The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1895-06-22
MODERN OPPORTUNITY.
Patriotic Work Comparable to Any Ever
Performed in the Past Awaits tho
Educated Citizen OF Today Who Is
willing to DO q Citizens Duty.

PutTlOtlc NoTk Soupu'"p'S w N"S I'~'
Performed in the Past Awaits ito
Educated Citizen OF Today Who Is
willing to DO a Citizens Duty.
Speaking last Tuesday to the gradu-
ating class OF Vanderbilt university,
Chauncey NJ. Depew. l.. l.. d., said:
"The student of today. as he studies
the great issues of the past, and the
stirring story of conflicts in congress
and in the field, Is apt to believe that
the opportunities for patriotic work no
longer exist That student must re-
member that we live not for the past,
but for the present and future; that ev-
cry period has its problems to be solved,
its dangers to be met and its oppor-
tunites What seem to us the com
monplaces of the day will add to or
diminish the happiness of those who
shall come after us. Anarchy, social
lsm taxation, currency and the rela-
tions of labor and capital are questions
as difficult, requiring as much judlcious
and patriotic consideration and de-
manding as much of the time and at
tention of the colleges and the college
men of the country as any which have
agitated the nation since the founda-
ton of the government. 1t Is not for all
of us to be legislators, or governors, or
cabinet ministers or presidents, but 1t
Is for all of us in the sphere in which
we move to take that interest in public
affairs which voices the opinion that
guides legislatures, congresses and
presidents.
D,,J,l lta t- t,, tl,.
holding of Office. In the hot competi-
tions of our American life, in the obli-
cations which q man owes to those
about him and dependent upon him, in
the duties and happiness which come
from marriage and domesticity. no
man, until he Is assured in some way of
independence from the emoluments of
office, can afford to enter public life.
The most lamentable wrecks which
have seen in thirty odd years since
was graduated have been the men who
have abandoned everything for the
public service, only to be thrown out by
the change of politics and to find that
their places in the professional and
business world had been occupied by
younger men, leaving them helpless and
stranded. But every town caucus ev-
cry village primary. every ward or
county convention is the opportunity
and the duty of the educated man. He
must belong to one or the other of the
great parties. because in representative
government it is only by such organiza-
tions that wise policies can eventuate
in wise measures.
Municipal Publication.
I'VE hear much-too much-of rings
and bosses. They are the natural re-
suit Of the neglect of the primaries by
the citizens. The boss and the ring on
one side, In secret partnership with the
ring and the boss on the other. present
tickets made up of thieves or tools and
then shout for us to vote for the one
or the ether in the name of protection
Or free t,ade. In the name of mono
metallism or free coinage of silver ac-
oOrdins to cur party affiliations. If the
educated men of the country who are
ministers, lawyers. doctors journalists,
business nen or farmers would per-
fern their duties In the primary school
of the caucus we never would expert
ence that despotism of a machine which
blishts ambition. destroys honest effort
for good government and plumbers i'm
partial partisans and antagonists.
"If we have neglected our duty to the
community, to the state and to the ma
ton by neglecting the beginnings of
government. we are not without rem
edy. Then Is the time for those. and
they exist in every community, who
have been trained i'm the schools to
formulate their ideas and to express
them upon the platform, or through the
press or by the pamphlet. to say to the
people protection and free trade can
wait they have waited and wavered for
century. All other questions can
wait as they have waited and wavered
for a generation. Thieves are in pos
session of. the statehouse. robbers are
intrenched in the city hall. Unite, dis
card party, disregard cries. shibboleths
and phrases, and so rescue the state
and the city The efficacy of this
method, though late one. and an un-
necessary one If the educated brains
of the country attended to their du-
ties, has been seen within year under
the inspiration of seventy independent
citizens in New York, a hundred inde-
pendent citizens In Brooklyn, the
triumph Of civil service in Chicago by
the popular vote and other equally sig
nificant manifestations of the resistless