A. J. BEVERIDGE

J. Frank Hanly Discusses Political Activities and Fallacies of Bull Mooser. J. Frank Hanly, whose intimate knowledge of political conditions and of politicians in Indiana makes of him a recognized authority on these subjects, has in his series of campaign speeches, turned a searchlight on Albert J. Beveridge and has revealed the kind of politician and the fallacy of his theories that the Bull Moosers are asking the voters to elect to the governorship of this State. When Mr. Hanly was governor and Beveridge was seeking to retain his seat in the U. S. Senate, Governor Hanly had first hand acquaintance with the Beveridge machine and Beveridge bossism, which the Bull Moose candidate Is now decrying. Speaking of the last when Beveridge was in control of the Republican organization in Indiana, Hanly said: “His attitude was that of a dictator. He sought no counsel. He would hear ho advice. Other candidates on the ticket with him t were given to understand that he was the issue. I have no censure or criticism for any min

who leaves his party because its ideals and purposes are no longer in accord with his own convictions. That Is his privilege. Aye, more. It is hi* high and bounden duty. But before he leaves, and especially if he be in public life and is accustomed tp share in the councils and shape the policy ol his party, he ought to make an honest effort to so form Its Ideals and shape Its purposes that they will accord with his convictions. Without this effort, the sincerity of his purpose may well be questioned. “And if he leaves his party from personal pique or disappointment, or from failure to realize his own desire for place and power—if actuated by these motives or any of them, he turns his back upon the party that has honored him and given him name and fame, and seekß to rend the mantle he has worn simply because it has passed to other shoulders —his act is perfidy itself and he is justly the subject of censure. And in such case his councils should be accepted with caution, and his leadership declined by all thoughtful, honest men. “If I believed Albert J. Beveridge actuated in his present apostasy from the Republican party by high and sincere motives and inspired by high concern of the public welfare and untempted by ambition and desire for personal dominance and power, 1 would have no word of censure for him. “When the party was organized this year he lost control of the state organization and could no longer reign as dictator. Then he announced his departure from the party that had made him all he is in public life, announced his departure before the party had met to write its platform or nominate its ticket, so far as the party in Indiana was* Concerned. “It is just to bear In mind in this connection that it was the Republican party in Indiana that had honored him. Yet he did not wait to hear it speak before he left it. He did not seek to influence its councils or to shape Its policies to the end that they might, when it did speak, voice the truth as he conceived it On the contrary, knowing the time and the place of Its meeting—the hour and the hall —he sought to forestall Its action, to # blight its councils and to abort its purposes by calling a convention, organizing a new party, writing a platform and accepting Its candidacy for the governorship, before the party to which he had belonged could have opportunity to either speak or act.” Mr. Hanly quoted a published interview from John Bonnell, of Crawfordsville, a close friend of Beveridge, making known the efforts of the Bull Moose candidate for governor to win Bonnell to his cause. Bonnell Is quoted with saying of Beveridge: “He then pleaded with me on the score of our old-time friendship and party affiliations, saying that Mr. Roosevelt’s nomination meant to him (Beveridge) his political life or death.” “Here we have It from his own lips," Said Hanly. “He battles today not in the army of the Lord at Armageddon for the public welfare, but in a personal cause, leading a personal army foY personal end* —battling for hi* own personal political life.” Comparing the State Republican and Progressive platforms, Mr: Hanly ff*f* the only substantial differences

