Valentine Democrat. (Valentine, Neb.) 1900-1930, 1900-09-13

folly of attempting to prepare people
fro government by denying them
the right to participate in their own
government.
Many politicians of our time are in
the habit of laying ii down as a self
evident proposition that no people
ought to be free until they are fit TO
use their freedom. The maxim is
worthy of the fool in the old story who
resolved not to go into the water until
he had learned to swim. If men are
to wait for liberty till they become
wise and good in slavery, they may
indeed wait forever"
When l say that those who distrust
the capacity Of the people for self-goV-
ernment tend directly toward mon
archy, 1 am only repeating what Lin
coin deliberately declared in his first
annual message. He SAID:
WHAT LINCOLN SAID.
Monarchy itself is sometimes limited
at as a possible refuge from the power
of the people. In my present position
1 could scarcely be justified were l to
omit raising a warning voice against
this approach OF returning despotism:
II is not needed nor fitting here that
a general argument should be made in
favor of popular institutions; but there
is one point, with its connections not
so hackneyed as most others, to Whlch
I ask brief attention. 1t is the enort
to place capital on an equal FOOTING
with. if not above, labor, in the struc-
ture of government. No
men living are more worthy TO De
trusted than those who toll up from
poverty; none less inclined to take or
touch aught which they have no hon
estly earned. Let them beware of sur
rendering political power which they
already possess, and which, if surren-
dered, will surely be used to close the
door of advancement against such as
they, and to fix new disabilities and
burdens upon them till all Of liberty
shall be lost"
WARNING MORE NEEDED NOW.
The warning is even more needed
now than it was forty years ago. The
Army and Navy Journal is already
justifying the colonial idea, and de-
claring that fate has decreed for US
destiny in which an imperial executive,
free from the restraints of a written
constitution, will govern subjects ac-
COZ ding to his own pleasure. The Unit
ed States Investor, published at Bos-
ton, in it's issue of July 28, says:
''Only blind person can fail to see
that remarkable transformations of
one kind or another are in store for
the race; hence the folly of asserting
that the policy of this country, which
is destined to play such leading part
in human affairs of the future, Snail
be governed for the most part by polit-
ical maxims uttered more than a hum
dred years ago. The greatest evil which
now confronts this republic is the clam
or raised by certain faction for set
tlement of our problems of state by
just such method as we have been
deprecating. Considerably more than
century ago a certain notable declara-
ton was made in this country to the
effect that all men ought to be free
and independent. This is merely gen.
eraliZation of the French school of Vol
taire and the encyclopedias. 1t is
dictum absolutely lacking foundation in
history and incapable of SyllOgistic JUS
tificatiOn. 1t was, however, a handy
phrase for US to employ when asserting
our right to break away from the moth
er country; it suited the exigencIes or
our situation in l716 admirably, though
in itself but a bit of sublimated deIna>
gogism. The declaration was SER
yiceable means to the end that was at
that time desired. To bring forward
this declara ton in this year, 1900, IN
with our treatment OF the
Filipinos and the Cubans, is as gross
an abSurdity as ever was practlced.
To do so is to offer an insult to the
intelligence of the people who first SUBJ
scribed to the declaration in question.
But why quote from newspapers as
to what may be done hereafter in the
presence of a law already enacted
which makes subjects out OF Porto
Ricans, withdraws from them the
of the constitution, and as
serts the power of the president and
congress to govern them without their
consent and tax them without repre-
sentation-a power as unlimited ana
tyrannical as was ever asserted or eX-
ercised by any ruler in all the history
of the human race. This doctrine has
not yet been approved by the people;
it furnishes the supreme question or
the present campaign. In the pres
ence of these perils the laboring man
has responsibility commensurate
with his opportunity. Without large
Of the laboring vote no par
ty can win an election in the United
States. The men who work for wages
can, by throwing their votes on the
one side or the other, determine the
policy of this country. They need not
march in parades; they need not
adorn themselves with the insignia OF
any party, but on election day their
silent ballots can shape the destiny OF
this nation, and either bring the gov
ernment back to its ancient land
marks or turn it into the pathway fol-
lowed by the empires of the old World.