Jasper County Democrat, Volume 19, Number 59, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 21 October 1916 — A MESSAGE TO MR. GEORGE ABE [ARTICLE]

A MESSAGE TO MR. GEORGE ABE

Playwright’s Neighbor Doubts His Progrosslronsss WAHTS TO BE WITH TEDDY Resident of Brook Mies the WellKnowit Author With Some Pertinent Political Questions. In the Indianapolis News of October 9 George Ade through the. Republican state central committee furnishes bis admirers with further evidence of Jiis peculiar type of humor. His last effort makes the “County Chairman” look like the work of a novice. He starts out with a confession and avoidance. He confesses that he never was a Progressive in principle and that he was a little ashamed of the things the party stood for, in fact he had no trouble in controlling his enthusiasm two years ago on some of the Progressive platform planks (strange that his Progressive associates were not informed of the fact then). This is his confession: He avoids responsibility for what seems to him his political mistake by saying he liked the company, and the spirit of his associates, and after all the Democratic party, saw some merit in the parts of the Progressive platform and passed a kind of child labor Jaw, a poor imitation of one that will very soon be passed. Senator Cummins of lowa thinks well of this one and says that it is the best that can be made within the constitutional inhibition. Who is to give us this good child labor law? James E. Watson, Reed Smoot, Murray Crane, Lodge or Joe Cannon? Yes, you marched with the Progressives "until they became a dwindling minority of bleeding mar-

tyrs,” and then you quit a cause about which you had no trouble in controlling your enthusiasm. Which of the planks of the Progressive platform cooled your ardor for the cause? Your invitation for a general return of Progressives to the company of Penrose, Smoot, Crane, Watson, Lodge and Cannon ought to specify wherein you were wrong, in principal, wherein these acknowledged leaders of the party of your choice has changed from four years ago, when they were the third party men, and the especial object of the wrath of Colonel Roosevelt.

Is it enough to say that Candidate Hughes is a "made to order candidate for Progressive voters” when you have renounced Progressive ideas as expressed in the planks of the Progressive platform. Candidate Hughes as a "made to order Progressive” may be of that kind who is wanting in enthusiasm about all the Progressive platform as you are about some of the planks. "Col. Roosevelt did the sensible and patriotic thing last January when he indicated that he was ready to jump.’’ (That, as I remember it, was at the $1,000,000,000 dinner). And here at last is the full confession of faith that was in you, you liked thd colonel’s company. The historian of fifty years from now who you think will be trying to expunge a record of what you call “the shame of Tampico and the Lusitania,” if your advice had prevailed in 1912 and the Col. had been elected would have found a page as red with human blood as will the pages of Europe’s history be when the tale is told in fifty years.

America would have been the third of the powers to join in the world’s war according to the great disciple of Mars whom you have followed from Republicanism to Progressiveism and back to the source from which it sprang. Authors over forty are seldom required to bear arms and bachelors do not often get their heart strings entwined in the web and woof of some boys life so that the full force of the mistake that might have been made by following your leader in 1912 cannot be fully realized by you and the alpaca coat, and chautauqua speech about which you so lightly speak, show’s that you little appreciate the great responsibilities resting on him whose adjectives and college rhetoric brought the most waj-like nation on the face of the earth to abandon a fixed cause and give proper heed to the rights of neutrals ».n the high seas.

In your underwriting of Mr. Hughes as a Progressive candidate, upon what do you fix the hazard on what he has said or on what he has done, or rather, on the fact that he has done nothing and said nothing to indicate where he stands. Referring again to the shame of Tampico and the Lusitania, which has settled your political policy for the next 100 years, (unless the colonel should change), it occurs to me the Progressive voter would like to know just what Mr. Hughes would have done to have saved us the disgrace which has chilled the marrow In your bones. Admiral Mayo, who was in command at Tampico, has the following to say about the shame and disgrace of the affair: “It is misrepresentation to say that American citizens in Tam-

pico were deserted In an hour of imminent danger. “It is distorting facts to say that Americans, robbed of the protection of their flag, were forced to seek refuge under the colors of a foreign power. “It is not true that the Tampico affair was marked by gross bungling. The fact that close to 3,000 Americans were taken out of the city, without loss of life or destruction of property, is a result that ought to speak for itself. "I have no interest in parties or political controversies, but I have a deep interest in the honor of the United States, the pride of the American navy. It is this honor and this pride that I am glad to defend against aspersion and misrepresentation.” The Lusitania affair whether regrettable or disgraceful ought not to be charged to the Democratic party or its President but to the party and the presidents of the United States who permitted the United States navy to degenerate from the third place as a fighting force to seventh place as a naval power from 1 897 to 1913.—8r00k Reporter.

Within seven hours after it had assembled in special session Tuesday, the Wisconsin legislature had passed through both houses a bill to permit soldiers on the border to vote, and the measure was on its way to the governor for his signature. While England has unquestionably lost several hundred ships from the action of the German submarines since the war began they are making every effort to meet the loss by building new vessels. In a report by the Lloyds for the three months ending October 1, it was shown that 469 vessels were being built in the various yards of England. It is no doubt true that a large number of vessels building in the United States will eventually go into commission under British or French registry.