The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1908-09-18

elected Roosevelt as President, awful
and manifold would be the calamities
that would inevitably fall upon the
American people and the salt of liberty
dom would be like the blazonry of silks
and jewels in the gloom Of the grave.
False Prophets All.
But out of these nettles Of direful
and dangerous predictions have sprung
the beautiful blossoms of safety and
prosperity. Instead of money becom
ing scarcer, it has become more plen-
tiful. instead of agricultural products
going down to nothing, they have great
ly increased in price; instead of la
borers' wages being cut down to pauper
rates, they have been greatly raised !;
instead of railroads having nothing to
do, they have not enough cars to carry
their passengers and freights; instead
of our business men being ground to
powder in the bankruptcy courts, they
are happy and increasingly prosperous;
instead of our manufacturing establish
ments going out of business, they are
doing an increasing business. We have
more money in use and circulation than
ever before; more money per capita
than ever before; more money in saw
ings banks than ever before; the dollar
has larger purchasing power than
ever before and the laboring man lives
better than ever before.
Republicans Lincoln's Heirs.
If there is one thing more than an
other in which Republicans are entitled
to legitimate pride, it is that Lincoln
was our first President, that we believ-
ed in him loyalty, supported him while
he lived, and that we have never lost
the right to call ourselves his followers.
There is not principle avowed by the
Republican party to-day which is out
of harmony with his teaching or in
consistent with his character. But only
those who believe in human rights and
are willing to make sacrifices to defend
them, who believe in the nation and
it's benefcent power, who believe In
the American system of protection,
championed by long line of our great
est and best-running back from Roose-
Welt to Washington-onlyt those who be-
lieve in equal justice to labor and to
capital, in honest money and the right
to earn it, have any title to name them
selves by the name Of Lincoln or to
claim moral kinship with that august
and venerated spirit.
Stood the Supreme Test.
Is the Republican party entitled to
public confidence? Its record speaks
in no uncertain tones in answer to this
question. After slavery had been abol-
ished by it, the war ended and peace
restored with no damage to the struc-
ture of the government, but on the con-
trary with added strength and with
increased guarantees of its perpetuity,
it remained to be shown whether the
power and success of the Republican
party were to be permanent, or whether,
born of crisis, it was fitted to
cone with the problems Of daily
national life 1t had destroyed
slavery, but in the absence of this great
adversary, could the party hold to-
gether against the thousands of lesser
evils that beset the public-the evils
of ignorance, corruption, avarice and
lawlessness, the prejudices of race and
of class, the voices Of demagogues, the
cunning of dishonest craft, the brutal
tyranny of the boss, the venality of the
mean? 1t is not too much to say that
the last fifty years have given an an
swer full of glory and honor. to that
question.
The Republican party in the mass