The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1904-09-12


gress, which requires the executive to
make regulations to govern the sub
OrdinateS of the pension office in deter
mining who are entitled to pensions.
President Cleveland had already exer-
cised this power by a regulation which
declared that seventy-five should be set
as the age at which total disability
should be conclusively presumed.
Similarly President Mckinley estab-
lished sixty-five as the age at which
half disability should be conclusively
presumed. The regulation now in
question, in the exercise of the same
power, supplemented these regulations
made under Presidents Cleveland and
Mckinley. ~
The men who fought for union and
for liberty in the years from 1851 to
1866 not only saved this nation from
ruin, but rendered an inestimable SER
vice to all mankind. We of the United
States owe the fact that today we have
a country to what they did, and the
nation has decreed by law that no one
of them, if disabled from earning his
own living, shall lack the pension to
which he is entitled, not only as a mat
ter of gratitude, but as matter or
justice. 1t is the police of the Repub-
lican party, steadily continued through
many years, to treat the veterans of
the Civil war in a spirit of broad lib
crafty The order in question carried
out this policy. and is justified not
merely on legal grounds. but also on
grounds of public morality. 1t is
matter of common knowledge that
when the average man who depends
for his wages upon bodily labor has
reached the age of sixty-two his earn
ing ability is in all probability less by
half than it was when he was in his
prime; and that by the time he has
reached the age of seventy he has
probably lost all earning ability. II
there is doubt upon this point let the
doubter examine the employees doing
erTsa M n n
tory or on any great railroad, and find
out how large is the proportion or men
between the ages of sixty-two ana sew
enty and whether these men are still
employed at the highly paid tasks
which they did in their prime As
matter of fact. many railroads pension
their employees when they have reach-
ed these ages, and in nations where OLD
age pensions prevail they always pegin
som ewhere between the two limits
thus set. 1t is easy to test our oppo-
nents' sincerity in this matter The
order in question is revocable at the
pleasure of the executive. II our op-
moments come into power they can re-
woke this order and announce that
they will treat the veterans of sixty
two to seventy as presumably in run
bodily vigor and not entitled to pen
sions. Will they now authoritanVeIy
state that they intend to do this? II
so. we accept the issue. If not. then
we have the right to ask why they
raise an issue which, when raised they
do not venture to meet.
Anthracite Strike.
In addition to those acts of the
administration which they venture to
assaiI only after misrepreSenting them,
there are others which they dare not
overtly or officially attack and when
they covertly bring forward as reas-
ons for the overthrow of the party.
In certain great centerS and with GER
tain great interests our opponents make
every effort to show that the settle
ment of the anthracite coal strike py
the individual act of the president, and
the successful suit against the North |
srn Securities cornpany-the merger |
by the department |
Of justice, were acts because of which |
the present administration should be
thrown from power. Yet they dare
not openly condemn either act They |
dare not in any authoritative or formal
say that in either case wrong !
was done or error committed in the |
method of action or in the choice OF
for putting that action |
INTO effect. But what they dare not |
assert in open day, they seek |
to use furtively and through special |
agents. 1t is perhaps natural that an |
attack so conducted should be made |
sometimes on the ground that too |
much, sometimes on the ground that |
too little, has been done. Some of |
our opponents complain because I'M |
merce law. suits were undertaken |
which would have been successful; |
others, because suits were not under |
taken which would have been unsuc- !
cessful. The Democratic state con- |
vention in New York dealt with the |
coal strike by demanding |
in deliberate and formal fashion that |
the national government should take |
possession of the coal fields; yet cham
pionS of that conventions cause now |
condemn the fact that there was any |
action by the president at although |
they must know that it was only this |
action by the president which prevent |
ed the movement for national owner
ship of the coal fields from gaining |
what might we'll have been an ire
sistible impetus. Such mutually de-
structve criticisms furnish an adequate |
measure of the chance for coherent |
opponents should be given power.
Democratic Policies.
So much for what our opponents
openly or covertly advance in the way
Of an attack on the acts of the ad-
When we come to con-
slider the policies for which they pro-
Tess to stand We are met with the diff
iculty always arising when statements
Of policy are so made that they can
De interpreted in two different ways.
On some of the vital questions that |
nave confronted the American people
n the last decade our opponents take
he position that silence is the best
possible way to convey their views.
They contend that their Iukewarm at
.itude of partial acQuiescence in what
others have accomplished entities
hem to be made the custodians of
he financial honor and commercial in
erests which they have but recently
fought to ruin. Being unable to agree
lmong themselves as to whether the
gold standard is a curse or a bless
ng, and as to whether we ought or
ought not to have free and un-
limited coinage of silver, they
nave apparently thought it ex-
1edient to avoid any committal
)n these subjects, and individually
Zach to follow his particular bent