Willmar tribune., 1901-10-16
OFFICIAL NEWSPAPER OF COUNTY.
OFFICE IN TRIBUNE BUILDING.
2O8 Fourth Street
Entered at the postof1ce at Wi1lmar, Mimi.
as second class mail matter.1
WEDNESDAY. OCTOBER 16, 100
A SIGNIFICANT APPOINTMENT.

A SIGNIFICANT APPOINTMENT.
President Roosevelt's first appoint
ment to federal Office in the south is
very significant one. He has apr
pointed exGov. Jones of Alabama as
federal judge. Jones is an ex.con-
federate soldier and gold democrat.
The republican papers are openly
stating that this is a step to break up
the solid south. It is we'll known that
many of the old slave aristocracy as
we'll as the new money aristocracy OF
the south are not in accord with the
present leadership of the democratic
party on any vital question. They
have been democrats only because the
negroes we're republicans. They have
voted the democratic state tickets to
keep the blacks from mismanaging
state affairs as they did during the
'carpetbagger" period. They have
voted the democratic national ticket to
keep negroes from getting federal Off
ces. The shaking of the "bloody
Shirt by republicans is another rea-
son for these men being democrats.
Now, if the president ignores the ne
groes and recognizes the old soldiers
of the confederacy it is figured that
they will go to the party where they
really belong on account of their opin-
ions on national politics.
It is to be hoped that the president
will succeed in this policy. ANY, man
or class of men belonging to a party
for the sake of policy, not principle,
is source of weakness instead OF
strength. This element will be ready
to adopt any kind of a platform that
promises success but will care little
for carrying out the premises after
success is won, and will be ready to
change policy after q defeat. This
must weaken the peoples confidence
in the party. And then the presence
of this old slave aristocracy in the
democratic party has been success
fully used by northern politicians to
scare the northern voter away from
the democratic party. We all remem-
ber how certain ex-everything in this
county wept scalding tears last fall
over the way negroes were disfran-
chised in the south. What will that
class of spouters do now when Roose-
velt Joins hands with the ex-confeder.
ates to keep the negro out of politics.
If Roosevelt can break up the solid
south and Low can defeat Tammany
the two bette noirs of the democratic
party will have disappeared and those
who actually believe in the principles
of the party will be more likely to not
only control it's conventions but con-
troll its actions if it should be entrusted
with power. The republican party has
always done more for the rich than it
has promised, because its leaders we're
more friendly to that class than they
dared to tell. The democratic party
during the same period has always
done less for the common people than
it promised because so many of it's
leaders were not in accord with the
party principles. Purged of that un-
desirable element the principles of the
party might become vitalized. 1t may
be that the organization will be broken
up, but the principles uf Jefferson will
live and it's followers will rally around
the standard of ''equal rights to all,
special privileges to none," and, freed
from prejudices attached to the name,
march to victory. The rank and file
of democracy in the west and parts OF
the south have been educated up to the
populist standard by Bryan's two
campaigns, and If it can get rid~of the
slave and money aristocracy of the
south it will take advanced grounds
on the questions of the day. The re.
publican party is welcome to the ele.
ment it seeks to propitiate and which
really belongs to it. But the republi-
can stump speakers will '''be up a
stump and will have to take back all
the awful accusations they have in the
past hurled at their new allies.