Gloucester County Democrat. (Woodbury, N.J.) 1878-1932, 1902-02-20

UILDING castles in Spain is q
very common and harmless
Va mental recreation. President
d ~ making three years before the
date of the election is Just
about as common and as harmless.
Whenever the newspapers run out
of anything else to do they try their
hands at springing new presiden-
tial candidates. On the Republican
side it seems that Hanna and Roose-
velt are in the lead, with occasional
mention of Fairbanks and Spooner. 1t
is in the Democratic field where the
nomination prophet gets in his most
interesting work. His vaticinations
range from David Bennett Hill of New
York as one extreme to Benjamin r.
Tillman as the other. The latest and
most interesting prognostication as to
Democratic candidate comes in the
shape of a news dispatch from Boston
and is to the effect that Hon. William
]. Bryan intends to make Tom L. John
son, mayor of Cleveland, the residuary
legatee of his presidential estate. If
that dispatch is true, it is of vast i'm
portance to the American people. Bry-
ans influence is still unqueStionably
great with the rank and file. Tom
Johnson has much strength of his own.
Bryan's strength added to Johnson's
would make Tom irresistible in the
convention and at the polls. Tom
johnson has been justly rated as a big
man ever since the Fifty-third con-
gress. Many persons then believed
him a presidential quantity, and his
recent career has increased the number
of his admirers and adherents. His
geographical location is good = first
rate. 1t is rumored in Ohio that he
will run for governor next year. If he
does, he will be elected. The Hanna
Foraker feud will give him the state
If he is elected governor, he will at once
loom up as president in posse. If he
is elected governor and Bryan sup
ports him, he will certainly go into
the presidential Office March 4, 1905.
1t Isn't English, You Know.
If Hon. Charles Fremont Cochran of
Missouri is not careful he will render
himself persona non grata to both the
Republican administration and King
Edward VII. He has had the temerity
to introduce into the house a resohl-
ton inviting South Africa's Grand Old
Manage, liberty's Grand Old Man
President Paul Kruger, to visit the
United States as the nations guest
and appropriating $4,000 to pay the
expenses Of hissxisit Should it pass
and should Mr.. Kruger accept, the
plain people of America, Republicans
as well as Democrats, would give him
such a welcome as would warm the
cookies of his great heart; but it will
not pass. The Republican bosses will
see to that. Cochran may introduce
all the resolutions which his generous
soul and fertile mind can suggest, but
this Republican administration will
never permit them to pass. 1t wouldn't
be English, don't you know.
The People Want 1t.
More and more it becomes apparent
daily that the Democratic party is
the party of the masses and the
Republican party the party of the
bosses. OF late years there has been
an insistent movement among the peo-
pie in favor of electing United States
senators by the people instead of by
the legislatures More than once the
national house of representatives has
voted to submit a constitutional amend
ment to that effect. 1t was always per-
mitted to sleep the sleep of death in
the senate-the millionaireS' club Dem
ocrats declared for it in their last ma
tional platform If submitted to the
people, it would be adopted with
whoop. At last the Republicans have
shown their hand. 1t happened in boss
ridden Ohio, where the Republican
duumvirs Hanna and Foraker divide
the Buckeye world between them. The
resolution came up in the Ohio house
of representatives. which is over
whelmingly Republican, and was kill
ed with dispatch if not with neatness.
Straws show how the wind blows.
Burdens Of Taxation.
AS a philosopher and logician the
Philadelphia Inquirer is dandy-yea,
verify, a Jeemes Dandy. Just for
amusement read this chunk of wisdom
from that source. 1t is rich, rare and
racy. The Inquirer says: Very few
people have felt the war tax. Very
few of them have known they were
taxed. Indeed, many of them never
were. Why, therefore, simply because
there is a surplus should the revenue
be cut off? Can we not use it to ad-
vantage?" Yes, of course we can.
We might squander a large portion of
it in buying flannels for our new wards
in the tropics or fans for our old wards
in Alaska. There is no trouble to find
ways to use it; quite the contrary
But, pray, whose money is it? The
peoples, and the people want the taxes
cut down. They are willing to spend
all the money necessary to support the
government literally, but they do not
desire to be mulcted beyond that. And
they are right, or all the political econ
omists from Adam Smith to the pres
ent time are wrong.
The truth is that many of the war
taxes were burdensome and yexatious.
Stamp taxes have never been popular
in this country since the day of
George Grenville and his stamp tax
act. Many of the features of the war
stamp tax caused lots of trouble and
produced little revenue. For instance,
the tax on kilograms was nuisance
and exasperating. 1t was the intent
of congress that the telegraph COM
panies should pay it, but they did
nothing of the sort. They shifted the
tax to their patrons shoulders. The
stamp tax on deeds, mortgages and
contracts was a source of irritation to
the people. The stamp tax on patent
medicines was unjust, being out of all
proportion to the value of smaller ar
ticIes sold by druggists. And so on to
the end of the chapter. If The Inquirer
will put it's ear to the ground, it will
ascertain that the body of the people
want these taxes repealed, and their
repeal will most probably prove to be
the most popular act of this congress.
Where the Government Loses.
Hon. William Sulzer, the gallant
young Democrat from New York, de-
serves great credit for introducing a
bill to force the treasury officials to de-
posit public funds in banks which will
pay 2 per cent on quarterly balances.
NJ & q