The Leon reporter. (Leon, Iowa) 1887-1930, 1905-08-10
PRESIDENTIAL POSSIBILITIES.

shS Souhtiy huoNS IoieTauIy Weli, buaU
the Secretary of Agriculture is not the
Iowa member of the cabinet of whoM
President Roosevelt wants to be rid
The other one is, by all accounts, pack
ing his baggage for departure early
next winter.
Leslie NJ. Shaw, appointed Secretary
Of the Treasury almost Immediately
upon Mr.. Roosevelt's succession to the
presidency in 1901, is going back to his
Iowa town of Denison there to engage
in banking and in the practice of law.
These occupations it seems, however,
will not occupy all his time NOR the
most of it, for he is expected to mingle
freely with the republican politicians
and voters of the state, and to take an
active part in the congressional cam
paign Of 1906.
| Mr.. Shaw is convinced that the peo-
pie of Iowa are fond of him, and he is
reputed to have hopes of their support
for the presidential nomination in the
National Republican convention of 1908.
He thinks that the situation will be
favorable for man who lives so close
to Wall street as Elihu Root does, and
he may shrewdly surmise that Mr.. Taft's
unpromising struggle with the unprom-
Using Philippine question wifi not help
the latter's boom.
Mr.. Shaw may point with significant
finger to the fact that the republican
party has never yet taken presiden-
tlal candidate from the sunset side of
the Mississippi river. He may suggest
pcrsuasively that the year 1908 will be
the best possible time to do so. Zach
airy Taylor was the only president of the
United States ever chosen from the
banks Of the Mississippi, but his Jeffer-
son Parish plantation in Louisiana was
on the east side; Mr.. Shaw thinks
it is now time to cross the stream high
with him.
But the republican candidate in the
coming presidential election, wherever
he may hail from, is going to need more
than the nominatio He will be over
Swallowed by the strong personality of
the incumbent, and possibly opposed by
presidential influence unless he proves
personally and politically acceptable.
His partys record since Mckinley
was inaugurated in 1897 will be heavy
load for the next republican candidate
to carry. How is he going to reconcile
the voters of the enormous growth Of
the trusts under the most monstrous
tariff that was ever enacted for the
alleged benefit of the American work
ingman and wage Garner? If he can
convince them that they have had real
prosperity in spite of trust exacticns,
how can he explain the unchecked
eagerness of republican officials in
every department of the government in
Washington to grab more than their
fair share of the said prosperity by
every known kind of jobbery and cor
ruption? How will he allay the alarm
of the people at the constantly growing
agggressions upon local self-government
through the invasion of the reserved
rights of the states; how explain the e1-
travagant appropriations, the heavy
taxes and the growing deficits?
The democratic party of 1908 will not
let these things be forgotten, and there
are many other sins OF the republican
party which will be brought to the at
tention of the voters. If the republican
party under the lead of so strenuously
honest president as Roosevelt riots in
extravaganza and corruption, what can
be expected of it under weaker head?
The democrats may we'll insist upon an
answer to this question, and effectually
to insist that it is time to turn out the
rascals who have defed party discipline
and loyalty in order to violate the laws
OF God and man.
The whig party lived miserably and
died little lamented because it had but
one political principle, which was the
hatred of Andrew jackson and all his
works, while all it's other alleged prin.
ciples looked merely to economic
measures on which the popular mind
i was often shifting. The democratic
party can win in 1908 by uniting on its
time-honored political principles and
showing make-shift measures into the
background. The preservation of local
self-government by maintaining invio.
late the guaranteed rights Of the state;
deposition to robber tariffs which tax
the people one dollar for the government
and five dollars for eXtravagantly pro.
tected monopolies; opposition to imper.
ialism; which in the Philippines alone has
already cost the taxpayers Of the United
States two-thirds the amount Of the
interest-bearing national debt; demand
ing that taxes and expenditures be
restricted to the needs of the uovarn