The Washington weekly post., 1900-09-18
Jerry Simpson as a Rough
and Tumble Debater.
GOOD IN REPARTEE AND EFIGRAM
Champ Clark Tells Of the DELIGHT In the
Hsase When the .eckie.s >tstesmas
Engaged lie " srdy BaItie-Aishty scalp
Taker and Tanner of Hides - Always
Ready TO Tackle an Advsr-ary-Reed's
speech in Jerry's District.

Inc tHO&+ tHEEtltc weapon VIII
one man ever assailed another is ridicuie-
Before its msreiless shafts logic, fancy,
beauty. learning. wisdom, courage. fame,
wealth. ancestral renowa, all go down
Even truth herself has hard fight with
IL, and emerges from the combat not al
ways victor Cervantes laughed SPANS
chivalTy away. Henry Fielding. the nov
elist. was OF a collateral branch Of the
/ imperial house OF Austria Edward Glib
bon, the historian. saws that By writins
! Tom Jones" alone Fielding established a
more splendid and enduring reputation
than all the crowned and sceptered Haps-
burgers that ever lived. SO 1t Is not tx
( trayas2nt 10 assume that Don Quixote
has exerted more influence over the hu-
man race than any real flesh and blood
/ Spaniard. He has certainly amused more
people.
Frederick the Great could thrash Aus
I trians. Russians. and Frenehmen ad H0i-
/ tum- Macaulay says that the world in
arms could not wrest Silesia from his
iron grasp. But by malignant ridieule
( Voltaire made him squirm and writhe and
howl and swear And I'm the art Freder-
lex himself was a past grand master
That Jerry Simpson has outlived a ma
tion's ridicule is proof conclusive that
there is something in the man.
! The day has gone by when IL sounded
smart TO hold him up before gaping
world as a clown, mountebank, ignora-
mus. or demagogue He is none of these.
( except the last. and that only in its high
er better, and genealogical sense-a lead
: er OF the people
Six years ago he was the butt of every
I joke, the text Of every paragrapher in the
I lanc. Now he stands in the very small
I group OF men whose names are respected
from ocean 10 ocean. He is no more like
Dennis kearney and the sand lot agita-
/ tors than he resembles Gladstone or Bis
marck. He is a witty. able. fearless.
sincere, well-informed friend OF man. with
a dangerous gift of gab-dangerous fer
MS opponents That ne sometimes chases
ignls iatui may be true. but in the main
he Is better Democrat than some nign
and mighty personages that wot of. who
make tar greater pretensions. To a man
VINO Is an out and out free trader. an in
come taxer, and a genuine jam-up BIZ
{ metallst' much may be forgiven in the
minor matters of politics.
In appearance instead of the uncouth
lout ne has been represented as being he
Is tail, slender lean, dark. weIl-dressAd
scholarly-loOking man, with Henry CLAW
/ mouth, wealth of coal black hair ana
l eyes indicative OF brains. He habitualIv
| wears gold-rimmed spectacIes. While
/ neither a Chesterfield nor a Beau Rruu-
mel, he offends not the aesthetic in either
manner or apparel Nor does ne walk
with the rolling gait of the sailor. as
might be supposed from his quondam oc-
cupatiOn, but with the characteristic STU
! dents stoOp and abnormal sedateness. It
is only when he bestrides his bicycle that
he cuts fantastic capers before high
| heaven.
Jerry is philosopher. l don't know
| whether he ever read Newton's "Prin-
cipia" or Bacon's ''Novum Organum" or
/ The Wisdom OF the Ancients" Possibly
/ he never heard of Sir William Hamilton
/ and mis- metaphysics. Assuredly he is not
a disciple Of Epieurus. He never quoted
/ from Plato, Aristotle. and the Athenian
! school, but he is philosopher neverthe-
| less of the homely. practical American
| type, of which Josh Billings, Bill Arp.
| and Sam Jones are exemplars
| Without college training or any claims
! TO scholarship such as Dr. Everett. of
| Massachusetts, or Grain, of Texas. pos
| sessed, somewhere, some time, somehow
on board ship, upon the tented field, on
| the Kansas prairles, or in Congress, he
has picked up a vast store of information.
made it thoroughly his own leavened il
with the leayen OF common sense, and has
/ it ready for instant use. He ranked
among the half-dozen best rousn and tum-
bic debaters in the House Not man OF
the $50 could tackle him in that hazardous
of
certainty OF coming out on top He was
as active as a panther, tenacious as a
swapping turtle, and as remorseless as a
circular saw. Many solar walk states
man has bit the dust beneath Jerry's
irony, hun or and philosophy He can
make a strong set speech without orator.
ical scallops. but he is in mis- glory in a
running fire debate. Jerry smites his op-
ponents hip and thigh when animated by
| what our schOolday friend. Julius Caesar
in his Commentaries" was wont to call
gaudium certaminis, which Sir Walter
Scott has paraphrased into
The stern joy which warriors feel
In foemen worthy Of their steel
Like Jobs warhorse. he shifts the battle
from afaT. | don't know his pedigree, but
from his predisposition toward skull
! cracking / think he must have come Of
Irish ancestry.
AT home Jerry Is a farmer. but I incline
20 the opinion that, like Patrick Henry
he let others perform most OF the actual
labor OF agriculture and speat most of his
| time resting in the shade of the trees re-
volvins matters of great pith and moment
In his busy brain. When he defeated
Prince Hal" OF Wichita, for Congress
Derry WAS tOWn marshal Of Medicine
Lodge, and put in most OF MS leisure in
sermonizing. dOgmatlZing and anathema
tizlng from the top of dry goods box.
The Populist uprising in Kansas develon
ed many queer characters, but IL sent an
/ exceedingly strong delegation in Harris
Hudson, Davis, Baker, and Jerry Simpson
Even If the PoDs should ever elect a
president Jerry is saved by reason Of his
foreign birth from the time-servjne don-
oie-dealing. good Lord, good devil policy
OF many who aspire 10 that exalted posi
ton. He is barred by The Constitution
and has no inducements of ambition lead,
ing him into The sOmersault business an
acrObatic feat which has undone SO manv
aspiring statesmen
In one respect he occupied a feIicjtons
position in the House He was always
when he Went into the skinning business
II he fiayed the Democrats. the Repub-
licans yelled with delight II he pounded
the Republicans. the Democrats made the
welkin ring with their cheerful voices. So
Jerry went on taking sealps and hanging
hides up 10 dry until the hammer fen an
noon March 1, 1895. sounding the knelI for
him and a vast caravan who went thene.
70 the pale realms Of political shade.
While By no means Cieeronian orator
he was clever in reDartee, rich In emf
grams. and merctiess in retort He has a
Condensed style OF speaking which few
men possess. For instance. in me shar,
sentence. Combines grow out of pro
teetloa as naturally as toadstools our az
a rotten log, ne uttered more truth than
i contained in many long speech.
A day or two after the Carlisle bin fen
stilborn. Jerry was making a speech. and