as follows: “(l) The initiative, referendum and the recall. (2) The abolition of the present road law permitting road taxes to be worked out and for their payment in cash. (3) The election of United States senators by popular vote. (4) Presidential preferential primaries. (5) The issuance and the sale of watered stock by corporations. (6) The regulation by commission of corporations doing an interstate commerce business. (7) A state inheritance tax. (8) Free school books. “Whatever the merits of his opposition to require the payment of road taxes: In money, it can hardly be said that it furnishes justifiable eauseDw the repudiation of his party by one whom it has greatly honored. He held the party’s commission for twelve years. The present road law permitting taxpayers to work out their road taxes under local supervision has been on the statute books during all that time and during all that time he never raised his voice against It. Only w r hen his party’s commission fell from his hands did he cry out against It. “On the election of United States senators by the people, the Republican platform is silent, but during the last Republican state administration a resolution indorsing it was favored by the Governor and recommended by him to the general assembly. “The prohibition against the issuance and the sale of watered stock is another one of the senator’s new-born ideas. He did not write it in his platform two years ago. He never in his life asked the Republican party to write it in any platform utterance it ever made. “The initiative, the referendum and the recall is opposed by the Republican party. It stands for constitutional representative government —government of the fathers. It has always so stood. That was its attitude during all the years Mr. Beveridge held its commission and in that attitude he acquiesced. His zeal for these is also new-born: born since his defeat two years ago. He did not put it in his platform then. His proposition for the regulation by federal commission of corporations engaged in interstate commerce is of equally recent origin. He did not put that In his platform two years ago. So also with his proposition for preferential presidential primaries; nor Is his proposition for free school books an idea of old birth. He did not write that In his platform two years ago. “ ‘Free school books’ Is a catchy descriptive phrase. In his campaign he has spent much time on this plank. It seems to be the rarest gem in hi* box of political jewels. His promise Is: ‘I will give the people free school books.’ He does not tell them how or by what process this boon is to be effected. “I invite him to come down out of the ‘blue sky’ to mother earth, where real people live, and tell the people how he is going to do it. If he is elected will school books grow on trees, or come down from Heaven as manna, or will they continue to have the mundane habit of having to be paid for by somebody’s money? He can not give them. They’ll have to be paid for, paid for by the taxpayer’* money. Whatever the state furnishes to any one for any purpose without expense to the person receiving it, must necessarily have to be paid for by funds derived from public taxation. States have no other funds. “1 know of but two ways by which he can provide" school books without cost to those who receive them: “1. Through a commission with power to purchase them on competitive bids from the makers of such books. If that Is his method, they are purchased that way now. And the state will have to pay for them then as the persons purchasing them now have to pay for them. And if it purchases them it can only do so by a tax laid upon the people of the state, including those who use the hooks, and in that event they will not be free, except in a deceptive sense. “2. By establishing a bookmaking plant of its own, employing authors and writers, and manufacturing books at state expense. .That expense will also have to be paid by the taxpayers. In the last analysis it is clear there is no such thing as free school books.” in response to Beveridge’s assertions that if he is elected governor there will be “a housecleaning from the lake to the river.” Mr. Hanly said: “During the late state administration there was a housecleaning in the state, a thorough one, but In the months of soul-trying effort Incident to It no message of God-speed was sent by him. He rendered no aid. On the contrary he and his friends were loudest and most virulent In condemnation.” “He cries out now against lobbies and lobbyists, but in 1905, though he spoke to the general assembly, he uttered no word against either lobbies or lobbyists. At the same time there was pending a fight for the abolition of free railroad passes, but he spoke no word in its behalf. An inheritance tar law had been recommended, but he uttered no word for it. The present public depository law, under which In three years nearly a million dollars have been saved to the people of the state of Indiana in interest on public funds, was passed without his aid. ■ ■ ■i, “The private banking act received neither aid nor comfort from him, and one of his closest friends in the gen- I eral assembly was its most bitter and , effective opponent. “In the light of all this I put the question: Is he not rather a late reemit In the ‘army of the Lord.’ Troops who are not at the crux of battle [

