Los Angeles herald., 1907-02-26

iof the Republican party on future
measures as follows:
"Wheu an evil or benefit is - wide
| spread that 1t affects so much of the
country as to be called national, the ma
| tiou'S power should be equal to end that
evil or secure that benefit to the Amer
team people.
When an evil o. benefit is so wide
cal and Affects none Of the American
people except that part of them who
live iu the state where the evil exists or
the benefit can be applied aud nowhere
else, the state should end that evil or
secure that benefit.
The storm raised by the beef trust
scandal caused the passage of the pure
food bill; and states rights. though
sorcly wounded. made little outcry be-
cause II would have been most unpopu-
lar. You will observe that states rights
Is u very polite creature and seldom
becomes excited for liberty except
when some financial interest is endan
gercd by the assertion of nationality.
states rights is not often heard Of,
unless financial interests are threat
eued; and not even then If the people
happen to- be sufficiently aroused
against evils that nationality will end.
An example Immediately at hand:
Child slavery exists in the mining re-
gions and in the silk mills of Pennsyl-
vanie the cotton factories Of the south,
the glass works of New Jersey and
West Virginia, and, indeed, at numer-
Gus points throughout the whole re-
public. Scores of thousands of little
children, from To IA year, Of age, are
compelled to work from ten to twelve
hours n day to their physical. mental
and moral ruin and the degeneracy of
| the race. And now, behind the
mask of states rights the interests
profiting by child labor are frantic
against the proposed law prohibiting
interstate commerce in the products of
child labor-this, too although states
rights is not technically touched by the
bill. The states cannot stop it.
Powerful interests which exploit the
people and the nations resources can
more easily handle a smaller portion of
the American people for their purposes
than they can handle the entire eighty
millions of the people for their pur
poses And If they are defeated in one
state-one small subdivision of the
American people-they always have
forty-tive other chances.
The extent to which the American
people are divided Onto states) precise
ly measures the extent to which their
power to end abuses is diminished. 1t
is all summed up in the republics mot
to, United we stand, divided we fall
This does not mean destruction of
the states in their natural spheres of
action. And their natural spheres of
action are described by the phrase To-
cal government
All this 1.-THE growth in population
woven into unit by railroad, telegraph
and telephonel creates new problems
which the old theory of states rights
never contemplated, and new necessi-
ties on the part of the people which
states rights cannot supply. But the
peoples problems -:ust e solved, the
peoples necessities supplied Each day
makes 1t clearer that only the nation
can do this. That is why the nation is
doing it. If the states could do that
work better nothing could prevent
them from doing it. 1t is because the
nation is the only force equal to the
daily developing needs of the people
that nationality is developing, and for
no other reason. In all of this there is
no HARM but only the welfare of the
people; for it is merely the people
themselves acting i common for their
common good
1t is announced that Mr. Bryan will
answer these arguments of Senator
BeVeridges in the April number of the
Reader, and that the senator will reply
to Mr.. Bryan's remarks quoted above.