Jasper County Democrat, Volume 14, Number 48, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 20 September 1911 — MUCH BITTERNESS [ARTICLE]

MUCH BITTERNESS

Displayed by Hanly In Attacking Republicans for Policy on Temperance. Bloomington, Ind., Sept. 14. While Republican State Chairman Edward M. Lee, former Congressman, James E. Watson and several other prominent men ,of his party attending the lay delegate convention here, sat in the audience, former Governor J. Frank Hanly gave his’party a scathing arraignment this afternoon in the most dramatic speech yet delivered bjfore the eightieth annual session of the Indiana Methodist Conference. The former Governor was wildly applauded when he declared his willingness to lead a crusade in the political campaign next year if the two parties leave the temperance question out of their platform. His speech was delivered at the Anti-Saloon League rally, which occupied the latter part of the afternoon session.

After being introduced as the next Governor of Indiana Mr. Hanly had to wait for'several minutes while the audience of nearly 2,000 stood and waved the Chautauqua salute as a greeting. Declaring that his party deserved defeat last year and set- , ting forth his own views and political intentions for the future, he avowed that if it meets defeat again next year he would not champion its broken faith. He declared that his party was divided today, not on account of the temperance question, but because of personal and factional fights. The speaker called upon his auditors to begin now an agitation that would result in the reactment of the local option law as a first step to state-wide prohibition. In closing he said in part: His written defy to the Republican -party and the party leaders came at the close of his speech and in the audience at the time were Republican State Chairman Edwin M. *Lee, exCongressman James E. Watsor. and a number of other leading Republicans of the state. His statement was as follows: “Today my party in this state stands in the valley of decision —doubting and uncertain. Last year it failed in its duty. It sought not right, but expediency —the expediency of silence. It turned its back upon a work more worthy than it had wrought in this common wealth in a third of a century. • As a result of its perfidy it wai defeated. Its defeat was sad," but sadder was the fact that it deserved defeat. That fact stained its nation-wide fame with shame. Today “the lip of its honor lies low in the dust.”

"Those who brought it there may -silence their conscience for the hour, and for the' moment justify their act, but before the jury time empanels they will stand condemned condemned through all eternity. “It is better to deserve to win and lose, than to ’ win and deserve to lose. The fruits of such a victory turn to ashes on the lips. No party can afford to sacrifice truth or principle on the altar of expediency. The idea of duty or of service can no more be ignored by a party than by an individual. The truest expediency, either for an individual or for a party, is the expediency of right. Neither men nor parties can afford to strike a balance Between civic duty and criminal pblicy. To survive there must be 'full acceptance of the first and complete repudiation of the latter. “To fall again nfcxt year will involve severe cost. There can be no victory with another surrender to a traffic loaded with the curse of God and man. The ill that befell us before Will grow and deepen until we sink beneath its shame and the people’s gathered wratht To thoughtful, sincere and upright men the conflict between duty and surrender is and will continue to

be irreconcilable. If there is further surrender, pleas for party harmony and party loyalty will not avail. They will be less effacious than they were before, and they were ineffectual then. Harmony can not be built upon false pretenses made and intended to deceive, nor can party loyalty be founded upon the surrender of that which has become a deep and mighty truth to thousands of stalwart, purposeful men. Such men can go to defeat, but they can' not surrender.

“Speaking for myself, and meaning the thing I speak, I say unto you that if my party fails in this behalf next year, either in platform or in ticket, I will not champion its broken faith. I will not share its blood-stain-ed hire'. I will not help it bear its million-fingered shame. I will not bring my conscience to another brewer’s mart. L can not stand forever before the truth and mock it with a lie. And I will not go in silence, for, in such case, silence would be crime.

“Deep as my love for my party has been and is, and it has beep and is deep, and abiding as my hate of that which wrought its shame is, and shall be deeper still if it betrays its trust again I will drag into the light its sin. I will paint its crime and folly. There- will be no padlocks on my lips. “There will be others—thousands of others—and together rising above the crime and folly of an evil time we will wash our hands of its sin and shame and curse, we will lift this great cause up until a comrnon love shall fuse our hearts in one. “We will appeal anew to the consciences of men. We will proclaim a new’ crusade with a prayer-forged zeal that will not be denied. Planted upon the the adamant of a righteous cause we’ll put nerve into our task. We’ll hew down the opposition. “We’ll strike home as Christians rfiay, as freemen can strike home, home to the heart and root of this monster wrong. Strike home until the blows we deal shall be felt the wide world through.”