The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1903-10-09
coWARDLY EVASION.

lit ISDOII COIllGS 1IOIll w dSuiJIS I@ll
that the president will recommend to
congress the appointment of a joint
commission to study the financial sit
uation and outline proposed currency
legislation. We can well believe that
it may be true. President Roosevelt
has already put himself on record in
favor of a tariff commission, and the
appointment of a currency commission
would be the easiest way Of shelving
a difficult and embarrassing subject
until after the next election.
Of all the solutions proposed for the
financial question in it's present as
pect none is more ludicrously inadmis-
sible than this. There is nothing for
a commission to do, and it would do
nothing. The whole subject of needed
currency legislation at this time has
been thoroughly threshed out. In the
committee considerations of the Fowler
bill last winter, in the reports accom-
panyfng it and the debates upon it, all
the facts of the situation were present
ed in sufficient detail We know that
the country needs a more elastic cur
rency. We know that this can be Sc
cured with safety, because we have the
guide.
With authority given to the banks
n DIR Lot inO IITo6QYs ctrinf
supervision, within careful limitations,
with a guarantee fund adequate to
protect the. noteholder against all
losses, and with a sliding scale Of tax
alton increasing the rate heavily ac-
cording to the proportion that note
issues bear to capital stock, thus
permitting larger circulation in time
of monetary distress and insuring it's
retirement as soon as interest rates
fall, the currency question would be
settled. No commission could tell US
more than this, and none composed Of
honest and intelligent men could tell
us anything different.
The fact is that the commission
would not be desired or expected to
tell us anything at all. 1t would exist
merely as a bridge TO carry this ques-
ton over the coming campaign. It's
creation would be purely political
measure. The design is to prevent de-
bate on the currency question this
winter, and to relieve the Republican
majority from a painful choice be-
tween legislating and being held ac-
countable for failure to legislate. The
whole policy Of Republican leaders
at this moment may be called one of
closure. They all want to move the
previous question. They want nothing
done with the tariff, nothing with the
trusts, nothing with the currency ques-
country to hold it's breath and make
the best of the ills it bears, in order
that the Republican party may not
have to go before the people carrying
the responsibility of any positive act
whatever.
This policy may have it's merits, but
not when It has been carried to the
point Of cowardice. The average
American voter hates a coward above
all other beings that crawl on the
earth's surface. He will forgive mis-
takes and condone vehemence or even
brutality, but he has no use for quit
ter. 1t is the mistake of this adminis-
tration to have clothed the strenuous
figure Of it's chief, for the present
occasion, with the hide of the harm
less sheep. The garb does not fit
him. The party is losing strength
and losing credit because it covers be-
fore present crises and confesses it
self either unable or unwilling to per-
form the duties of q majority, lest it
should thereby lose vote. 1t will >go
into the next campaign with the word
coward" written all over it.