Clarke courier. [volume] (Berryville, Va.) 1869-1997, 1904-09-07
FROM WASHINGTON

correspondence which | consider
of importance for the voters of the
country To become familiar with i'm
all the various phases of his origi-
nal and many-sided attitudes on
public questions. ! will give them
a few more gems from his fecund
pen.
Here's what he thinks of the
average voter and citizen OF foreign
birth:
In American Ideals (Nol. /. p.
40, he gives tip to the man of
foreign birth who has been elevat-
ed to public life 10y his fellow-men:
1T is from these same great
cities that the worst legislators
come. 1t is true that there are
always among them a few cultivat-
ed and scholarly men who are well
educated and who stand ON higher
and broader intellectual and moral
plane than the country members.
but the bulk are very low indeed.
They are unusually foreigners. of
little or no education, with exceed
ingly misty ideas as TO morality
and possessed of An ignorance 50
profound that it could only be
called comic were it not for the
fact that it has at times such seri-
Gus effects upon our laws.
In American Ideas (Vol. ii. p.
23), he favors the Populists with
this compliment:
Refinement and comfort they
are apt to consider quite as objec-
tionable as immortality. .
A taste for learning and cultured
friends, and a tendency to bathe
frequently, cause them the deepest
suspicion. Though they
eften make war on vice, they
rather prefer making war on pros
perity and refinement"
And again in his pamphlet on
the Campaign of 1896:
Thrift, industry, and business
energy are qualities which are
quite incompatible with true Pop
ulistic mind. Such conduct strikes
Populist as immoral. "
And the pops are just now
engaged in an attempt TO play into
Roosevelt's hands by stealing
Democratic votes.
Theodore Roosevelt started out
in politics as an outspoken and
ardent free trader.
This means, as we all know, not
reformation of the tariff, but a
complete abolishment of all duties
and therefore of all customs reve-
nues. He joined a free-trade club
in New York and continued his
membership during all the time he
was a member of the assembly and
until after the nomination of James
G. Blaine in 1884.
lnthe Life of Thomas II. Benton,
Author Roosevelt writes, among
other things in regard to the tariff
as follows:
Political economists have pretty
generally agreed that protection is
vicious in theory and harmful in
practice; but if the majority of the
people in interest wish it, and il
affects only themselves, there is nc
earthly reason why they should
not be allowed to try the expert
ment to their hearts content.
The trouble is that it really does
affect only themselves, and in 1925
the evil was peculiarly aggravated
on account of the unequal way in
which the proposed law would
affect different sections. 1t pur.
ported to benefit the rest of the
country, but it undoubtedly work
ed real injury to the planter states
and there is small ground fol
wonder that the irritation over i
IN the region affected should hav,
been so intense"
Again, in speaking of the tariff
he says:
In 1928 the tariff, whether i
benefited the country as a Who'll,
or not, unquestionably harmed tn,
South, and in a federal union it i
most unwise to pass laws whicl
shall benefit one part of the com
munlty to the hurt of another part
when the latter receives no com
pensation.'
In commenting upon the speecl
OF Clay in defense of protective
tariff, Author Roosevelt says:
Clay's assertions as to what TIN
tariff has done for the West wer
equally i'll founded, as Bentoi
showed in a good speech wherein
he described picturesquely enougl