Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1890-09-30
POOR MANS KAISER,

Mr.. William Walter Phelps is using a
portion OF his time, while in this country, to
improve each shining hour in cementing
his diplomatic relations with Germany by
offering praise at the shrine of the German
Emperor. An interview with that diplo-
matist, recently published, gives him an op-
portunity to speak of Wilhelm II. as "the
poor mans Kaiser" and as exceptionally a
monarch who is devoted to the love and
care of his subjects.
This might be taken as the fattery of
rather oficious representative of the United
States at the German court, if it were not SO
far justified by the facts as to permit the be-
lief that the praise is genuine. The young
German Emperor has sufficiently shown
that, among the other medieval ideas of his
position, he conceives himself to occupy
paternal attitude toward the working
classes. They must accept the imperial
ects for the improvement of their
position; but the Government must
see that they are fed and clothed.
The young champion of absolutism is
equally ready to employ his troops to sup
press strike and to order the employers to
give their men decent wages. We may ad-
mire young monarch who pursues that
ideal of paternalism; but when the repre-
sentative of the United States appears as its
eulogist, it creates doubt as to whether
Mr.. Phelps has much idea of the democratic
method of improving the condition Of the
masses.
The first rejoinder to Mr.. Phelps praise
of Wilhelm as the "poor mans KAISER" is
that monarch who deserved that name
would aim, as the first step for alleviating
the state of the poor people, at the removal
of the military burden which now oppresses
all Europe. No ruler there can do more
toward disarmament and the reliet of taxa
tion than the young German Emperor. If
the necessity of spending years in military
service and the taxes for the maintenance of
great armies were both removed, the work.
ing people, not only of Germany but of all
Europe, would be more relieved than by
any of the schemes of imperial socialism
which the young Kaiser has evolved.
But the idea which it is most incongruous
for a representative of American democracy
to praise, is that any real improvement in
the condition OF labor is to be attained by
treating workingmen as children who are to
be told by Government when and how to
work, and as a reward for life of patient
toll and unreasoning obedience are to have
food, clothing and decent burial. An ex-
ponent of imperialism may ba pardoned for
supporting this theory; but its praise is
hardly in place in the mouth of the official
representative of the United States. The
fundamental plan of this Government is that
if all men are given equal chances before the
law and its creations. the workingmen will
be more intelligent and the rewards of in
dustry more widely distributed than there
can be under the tutelage of any absolute
power. The best proof of the truth of this
principle is the fact that although its opera
tion has been in many respects perverted
and thwarted BY the abuses of our corporate
system, the workingmen of the United
States are to-day better off without "a poor
mans Kaiser" than those of Germany are
with one
Perhaps the fact that Mr. Phelps is rep
resentatlve of the corporate system as much
as, if not more than, OF the people of the
United States, may account for his admira-
ton of the imperial theory OF paternal
guardianship of the working classes.