The Columbia herald. [volume] (Columbia, Tenn.) 18??-1935, 1904-09-09
HENRY WATTERSON
Makes Great Speech at Meeting
of Democratic Editors In
New York.

At the national conference of Demo
cratic editors at the Waldorf AstOIis
Wednesday night, Hon. Henry Wat
terson responded TO the toast. h'
Issue and the Outlook. - He said il
part:
I'm order to allay curiosity and
suppress conjectuIe-oI words to thai
/, effect-let me say In the beginning,
that / believe we can win this Presi
Dental battle. / will go even fur
Their. and say that, with anything like
an even showdown of rowder ano
ball, il will he our own fault If we
lose it The two parties will go tC
the finish fairly united. Each will
poll very nearly. if not quite. its nor
NAL strength. The independent vote,
/ therefore, will decide the result.
lin the five debatable States OF
| New York. New jersey and Connect
cut, in the East. of Indiana and Wis
| consln, in the West, there are, on a
rough estimate. million of these in
| dependent voters. Half million of
| them are Germans. The other half
are Mugwumps and fioaters. For the
| life of me / cannot see how any self
respecting Mugwump can vote for
Roosevelt, the recIeant Civil Service
| Reformer, nor how any intelligent
German, much as the President re-
sembles the Kaiser, can be willing to
take even lottery chance in a war
with the mother country. precipitated
upon the drop of hat. to gloIify the
administration.
Parker, the jurist, means peace
with all Nations, entangling alliance
| with none. Roosevelt, the wal lord
means complications abroad and cor.
ruption at home, designed to prolohg
a single party dynasty. and to peIpetu-
ate its favoIites and agents In power.
Every economic question must pause
before an issue so tranScendant.
In venturing to discuss it tonight,
though surrounded by members OF my
own party and profession. may l not
take supposltitious standpoint, and
declare that. If | were Republican,
and over about the headwateIs of Bit
ter Creek, there are Democrats who
insist that | am not much better-I
would vote for Parker and Davis and
against Roosevelt and Fairbanks
Being only plain American, who
loves his country and clings to its IN
situations, l mean to do this anyhow.
| shall do it because it seems to me
the upright thing to do. the enlig hten-
ed thing to do, the prudent and hon
est thing to do.
.. Touching Roosevelt and his charac-
ter the speaker said:
Inevitably the personality, the
character and performances of Theo-
dore Roosevelt, occupy the foremost
II in, hn ind
constitute the chief horn of the peo-
palgn.
and the end of tho chapter. Yet, Ee-
dent. land to hold him to just meas
of abusing him. | would not, for my
part, inter an unkind or discourteous
word. l admit that he is as sweet
gentleman as ever scuttled ship OF
cut throat. Indeed very much of
that kind OF gentleman; for. hoist
ing the black flag over the South, has
vice Reform and cut the throat of Re-
ciprocity? Has he ever obeyed the
law in case it stood in the way OF his
humor, from the time when, over the
acquitting report of his own Com
mission, he removed States Attor-
ney from the Office to which the peo-
pie had elected him, here in the city
and county of New York, to the time
when, by a scratch OF, his pen, he usur-
ped the power of Congress and added
many millions of outlay to the pen
sion rolls? Is he not responsible for
the fly by might theatrical comblna-
ton miscalled the Republicans of Pan
ANA? Was his treatment of Miles and
Schley the acts OF a wise, or consider
ate President? Was his promotion of
Wood just either to the army or the
people? Was his proceeding in the
postal scandals not shuttle designed
to suppress, whilst seeming to expose
We're his operations against the North
ern Securities not the merest play to
the galleries, achieving. thus far.
nothing beyond the throwing of lit
tie dust into the eyes of unthinking
peoplel Does not his whole career,
illustrated by his writings, his sayings
and his doIngs his needless criti-
cisms. his spectacular explorations,
his broken promises-Ieveal to us a |
self willed adventuIer upon the high |
seas of public life, having no rudder or
except his own ambition, no
principle or Iule of conduct save that |
of decking the machine with the
fiounces and fur bellows of civic right
eousness. whilst violating the spirit
and sacrificing the actualities of the
Civil Service by line of partisan APP
pointments to Office, never surpassed
during the worst times Of the spolls
system he has so stigmatized and ex-
emplitied! Was Jackson, whose Igno.
rance he rehukes, more personal and
autoc ratio than he is himself? Was
Grant, whom. in lite, he persistently
more Indifferent to the
of public sentiment? And
il we have seen such things in the
green leaf, what may we expect to see
in the brownf II elected President in
1904, why not again in 1908? The
broken, what may not he the
in 1927"
ANNOUNCEMENTS