Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 35, Number 135, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 November 1903 — POLITICAL COMMENT. [ARTICLE]

POLITICAL COMMENT.

Panama Will Stand. No sensible person in the United States will allow himself to be deluded by the stories which may come from time to time of vast demonstrations to be made against Panama by Colombia. Nor will any one be affected by the stories that Colombia will not recognize Panama's independence. Many years pased before Spain recognized the independence of Mexico, Peru, Bolivia and the rest of the countries which broke away from her in the first quarter of the nineteenth century. Mexico had not formally recognized the republic of Texas at the tiine of hex annexation to the United States, although nine years had passed since San Jacinto. The failure of Colombia to give her endorsement to the new republic will have not the slightest effect on the status of that government. The United States has given full recognition to it. The other countries, on the American continent as well as in Europe, will follow the United States’ example. Let nobody have any doubt on this point. There are two reasons why Colombia will never regain control of Panama. Colombia lacks the military and naval power to conquer the isthmus, even if the United States kept its hands off. The United States is bound by its treaty of 184 G to protect the isthmian railway from Interruption by any party, and it will perform its duty to the extent of Its power. This would prevent Colombia from invading Panama, even if it were strong enough otherwise to overcome the physical barriers on the land side or had a navy powerful enough to convoy troops and make a landing on either qpast at the isthmus. There Is not the faintest chance that the old regime will ever be restored in Panama. Colombian authority is as dead on the isthmus as Spain’s is in Cuba and Porto Rico. No pronunciamentos which may emanate from Bogota in the next few weeks need excite anybody In the United States. This is a revolution which will not go backward.

The political metamorphosis which has established the republic of Panama; under a United States protectorate is timely for more reasons than one. It is a warning to the colonizing, or wouldbe colonizing, nations of Europe that the guardianship of the hemisphere is in the hands of the United States. A good deal is heard every year or so about large European colonies of one sort and another being planted here and there in South America, especially in Brazil, Venezuela, Chili and the Argentine Republic. Those colonies will have no political Influence in any shape. They will not affect the status of those South American nations In their respective spheres. The government of those countries will be in the hands of their own citizens, and will be exerted from their own capitals, and not from any part of Europe. The revolution at Panama, the recognition of the new republic and the dominance of the United States at the Isthmus throws a light on those points which will be read around tlie world. The administration at Washington, behind which stands the American people, is master of the situation. Whether a United States army goes to the Isthmus or remains away will depend on the administration’s views as to the exigencies of the situation at that place. President Roosevelt's acts on the isthmus and ills recognition of the isthmian republic in 1903 are as momentous in the history of the Western hemisphere as were Monroe’s hands-off-the-American continent warning which was sounded in 1823, and 1903’s acts supplement those of 1823. St. Ixmis Globe-Democrat.

Farmer* and the Tariff. The Hon. Horace Boies raises the question whether the farmers of lowa are in any way benefited by a protective tariff. lie tries to show that they nre not benefited by protection and, that they wpuhl be better off without such a tariff. He quotes no facts. His whole argument is purely academic, and not very good at that. His conclusions are not accurate, and his assertion that the farmer would be benefited by the removal of the protective tnriif is not correct.

By far the greater portion of (he products of the farms of this nation is consumed by the people within its territory- The Treasury statistics of exports and Imports show this. Of the people of the United States, who are the consumers who buy farm products? Do the farmers buy their own products? Do the farmers sell to farmers? Most certainly they do not They sell to people not engaged in farming. Who are the men not engaged l(i farming? They are the professional men and merchants and manufacturof the people belong to the laboring men in another group. The great mnss of the people belong to laboring classes. The greater portion of the products of the farms are, therefore, sold to the laboring men. How much these laboring mem will buy depends on their standard of living and. their purchasing power. Anything ttant decreases the purchasing power of the laboring IPOD, therefore, disturbs tha market for products of the farms of lowa and the other States of the country. < If men have not the money with which to buy the products of the farm, the farmer cannot sell, or. If be sell at all. It must be to people In other countries and bit prices must fall to

pay the cost of transportation to the foreign market. The farmer is vitally interested in any proposition which, if adopted as a policy, will decrease the purchasing power of those who consume his products. He is vitally interested in the welfare of the laboring men of the country.

