The Pensacola journal. (Pensacola, Fla.) 1898-1985, 1908-03-13
The Ohio Senator's
Ionoble Exit.

This is a great country of ours
Nowhere else on earth could the Of
fetal act of the executive head of q
nation in dismissing bunch of troops
from the army without honor for a
gross offense SO clearly proven that
the common sense of the whole coun-
try has fully justified the dismissal.
have been made a formidable issue
in national politics. And yet that is
just what was done by Senator For
aker, OF Ohio, in the matter of the
presidents action in discharging the
battalion of negro troops for its MUIR
derous night assault upon the unsus-
pectiHg people of Brownsville, Texas,
TO avenge a fancied wrong.
Foraker was a candidate for presi-
dent and at once saw in the incident
the chance to make capital among
the negroes of the South in fslrIher-
Rrce of his presidential Aspirations.
he brought the matter before the SEN
ate, defied the president, had COM
mittee of investigation appointed,
summoned witnesses by the score,
taxed the treasury thousands of dol
lars to pay the expenses of the exam
ination, posed before the nation as
the exclusive champion of the colored
race, rallied the negroes all over the
country TO his support in their usual
emotional way, and in the end finds
himself beaten. on the evidence and
the president fully sustained By the
report of the committee made UP of
majority of republicans.
There has never been any doubt for
moment with any fair-Ininded man
of average intelligence as to the jus
tice of the presidents conduct in the
premises. He properly denounced the
action of the negro soldiers at Browns
vile as the blacklist and most in
famous crime in the history OF the
United States army. and when he
stripped them of the uniform they had
disgraced he did what any command
erin-cfief, sensitive to the honor of
the army, should have done.
He gave the negroes not actually
engaged in the, dastardly assault
upon the sleeping town the fullest
opportunity TO exculpate themselves
and reveal their guilty associates.
but they declined to do so and made
themselves particeps criminis before
the whole country. and now that the
senate committee has reported, sus-
tanning his action. the incident is hap
his own state as a presidential candi-
dates finds himself Inundated before
the nation as a demagOgUe who was
willing 10 ride into power on the color
line and infiame sectional prejudice
from one end of the land to the other
to promote his personal ambitions.
There are so many issues so widelJ
different in character before the eoua-
try that the average citizen finds him
self bewildered by their compGexity
and variety. burt we can all ~~-~--,-4-
late ourselves that the reactionary
senator from Ohio has failed in his
selfish and unpatriotic purpose to
reach The presidency by appealing to
the color slime and arousingF resent
ments which might have grown.
fiercer even than those that divided
the country in civil war.
The report of the senate committee
strips Foraker of all power for evil,
makes him a subordinate and unim-
portant figure in the approaching
campaign and permits the American
people TO deal with living issues in
which there can he no appeal TO the
misleading passions and preJudices of
the dead past and no revival of the
race problem.
All the pending legislation in con-
gress is of less Importance to the
South than the right settlement of
the venomous question which Fora
ker had forced upon the country.
And happily it has been settled right