when the fight is on are not of great value, in ail the instances which I have cited the ‘army of the Lord’ was compelled to fight and win or lose without ‘Rienzi.’ “Mr. Beveridge’s opposition to temperance legislation during this long term of years and his present hypocricy is so patent to those who have been observant and in a position to know, that it seems incredible that any one should be deceived by anything he may now say. Yet many sincere friends of temperance are thinking of voting for him under the belief that he is a real friend of the temperance cause. —“Qntheißth of January, 1905, Mr. Beveridge was re-elected to the United States senate by the general assembly. He was present at the time and addressed the general assembly while convened in joint session. The remonstrance law was then pending, its fate was uncertain. It needed friends, especially in the senate. Some of Mr. Beveridge’s moßt ardent supporters and closest friends in the senate were opposed to it. It was finally passed in the senate by a narrow margin of three votes beyond the constitutional majority required to make it effective, -I but this militant ‘soldier of the cross,’ this intrepid ‘guardian of the public welfare,’ this ‘Rienzi of the people,’ did not join the '‘army of the Lord’ that was battling for it.” Beveridge was opposed to placing the county option plank In the Republican platform four years ago, and after It was written In and the measure was before the legislature, no help for its passage came from him. Mr. Hanly quotes numerous letters and statements from eminent Republicans to prove that Beveridge was not friendly to the temperance plank of the party, and said that the initiative and referendum, as proposed by Beveridge, can not permanently solve the liquor question in Indiana. Said Mr. Hanly: “The remedy Is itself an assault upon constitutional government. It contravenes the whole theory of representative institutions. But that phase of it I discussed last night at Tipton, and can not take the time to debate it now. But even If It were not unconstitutional and revolutionary, it would be absolutely ruinous to the temperance cause. If the constitution be amended, or a new one adopted, incorporating the Initiative and referendum, the question will recur every two years and will be constantly and forever before us. Submitted today, and victory won, by the temperance forces, two years later the liquor Interests will put it up again through the initiative, and through the referendum it will have to be met again. This process will be recurrent and unending, until, at last, worn out and their resources exhausted, the temperance forces will be compelled to give up the fight. Local option will have been destroyed and the whole state will be made ‘wet.’ For you will remember his pledge is to ‘favor county option as a temporary relief only. Through the Initiative and referendum It will be swept away. “To make a state campaign will require much money, the services of many men as organizers and speakers and much of the people’s time. That such a campaign can be organized, financed and waged every two years ad infinitum is impossible. How any sincere temperance advocate can be deceived by such a program or aid in its initiation and adoption, aside from all constitutional reasons, is beyond my comprehension. The liquor interests themselves could not have devised a more cunning or efficient means for making Indiana all ‘wet* than this man proposes. “Believing this, I call upon the temperance electors to refute its advocacy and to reject it at the polls. I beg them not to let themselves be deceived. And I caution them that Albert J. Beveridge, Edwin M. Lee, Horace Stillwell and Freddie Landis are not safe counselors on this question. “They are Greeks bearing gifts, and if the temperance people of this state accept them the gifts will turn to ashes on their lips. “In the light of these facts’ and of his record, it seems incredible to a candid mind that Mr. Beveridge’s present apostasy from the Republican party was occasioned by fear that the party would not this year incorporate a county option plank In its platform. Against that program I place that of the Republican party. “Upon that platform its candidates are standing four-square. To its performance they are pledged. The platform and the candidates also pledge a constitutional convention. They are opposed to the initiative and referendum. If a constitutional convention is called, the temperance forces of the state will be given their opportunity —not for the Initiative and referendum —but for a constitutional inhibition against the traffic —an inhibition in the people’s own law which shall stand permanent and abiding until the constitution itself i* changed by solemn and orderly process. As a temperance man, that progress appeals to me. It ought to appeal to all temperance men—all Republicans, all Democrats, all Prohibitionists, who believe in the annihilation of the traffic. It meets the conditions we named last December in the great omnipartisan convention held in Indianapolis, to which we pledged our faith and our support. For that I battle, not only as a ‘soldier of the cross,’ but as a free man with a ballot. For the temperance people of Indiana here is the real field at Armageddon. Here only spread the real enlistment roll. For every Christian man or woman can truly sing ‘Onward, Christian Solfiler.'"

J. FRANK HANLY.