The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1900-10-12

election no matter who is elected.
AS to Letting " Well Enough Alone -
Extract from speech of Gen. P.
A. Collins, of Boston, before the
New Jersey Democratic State Con-
vention, at Trenton, September IL:
Last Friday Governor Roosevelt
said in Michigan that the watch
word of this campaign is, "Let well
enough alone" 1t might be, and
probably would be, good watch
word if we had the "well enough,
or could find it and benevolent
assimilate it." But it is not well
enough with us at home or abroad
at present. It is not we'll enough
to have the wealth and the control
of the industries of this great coun-
try getting into fewer and fewer
hands, with an agent debating the
government policy; it is not
well enough to have prices adj
yanced by fostered and protected
monopolies twenty per cent, while
wages are reduced; it is not well
enough to make it soon impossible
for 80 out of 100 men to enter in
dustrial or commercial life, except
as employees and solely on en-
ployers' terms; it is not well enough
to pretend to go to war for the
sake of humanity and turn it into
a war of conquest and of plumber;
it is not well enough to drive the
Spanish out of Cuba to make Cuba
free, and then deny the Cuban
people full and free voice in form.
ing government; it is not well
enough to rob Porto Rico of hel
former market and deny it the only
other possible one; it is not well
enough to pay 500, 100000 for the
worthless title of Spain and attempt
to impose our rule by force upon
100000 strangers, who never
did us harm, and whose only
ofenge is seeking the same freedom
that we enjoy; it is not well enough
to add 5000, 900, 900 to our national
debt within two years; it is not
well enough to add 5000, 900, 900 a
year to our taxes; it is not well
enough to bring 10,000,0 900 Asiatics,
who work for a few cents a day,
into competition with American
labor; it is not well enough to make
secret treaties, in violation of the
Constitution, and enter into secret
understandings with a foreign
monarchy, to mix in its quarrels
and take part in its crimes; it is
not well enough to have Congress
abdicate its powers and shun its
duty, leaving all government to the
President; and, finally, it is not
well enough, or we'll at all, to drag
down to the dust the standard of
human liberty, raised by the faith
ers in the days that tried mems
souls, and break our plighted word
to the human race.
The only way to find the "well
enoygh' is absolutely to reverse
the present policy and return to
the normal state of the Republic.
The craze for empire, and the cheap
and foolish imitation of European
raids upon peoples supposed to be
infirm and helpless has had its
sorry day.
The invocation to be IA world
power" iu a piratical and despotic
way, has taken the Imagination of
the President, and appealed to the
cupidity of the commercialism that
surrounds him. There is another
and better world power not yet
too late to recover. Four years ago
this Republic was the greatest
world power that ever swayed the
minds of men. There was no stain
upon our honor, no blood of an
alien people on our hands; we>had
kept the faith of the fathers. The
torch of liberty passed round the
world for more than a hundred
years had been lit at the flame of
the : American Revolution. No
human influence for freedom and
progress in all the ages Las equalled
ours; aud with leadership in liberty
and self-government marked the
most marvellous material progr ,ss
that the world has ever seen.
{ Shall we return to that ideal state
while yet there is time, or shall we
drift, as we are drifting, to the
vortex that has swallowed all the
grasping empires of the past and
where all others are fated to follows
This is the supreme question the
American people are summoned to
decide.