' ■ V Let us see what the lessons of facts and history are. In 1892 a Democratic President was elected on a tariff reform platform. As soon ijs possible a tariff law tvas enacted that put everything as nearly as possib|e on a freetrade basis. The result was that business was disturbed; manufacturers were compelled to close down their plants; railways to lay off men and stagnation in the industries of the country followed. Two million five hundred thousand men became idle. They were drawing no wages. Their purchasing power was reduced almost to nothing. Every wage earner represents on the average, a family of from two to seven people. Usually the family is represented by five, but to be conservative, let it be represented by four. The disturbance of business that followed the tariff change in 1893, therefore, was directly felt by ten millions of people in the United States who were obliged to lower their standard of living to the plane of bare existence, and ‘some were compelled to subsist on the charity of the people. As this number of people was about one-eighth of the population of the country, and all other people were economizing as much as possible on account of the hard times, think you the farmers were not interested? Did they get high prices for their products? Did they sell as many bushels of wheat, as many cattle, as many hogs, as many potatoes, as much butter and as many eggs aSi they do when every one is able to buy all that he wants to eat and all that his family wants to consume? —Davenport Times.

Finding the Fnnlt. The Democratic leaders in the House have been full of sympathy for the woes of Cuba. They have constantly found fault with the Republican majority for not making greater speed toward establishing those trade relations with Cuba so evidently demanded by her interests and our own. Yet when the bill to do these very things came up in the House on Mondaythe Democrats sought to kill it with an amendment to remove the differential duty on refined sugar. The direct effect of such amendment would be to transfer a large part of the su-gar-refining Industry from the United. States to Europe. Indirectly It would, destroy the sugar-growing industry of Democratic Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas by depriving it of a near-by market of refineries. Of course that was not what the Democrats really wanted to do. Had the Republicans accepted their proposal they would have run crying to the Senate to save a leading industry of three Democratic States from the destructive folly of their own Democratic Representatives. What they wanted to do was merely to “put the Republicans in a bole” by killing the Cuban treaty so they could denounce the Republican administration for failing to carry out a great national policy.

“We do the work and you find the fault,” was the phrase in which Speaker Cannon at the close of the Fifty-Seventh Congress described the attitude of the two great parties toward questions of national interest and honor. The accuracy of the description was again proved by the course of the House Democrats on Monday. 'And yet there 1 are thousands of wellmeaning Democrats who cannot undcrytand why the American people refuse to trust their party with the great hush ness of government. —Chicago Inter Ocean.

A Dismal Kailnrc. There never Mas a more dismal failure than that of the opponents of the isthmian canal, alddd by the Democratic party, to arouse popular clamor against the adminMration of President Roosevelt for its course in connection itli recent events involving the new republic of Panama. , Every criticism which has been put forth has fallen flat. As Ptof. Langley’s air-ship, when started from Its catapult, falls to dart into the blue empyrean for an extended voyage, but makes a bee-line for the river, where it buries itself out of sight In the mud at the bottom, so lias every antiadministration lie on the subject of the canal, the revolution and the recognition of the new republic, plumped by the shortest possible cut to oblivion, leaving Its promoters astounded as well as dismayed. ♦be people, on the other hand, have been quick to recognize the fairness, the patriotism and the practical wisdom as well as the energy of the administration, and are full of admiration for what lias been done. President Roosevelt and Secretary Hay -havo brought about a situation of which the logical sequence is the prompt completion of an isthmian canal. It has surprises! and nonplussed the opponents of the Isthmian canal, who are left “without a leg ts stand on.”—Milwaukee Evening Wla» <-vital u. ,