Ottumwa semi-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1899-1903, 1900-06-21

SUI why lHey ueeu no longer STAND Dy
the republican party. To all such who
may be inclined to listen to these spe-
cious arguments, would address an
emphatic word of warning. Remember
that, admirable tho our legislation has
been during the past three years, it has
been rendered possible and effective
only because there was good admins
tration to back it. Wise laws are in
valuable, but, after all, they are not as
necessary as wise and honest admits
tration of the laws. The best law ever
made, if administered by those who are
hostile to it and who mean to break it
down, cannot be wholly effective, and
may be wholly ineffective. We have at
last put our financial legislation on a
sound basis, but no possible financial
Legislation can save us from fearful and
disastrous panic if we trust our f.
nances to the management of any man
who would be acceptable to the leaders
and guides of the democracy in its pres
ent spirit. No secretary of the treas
i ry who would be acceptable to, or
who could, without loss of self respect
serve under the populistic democracy,
could avoid plunging this country back
into financial chaos. Until our oppo-
nents have explicitly and absolutely re-
pudiated the principles which is 1896
they professed and the leaders who en-
body these principles, their success
means the undoing of the country. Nor
have they any longer even the excuse
of being honest in their folly. They
have raved, they have foamed at the
mouth in denunciatipn of trusts, and,
now, in my own state, they their fore
most party leaders, including the man
before whom the Others bow with
barred head and trembling knee, have
been discovered in trust which really
is infamous, and, perhaps, of criminal
character; trust in which these apos-
ties of democracy. these prophets of
the new dispensation, have sought to
wiring fortunes from the dire need of
their poorer brethren.
/ rise to second the nomination Of
William Mckinley, because, with him
as the leader this country has trod the
path of national greatness and pros
perity with the strides of giant, and
because, under him, we can and will
once more and finally overthrow those
whose success would mean for the ma
ton material disaster and moral dis
grace. Exactly as we have remedied
the evils which, in the past, we under
took to remedy, SO, now when we say
that wrong shall be righted, 1t most
assuredly will be righted. We have
nearly succeeded in bringing peace and
order to the Philippines. We have sent
thither and to the other islands to-
wards whose inha bitants we now stand
as trustees in the cause of good gov
eminent, men like Wood, Taft and AL
len whose very names are synonymous
of integrity and guarantees of efficien-
| cy Appointees like these, with subor-
ldinates chosen on grounds of merit and
fitness alone are evidences of the spir-
lit of method by which this nation must
approach it's new and serious duties.
Contrast this with what would be the
fate Of the islands under the spoils sys-
tenn so brazenly advocated by our OPP
ponents in their last national platform.
The war still goes on, because the al
| lies in this country of the bloody insur-
rectionary oligarchy have taught their
foolish dupes abroad to believe, that, if
the rebellion is kept alive until next
November democratic success at the
polls here will be followed by the
abandonment Of the islands-that