The Montgomery advertiser., 1907-08-27
LAYING THE-nLAME.

The New York Commercial, taking q non n-psrtisan view of some public men and their ways and peculiarities. says:
 Imagine President Roosevelt about this tiiTe, or Governor Glenn, or Cover nor Conner, or even Governor Hughes, delivering himself of such sane. sober. conservative ana timely utterances as have come from former Supreme Court Justice Morgan J. O'Brien within the past thirty-six hours! It Is practically inconceivable. For, whether wholly consciously or not in every instance, the average high-up public official in these days appears to regard it as chief part of his sworn duty to de- nounce somebody or something in such a way as to make exceptions look like generalities, to urge drastic legislation, to engage in spectacular prosecutions and to project threats so numerous and diversified as to raise a suspicion that nine-tenths of the world have turned lawbreakers and evtl-doers. We know" says Juege o'Brien, that the great majority of our business men are honest and law abiding. and be- cause of the bad conduct Of some It is manifestly wrong to arraign alL
 There seems to be strain of So- ciaIism running through the country. To denounec all rich men as rascals, and all corporations as thieves appears to be the road to popular favor in the estimation of some of our public men. There is now, and has been for some time a feeling of unrest and uncer- tainty, in some instances almost amounting to panic, in the business world, as all know who read the news papers This, Judge OBrien argues lis due to a growing lack of confidence in values. caused by persistent attacks upon important business interests and threats made by men holding high pub lie office that other attacks of simi- lar or even more destructive nature are in contemplation. The entire bus mess interests of the country are being arraigned without limitation or dis tinction, and the attacks are failing. like the rain, equally on the good and the bad"
 This would be an exceedingly un- desirable country r all the men Of wealth and all the corporations were as lawIess and soulless as some of our public men would have us believe. If none were honest or reliable but the very poor. life would not be worth liv- ing in our country. The Commercial does not hesitate to place the chief blame where it belongs, The Presi- dent of the United States" it argues, has been and is the head and front of this inglorious company of crusad- CTS gainst important business inter- ests, these threateners. these indis- criminate critics; his public utterances of Tuesday last were only repetition, a further development, of these tactics; and the man most prominently men, toned for the Republican nomination for the Presidency to succeed him in 1909 took occasion twenty-four hours in advance to indorse and commend the policies defined by these utterances. Is it any wonder, under the circumstan- ces, that an investors panic marks the daySto- day market movement? With eighteen months more of Roose- Welt and with Taft promising to repeat the dose in larger volume and for a long period. is it strange that there Is a nervous unrest among practically all classe of our peoplt and business halt and hesitancy here that are con splcnouS by their absence in Europe