The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1902-05-09
Credited to Gen. Funston's LO-
tus Club Speech.
REPLIES TO BURTON.
Kansas Senator Asks Democrats
to Be Good.
Tennessee Mans Reply Was Ex-
tremely Bitter.

resumed his speech on the Philippines
in the senate Thursday afternoon. He
returned to the attack made by Senator
Carmack of Tennessee upon General
Frederick Funston. If Mr.. Carmack had
regarded as reprehensible the methods
used by the Kansas general, Mr. Bur
ton declared, he should have opposed
the confirmation of Funstons nomina-
ton to be a brigadier general when it
was before the senate. Funston's rec
ord was known to everybody. The gen
eral had nothing to conceal. The Demo-
Gratis, he continued. had not stopped at
army officers, but had carried their at
tacks to the president
THE president" said Mr.. Burton,
needs no defense at my hands, as a
soldier. or as a statesman, in literature
or in politics. He is the first citizen OF
! the United States. The criticism IS
made that he travels too fast I think
at the close of the next campaign IN
! 1904, when he gets through with the be-
/ draggled Democracy, his opponents who
! now refer to him as a race horse viii
refer to him as a steam engine and j
rapid one at that.
Il do not know how long it will take
to civilize the Philippines. 1t has taken
a century to bring the people of the five
| civilized tribes of the Indian Territory
up to the standard of citizenship, but
/ they are now ready for it. Their terri
/ tory will soon be admitted as a terri
| tory or as a part of a state. The peo-
/ pie of the Indian Territory are a splen-
| did class of Americans and many OF
| them are equipped for service in con-
! gress or in any other position of re-
| sponsibility."
Mr.. Burton also took occasion to re-
ply to the speech made by Senator Till
| man IN which the South Carolina SEN
| ator discussed the race problem and de-
! Tended lynchings.. In this connection
Mr. Tillman referred to lynching in
/ Kansas few years ago. Mr.. Burton
! declared that the people of Kansas were
| law loving people and the good citizens
OF the state deplored the violence men
| toned and were ashamed of it. The
senator warned the south that if the
right of suffrage was taken away from
/ the negro the law of compensation
( would assert itself, and the negro would
| come into the property of the south.
| Already, he said, Booker T. Washing
/ ton had advised the southern negroes
| to let politics alone and get homes, and
| this advice was being followed. Mr..
| Burton also referred to the work of the
| Rev Mr. Vernon in Kansas, whose skin,
| ne said, was black, but whose heart
was white and his work a splendid ex-
ample for others to follow.
ton said:
You are assuming now the role you
/ nave been playing for the past 40 years.
! You are grumbling- I ask you to Quit
| It L ask you to come forward now and
you to stop talking against our soldiers
in the Philippines; I ask you to stop
questioning our motives. I ask YOU to
| stop talking against the policies or i'm
| ag1nary policies you think we have of
trying to enslave somebody over there.
/ What we are trying to do is to learn Wha t
| we ought to do. A nation no more than
| an individual can do wrong without
/ punishment When a nation does a
! wrong the evils growing from it are
greater than We're ever anticipated.
| The soldiers of the union did their
| duty and are doing it; they builded
better than they knew I grant YOU In
dividuals may do their duty in fighting
/ and be wrong. can conceive of a case
| where a soldier in the Philippine islands
could be Obeying an order that was
wrong. But I cannot conceive of a ma
| ton doing wrong and not receiving
| punishment What I want to know is
the right of this question, what is our
| duty2''
CARMACK FOLLOWS BURTON.
Senator Carmack of Tennessee in re-
ply to Mr.. Burton. delivered an attack
upon General Funston, which for bitter
| ness has seldom been eQualled in the
| senate He declared that in his state
| ment regarding AguinaldO's alleged cru
city Funston had uttered a "'willful, ma
| licious and premeditated lie"
| Il listened with rather an attentive
ear to the labored eulogium which the
senator from Kansas (AIr Burton1 maid
ston," said Mr.. Carmack IF it will
satisfy the senator to know that he has
proved General Funston to possess the
| qualities of physical courage and pIvsi-
cal endurance, I freely concede it. If a
few acts of reckless dare-deViftry in
the Philippine islands or elsewhere is
enough to make a man hero, he is
entitled to his laurels 1 have never
disputed anything the senator has said
/ bearing upon the one question of Gen
eral F'unston's physical courage. I an
as ready as any man in the country tc
honor an exhibition Of military courage
for, as a matter of fact. it is the com
monest quality of our race. and there
are very few men who do not possess 1t
In an army of 900 men gathered
from any part of the United States you
I wouldn't find thousand and I do not
believe you would find a hundred cow
ards.
THE quality of physical courage, OF
military courage, is not SO very rars
that we are to make a denigod out OF
every man who demonstrated that he
possess it. I shall never consent thai
[ any man shall have unhn tied license Il
insult and slander and defame simply
because he has swan river and charg-
ed fort.
THE senator from Kansas makes pa.
thetic reference to the fact that Genera
E'unston's lips are sealed. Who sealed his
lips2 How did they come to be sealed.
| The senator simply draws attention Il
the fact that Funston's slanderous- anc
lcentious tongue had become such Z
common nuisance, had had made hin
| such a shame and scandal to the army
| and to the admin1Stra ton that the pres
| ident in the interest of COMMON de
cency, was compelled to muzzle him
The senator from Kansas seemed Il
think that I am lacking of magnanimity
because I attack a man whose lips are
sealed. but what difference does it make
that Funston's lips are sealed 50 long
| as the mouth Of his senatorial champion