The Owosso times. (Owosso, Mich.) 1897-1926, 1902-10-31
ANOTHER GOOD MEETING.
Fine Address by Hon. Phil. r. coIsrove
Monday Night.

A fair sized audience met in the court
room at Corunna Monday evening to
hear the issues of the campaign discuss
ed by Mr., Phil. +. Colgrove, of Hast
ings. The meeting was called to order
by Mr.. F. E. Welch, who called Mr..
Will A. Rosencrans to the chair. Mr..
Rosencrans reminded the audience that
it would be but week from that
time when they would all be call
ed on to say whether they wished the
present conditions to continue or not:
that few years ago the country was in
the slough of despond and that ever
since the first term of Mckinley began
they had been getting farther and
farther away from that same slough.
However, he said, Mr.. Colgrove will
tell you more about that.
On being introduced Mr.. Colgrove
commented on the fact that the meet
ings of the state were not largely at
tended this year ayering that the
people were too busy to attend. 1t was
the experience all over the state and in
both parties. The object of the meet
ings was not, however, a discussion in
learned sense. 1t was merely to get
the people together, merely to remind
them that they had duty to perform,
to go to the polls and to stir their
neighbors up to the necessity of going.
|
But the republican party, said he, is
and always has been, party of pro-
gress. For over forty years with one
short interim it has been the dominant
party 1t has been party of response
bilities. 1t has had to undertake ex-
periments. 1t has made progress
through it all by constantly eliminating
the bad and clinging to the good SO
in the case Of the result which the late
war left with us. The party has fol-
lowed this same policy of eliminating
the bad here and there and cliuging to
the good until state of affairs entirely
creditable to the American people and
quite agreeable to them has been at
tanned.
In 1896, 1898, 1900, the democrats had
different paramount issues. They have
made the money issue paramount" I"
imperialism and militarism have each
served their terms as paramount" is
sues and this year the state issue here
in Michigan is their paramount issue,
and Governor Bliss seems to be their
only state issue. He was glad to tell
them thing or two about the govern
or -
On looking up the records of the gov
ernors of Michigan he had found that
but two of them had been college grad
yates. Governor Bliss had a diploma
however, that the rest would be willing
to exchange theirs for. He had re-
sponded to the call for troops in the
civil war when the life of the nation
was threatened and had gone out to
save his country. He enlisted as a
private. For conspicuous bravery in
action he was promoted time after
time until he became captain He
was taken a prisoner, and kept in Ander-
sonville and other southern prisons, all
of the horrors of which he knew. And
yet in spite of their horrors and in spite
of all the homesickness (which he felt as
,, well as the others with him, when the
time came when for amusement and to
show their feelings the boys in the
, prison voted whether the war were a
failure or not, Captain Bliss was one Of
those who voted for President Lincoln
and the continuance of the war. He
was as homesick as the rest but he was
. enough of a patriot to say that he
wanted the war to go on and that he die
. not want to be sent home at the ex
pense of anything less than an honor
4 able peace which meant that the nation
! was saved. That showed courage of 6
high order. It showed backbone.
When the war was finally over Cap
tain Bliss came back to Michigan and
|, cast his lot in the Saginaw valley He
: helped transform the wilderness. He
builded fortune for himself and help
ed build up the valley, commercially
financially, morally, socially, and in
every other good way.
Governor Bliss has been condemned
for his veto of the Ward Lowery
> mortgage tax bill. Do you know that
that bill would have practically annihi
lated the primary school fund of the
!, state, the share of which coming tc
Q Shiawassee this year is approximate
: ly S22,650, or more than half the
7 amount paid by the county to the stat,
: for all the expenses of the various state
: institutions and the running of tn,
government machinery as wellP That
: was why the governor vetoed the bill
He stood between the primary schoolso o.
{ the state and the bill which would have
' struck this blow at them, without Civ
: ing the state. any compensating advan
. tage elsewhere. So with the so-callet
$ ripper legislation. 1t was asked for b,
v the representatives and senator's from