The independent. [volume] (Lincoln, Neb.) 1902-1907, 1904-11-17
Tom Watson Will Fight On

New York, Nov. 13.-Thomas E.
Watson today gave out the following
statement:
1t should be borne in mind that at
the time the Springfield convention
rendered me the presidential nomina-
tion the peoples party had no real
existence as a factor in national poll
tics for eight years. In the presiden-
tial election of 1900 it gave to its nom
inee only 5000 votes. To that extent
had the fusion of 1896 swallowed up
q movement which IN 1894 counted
nearly two millions of votes and about
$500 active newspapers. Therefore we
had to build from the ground up in
1904. We had almost nothing to start
with in the way Of party organization,
campaign funds and newspaper sup
port; we had only three months in
which to work. These things being
first considered, some fair idea of what
was accomplished can be had only
when the official returns are known.
Up tt t3ass time no official statement
has been made OF ti1o~uote. and can
only guess what 1t was from infUff
tion conveyed to me by friends in
various parts of the country. These
sources, of course. are not Wry re-
liable. Basing an estimate dp> them,
however, my opinion is that received
something like half million votes,
scattered through so many States,
north and south, east and west, to in
dicate that the sentiment which gives
its moral support to the peoples party
is national and not sectional. / have
found everywhere that the current was
strong and deep in favor of Jefferson
iaa democracy. believe today that If
al those WLo believe in that theory of
government could be united in har-
monious action we could sweep the
country
Mr.. Roosevelt's overwhelming ma
jcrity was not SO much due to the
fact that our people believe in class
reign Of special privileges. 1t
was not by any means an endorsement
OF corporation tyranny, the greed of
the truset: or the methods of combined
capital
Mr.. Roosevelt's majority over Mr.
Parker was due mainly to two things.
One was the immense personal .,op-
ularity of Mr.. Roosevelt himself. and
the other was the immense unpopular
ity of Mr.. Cleveland's second admin
istration. Unfortunately for Mr.. Par
ker, he became SO completely identified
with the marauders who plundered the
slo1,t during Mr.. Cleveland's
second administratiu tiuis that he had to
bear all the odium which they have II
cured. The people have never had q |
chance to show just what they thought
If that second administration. Mr..
Bryan's two campaigns did not give
them the opportunity. 1t was only I
when the old Cleveland combination
secured the defeat of Bryan and Hearst
and dictated the nomination of Mr..
Parker that the. masses got the oppor-
unity to vent upon national candi-
late the intense hatred which they
had been nursing for years against
such men as Olney and Belmont and
Carlisle and Cleveland himself. They
knew that I could not be elected and
hey were so eager to make the best /
If the opportunity to safeguard the
country against the repetition of that
aturnalia of class legislation which
marked Cleveland's second administra-
ion that they rushed to Roosevelt and
ave him majority which does not
lnder ordinary circumstances belong
o the republican party. In other words,
he personality of Mr.. Roosevelt and
he unpopularfty of Parker's environ
nent carried into the republican col
INNS vast multitudes of men who, un-
er ordinary circumstances would not
e found there. /
My own plans for the future en-
race a complete organization of he
eople along the lines of Jeffersonian
emocracy, the re-establishment of re-
orm papers, and a systematic propa- Il
anda of Jeffersonian principles, in or
er that in 1908 there shall be party t
genuine opposition to the republi- t
an party and it's present policies. If l
olitical his sory teaches anything it 1
that old parties never accomplish c
ny reform unless they are irresistibly t
riven to it by pressure from without. /
hope at least to be of some use to my