The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1903-01-09
COMMENT.

season OF glaOneSS Is usually marked
by an increased number of suicides
This year has been no exception. Is it
because the joys Of the fortunate
make the unfortunate more despon-
OBSERVATION-DISCLOSURES.
President Castro says it is all right
about arbitration, but there are some
conditions he wants to make. No
body will bother very much about
those. though, until the whole case is
submitted to The Hague tribunal. The
European powers have some preliml-
nary conditions, too, but since they
say these will not be allowed to pre-
vent arbitration of the whole issue they
need not worry the world. The case
will surely go to the international court
and will be determined by that body
strictly upon its merits, and that is
what we all want.-ChariestOn Post.
We infer that the rumor, put in cir
culatiOn at Albany. hat Plat may
not accept a re election" is a kind IF
preliminary notification discreetly is
sued in preparation for the coming
conference Of the governor with Plat.
It is q pretty direct hint to the latter
that he must take his medicine meekly
in all state matters, or else that there
may not be any reelection for him TO
accept. This would be to take a leaf
out of the bOSS's own book. He used TO
| say, Wlen MS 3IJelIlOn was CalleO 10
any independent expression or act by
an o~ffceholder, Il believe he is not a
candidate for re-election.''-New York
Post.
The New York Evening Post has
done a public service in sending 10
Harrington, Delaware. a staff corre-
s%pOndent to report fully the circum-
stances surrounding the special cleo
ton held there Tuesday for a member
| of tho Iooicl0 t11ra Tho lection rac,11tnj
in a victory for the Addicks faction.
and it is we'll that the country shouli
know how that victory was accom-
plished. The Evening Posts CORE
SpOndont gives the details with an as
founding confidence in the accuracy Of
his statements. He declares %unequiv-
Ocally that the election was bought.
At the regular election of November
4th, no representative in the Legislature
from the Ninth district was chosen, tho
AddickS and the anti-Addicks candi-
dates each receiving 424 votes, and d
special election was ordered for De-
Cember 30.-COlumbia State.
C~ontending in the January numbe
of the North American Review that
The country is tending towards over
population, Ida Hustled Harper takes
rs an instance the thousands of small
children whD are working steadily in
the cotton mills of South Carolina.
There are other offenders than South
Carolina, of course, and they are not
all in the sOuth-thOugh it is probably
true that in point of numbers South
Carolina makes the most distressing
exhibition. But child labor in South
Carolina. Or in Alabama, or in Virginia.
or in Pennsylvania is no support for
Mrs. Harper's Malthusian argument.
! The southern states mentioned are
certainly not over-populated. If chill
dren Of tender years work in their
| mills, it is not because the children
could not otherwise be supported. but
because OF the heartlessness which en-
abl@S employer and parent to turn
childhood into coin.-Norfolk Land
mark.
We have just received the Buenos
! Ayres Weekly Herald of November Il,
1902. in which we find an article on the
Monroe doctrine. containing the follow
ing significant paragraphs: 1T is per-
haps only a question Of a little time
when those revolutions and distur-
Dances which break out from time to
time in the smaller and more disrep-
utable South American republics will
be a thing Of the past: for it stands
20 reason that 4 great power which
| guarantees their safety from without
will not tolerate a reign Of chaos and
miSrula within their territories. II
they cannot maintain internal order
! they will assuredly forfeit their right
to autonomous states" Here is a con-
! fessiOn by a South American newspa-
per that some of the so-calIed South
American republics are not capable OF
self-gOVernment and an intimatiOn
that the United States must, under the
Monroe doctrine, undertake to dis
cipline them. In the same connection
! we find in the December Atlantic "A
Letter from Brazil by George Cham
herlain, in which it is shown that con-
ditiOnS are by no means ideal even in
that great observation-disclosures Times
The Boston Journal, in discussing
ANTITRUST" legislation and the APP
| parent hesitancy with which congress
| approaches the task" concludes that
1T is by no means the easy thing that
seems TO be supposed by some to draw
up Il bill, within constitutional limita-
tons. which shall accomplish what IS
desired in the public interest without
Imposing a serious handicap upon in
J dutriaI and business development"
Our contemporary then adds that IF
| anybody imag ineS the contrary let him
try his hand merely at drawing up a
definition of Il trust, and he will cure
himself OF his delusion." The Jour
nails point as to constitutional lin1i-
tations" seems we'll taken. But adj
hitting, for the sake of argument, that
it is not. it o still be no Easy
thing 10 secure the passage by a re-
publican congress of an effective anti
trust bill. For the trust interests
might be depended upon to see to 1t
that no such bill went through. Yet
there is an cas- way, comparatively,
of reaching the rusts and with that
way constitutional limitations have
nothing to do. It is through tariff re-
vision. The matter is merely one of
arousing the masses to n determination
to place the democracy again in power,
under pledge 10 batter down Dingley-
ism. which protects II fosters the
trusts. Tariff revision legislation is
the only "anti-trust" legislation that
will accomplish what IS desired in the
! public Observation-Disclosures Dispatch.