The Columbia herald. [volume] (Columbia, Tenn.) 18??-1935, 1903-08-07

deliver ed an address July Is at Chau
tuaqua, n. Y. His subject was Rep
resentative Government.
! That address should be read by every
American citizen. 1t shows that the
evils of the DAY are recognized by d
republican governor who has this
courage to speak plainly. 1t is true
that no well informed person denies
the correctness of the charges made
by the republican governor of Wlscon-
SIN and yet it is significant that other
republican leaders keep silent ana that
those who speak candIdly upon these
subjects, as the Wisconsin governor has
done, are not regarded by parry
leaders as thoroughly sound repuDli-
cans.
IN his speech at Chautauqua, Gov
ernor La Toilette pointed out that the
basic principle of this government is
the will of the people; that Its found
ers devised system which seemed to
assure the means of ascertaining that
will, of enacting it into legislation
and enforcing it through administra-
ton of the law. This will was to be
accomplished by elacting men to make
aud men to execute the law which
represent in the laws 40 made and
executed the will of the people. Gov
ernor La Toilette said that this was
the establishment of representative
government where every man had
equal voice, equal rights ana equal
RESPONSE bility. And then this repub-
lican governor asked his auditors
Have we such government today,
n I'd ro nj n " aornfnu m ha dnYni l.
mated by forces, in making and enact
ing our laws, which thwart the Will OF
the people and menace the very life
of representative government No
man questioned 1t for hundred years.
Whoever asserts 1t now is denounced
as a menace to industrial progress. =
Governor La Toilette quoted from
Washington, jefferson, Lincoln and
others to show that the fathers of the
country rega rded the people as the
source of power, and he saiu tnat it
was reserved for Abraham Lincoln, On
the field OF Gettysburg, to express at
once the profoundest and most phiios-
orhlcal. the simplest and most popular
definition of American democracy ever
uttered, when he declared:
- We here highly resolve that these
dead shall not have died in vain; that
this nation, under God, shall have
new birth of freedom. and that the
government of the people, by the
people and for the people shall not
perish from the earth. -
Governor La Toilette dIsclalmed any
disposition to excite the preJudices
of his auditors or to invoke an unfair
Judgment, but he declared that deep
conviction lmpelled him to appeal to
their patriotism to meet an impend-
ing crisis. He said: "We owe it to
the living as we'll as to the dead to
make honest answer to this question,
is our government of city, state, and
nation thoroughly representative OF the
will of the peopleY' -
Governor La Toilette further said:
lone of the causes of revolution
proclaimed IN the Declaration OF
independence was: Imposing taxes
on us without our consent Today,
great aggregatIons Of corporate wealth
buy immunity from taxation in our
legislatures, and throw the burden
which they should bear onto the indl-
vidual taxpayer of every municipality
and state Betrayed by his representa-
taxed for the benefit OF the corporation.
Taxarlon without representation is as
much a Grin against just and equal
government in 1903 as it was in 1776.
Government by corporations is as
destructive of the liberties of the
people of this country as the exercise
of the same power by foreign mon
arch. The arbitrary control of the
price of coal and iron, and corn, and
wheat. and beef-whether by an ex
tortionate transportation rate, or by a
monster combination, is a more abso-
lutte tyranny of the American people
than quartering the army OF King
George upon the American cOlOnlsts
without their consent. There can be
no such thing as commercial slavery