The Bemidji daily pioneer. [volume] (Bemidji, Minn.) 1904-1971, 1908-09-02
FORMAL REP
BY DEMOCRATS
National Commit eAnsWers
] Cleveland Article.
f.,
-
USES BITTER LANGUAGE

II. s. = (
John M. Atwood, Chairman Of the Com.
ralttee on Speakers, Wrote the An.
sWer-Declares the Fair Fame Of
One Who in His Lifetime Had Been
Great Man Was Sold for an
Amount Of Money.
Chicago, Sept "A formal reply
TO the ante-mortem article written by
former President Grover Cleveland,
advocating the election Of Taft, came
from the headquarters of the Demo-
cratic national committee It was
written by John NJ Atwood, member
OF the committee from Kansas and
chairman of the committee on speak
ers The reply which Mr. Atwood
save cut follows -. ..
Never since DR.. Rufus Griswold
betrayed the trust that was his as
literary executor of Edgar Allan Poe
and mutalated the memory of him
whose literary representative he was
has there been such a fragrant be.
trayal of trust by. one sustaining a
fduciary relation toward illustrious
dead as when Mr. Frederick S. Hast
1ngs sold for money the fair fame of
one who in his lifetime. had been a
great man. -
The Grover Cleveland article
which has been exploited by the Re-
publican national committee was in
tended by it's publishers to lead the
reading public to believe that if Mr..
Cleveland were living today he would
be one of Mr.. Taft's political cham
pions,
1T must be borne in mind that
this article, cenceding it's unperverted
authentleity, was written before the
Republican national convention; be-
tore the character of it's delegates
could have been known; before it was
known that these delegates were so
lar from being untrammeled repre-
sentatives of free people as to be
marionettes moved by the will of an
other; before the convention had re-
fused to speak for honesty in elec-
lions by refusing to declare for pre-
election publication of campaign con-
tributions; before the convention pro-
mulgated socialism, by declaring that
the government should go into the
banking business; should establish
postal savings banks
. Twice Made Cleveland President,
"The worst enemy of the dead Dres.
ldent could not have more perfectly
m1sreprese his mental attitude to-
ward public affairs than to proclaim
that II living, he would have advocat-
ed the candidacy of one who was ar
rayed as leader against the party
That had twice made him president;
one who was standing on a platform
that placed that candidates party out
side the pale of common honesty; a
platform that promulgated a. political
tenet that had for it's central thought
socialistic seed. For party today
that will not proclaim the source
OF its campaign income is for that
party to say that it expects income
from sources that it dare not proclaim.
Can anyone imagine Grover Cleve-
land, whose primal characteristic was
honesty, advocating the election of a
candidate who stood for admitted dis
honesty of purpose?
If the postal savings bank is estab-
ltshed, the federal government goes
INTO the banking business, and So
cialism is just that, viz: the introduc.
tlen of the government into the field
OF private enterprise. Can anyone
imagine that stern old individualist,
Grover Cleveland, advocating the elec-
ton of one who stood for even semi,
socialism?
ITO misquote the dead, who have
known naught but private life, is
shameful thing; to misconstrue the
dead, whose life is part of the coun-
try's history, and to exploit that mis-
representation as political asset, is
both shameful and wicked thing"