Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1908-09-15

years hunt for an issue on which
he can be elected President
WILLIAM H. TAFT.
CINCINNATI September 10. - Judge
Taft. after reading Mr. Bryan's comment
m President Roosevelt's letter to Conrad
Kohrs of Montana yesterday. prepared
reply to Mr. Bryan. in which he made
the most direct and pointed attack on the
democratic candidate he has yet delivered
in this campaign. Judge Tafts state
menf follows:
In my notification speech and in other
speeches made since I attempted to make
clear my position on all the issues OF the
campaign. If Mr.. Bryan has Deen uh-
able to understand them l cannot make
them clear | stand on my record III
office and ON what / have said.
Bryan's Record Attacked.
Mr.. Bryan should devote little time
to his own record, from which he seems
to be struggling to separate himself Win
all the adroitness acquired IN a t~eiVe
years hunt for an issue on Which ne
can be elected President The readiness
with which Mr.. Bryan in successive presi-
r,ount issue to another shows that the
chief consideration which has affected
his selection of an issue has been its
pIausibility in attracting votes.
He presents the remarkable spectacle
of one who has been seeking the presl-
dency for twelve years without success
and without official responsibility ana
without the opportunity to test the rari-
Gus propositions which he has advocated
for reforms and yet of having the event
demonstrate what a colossal fallure ne
would have made in each instance mad
he been permitted to carry his proposals
in the policies of the country.
Former Issues Dropped.
He does not now say whether he Is
still in favor of the free coinage of silver
He does not now answer the question
whether If he were President and an
exigency should arise in which he would
be called upon to exercise his discretion
afirmatively to maintaining the party
between gold and silver. he would exer-
else that discretion.
he has not permitted himself to dis
cuss in this campaign the issue OF anti
imperialism. which was the paramount
issue in 1900. as he declared. and In re-
spect to which thes policy of the repub-
lican party has been vindicated by the
event so that tranquility and good gov
eminent exist in the Philippine Islands,
and even the independstias prefer repub-
lican victory to Mr.. Bryans promises.
Attitude Toward Railways.
HE now says that he favors the more
rigid regulation of the railroads. In 1905
he expressed the view that the railroads
could not be regulated. because the rail-
roads would own the regulators appointed
by law, and therefore he was In favor OF
government ownership. We hear nothing
from him on this subject. Instead. by
describing his platform not only as an an
nouncement of principle, but as protec-
ton against uncomfortable issues, he has
attempted to give bond to keep the peace
with respect to government ownership.
which. by its mere announcement, showed
it's lack of the vote-catching quality.
He processes to have been the father,
and now to be the heir. of the Roosevelt
policies. and yet In no campaign OF three
which he himself led. did he make them
the paramount issues. Indeed, In the
Parker campaign he took occasion to
charge Mr. Roosevelt with militarism and
with being completely subject to the In
fiuence of corporations. only to see him
win the greatest peace triumph OF the
world and secure such an effective stamp
ing out of corporate abuses as to elicit the
admiration OF the entire country.
Bryan and Labor.
Mr.. Bryan processes to be the great
friend of labor, and yet he was one of
the chief supporters in the passage Of
the German Wilson bill that made labor
helpless for four years. He then pro-
posed as a remedy for the disasters to
which labor was thus exposed the issuing
of fifty-cent dollar. which would have
cut in half such wages as there were and
would have led to the hardest kind of
struggle on labor's part to restore its
wages to its proper equivalent under the
gold standard.
The country has been most fortunate
that the fallacy of Mr. Bryan's railroad
propositions has been exposed without the
cost of putting them into actual govern
mental practice. and 1t will be fortunate,
indeed. IL the danger OF four years de-
preston, to which it would be exposed in
case OF Mr.. Bryan's election, may be
averted, and IL by republican success In
November. and subsequent prosperity and
by clinching Of the Roosevelt policies,
he may be again shown to be prophet
wi