Waterbury evening Democrat., 1908-02-14
ROOSEVELT 4 DESPOT
Ex-Governor Black Plays Presi-
 dent at Dinner In Boston.
CALLS HIS POLICIES ANTICS"
Accuses Chief Magistrate of Forcing Secretary Taft on Country as His Successor With Hardly the FormaIity <of a Convention or an Election.

Successor With Hardly the Formalit,
 <of Convention or an Election.
 Boston, Feb 14.-Ex-Governor Franl | s. Black of New York, who placed
 President Roosevelt in nomination a : the Republican national convention il 1 1904, in an address at the annual din ner of the Home Market club called
 him despot, charged him with thu
 financial depression and accused the
 chief executive of a series of antics
 which had reached climax, he said
 in an effort to force Secretary Taft on
 the country as his successor with hard
 ly the preliminary of a convention or
 an election.
 "The country was doing finely" said
 MT. Black, until the continuation last October of those dangerous, socialistic,
 un-American doctrines which took away her courage and started her on a course of wandering and hesitation.
 These doctrines have been promul- gated under the cloak of Republican name. But they are not Republican; they are not American; they are not for that people whose every impulse teaches that liberty to be permanent must be restrained by law.
 Predicts a Crisis.
 "We have seen within the last few years the gradual obliteration of the Republican idea. The protection of American industries, the equality of American citizenship, the independence of the court, the fixed and salutary boundaries of coordinate functions, the guaranty of fair play, the scrupu- lous regard for the limitations of off. cial power-all these, which have been the blood and spirit of the Republican party, are staggering under blows in. ficted in the party name"
 MT. Black told his hearers he repu. diated and condemned these wild and socialistic incoherences." A crisis, he said, was approaching.
 Respect for the old and we'll estab. lished," he said, lis giving way to fe. verish desire for the new and expert mental. The decisions of our highest courts are criticised by men who never studied law and by lawyers who never tried a case.
 Policies consist now of a series of antics. Integrity seems almost han dicap. Public officials are excused from performance if they are gifted in ex. planation. Crime, always active and seems even more aggres- sive now because the new method of punishment is by denunciation instead of by conviction. Nearly everybody is accused, but few are tried. If no crime has been committed, it is immoral to charge it. If crime has been commit. ted, why not punish it? If those ac. cused are innocent, the oft repeated accusation is a wicked islander. If they are guilty, their immunity is national disgrace.
 Confidence Destroyed.
 whichever way the truth may be, the present attitude of the national government is without defense. The credit of our people has been assailed in accents carried around the world. Their violence and repetition have achieved their only natural results. Confidence. the basis on which all friendly intercourse depends, has been finally destroyed. The laborer deprived 1 of work is now demanding govern ment aid as the next legitimate step In this new and frenzied dispensation. Prosperity, but yesterday at the flood, las leaked away, and there along the banks are furnaces with their fires out md idle railroad trains with workmen sleeping in the cars. And yet vesu- rius still continues active. The tor 'ent of vituperation is still tearing on, md the cry of the stricken is filling he land. Will men build again while hese eruptions last? Where is the nd and what?
 "A guarantee of personal liberty, a rec field and fair chance" Mir. Black aid, constituted government at its highest. Americans do not need" he vent on, "t0 be managed or advised in heir business, their habits and their 'leasures. This country does not need my one to run it or to feed it. It sadly leeds some one who will let it alone"
 TyrannieaI Trust.
 Alluding to the presidents propulsion f the Taft boom, Mir. Black said: "The nost tyrannical trust in existence to- lay is the trust in politics. There nev- r has been in the history of this coun. ry a bossism so despotie and unscru- ulous as that which controls you now. t has already reached that appalling tage where 1t is sought to fill the ighest elective office in the world by xecutive appointment without even he safeguard of a confirmation by the enate."
 The two great political parties. the peaker asserted, had become mere laythings In the hands of the men whom the intelligence of the country ejected. No matter which won. he ara. tt would be a case of competitive nfitness. "we nave seemingly entered" said he former governor. upon a national .SS.Hch and, whirling the big stick, ss running amuck through the instI- 7iions of the land"