Manchester Democrat. [volume] (Manchester, Iowa) 1875-1930, 1908-12-30
suoh q Descent.

It ID with a feeling of deep humilia.
ton that the admirers OF Mr.. Roosevelt
will read his statement about proceed
Ing against certain truth-seeking news
papers for libel or against the editors
and owners Of them for criminal libel,
In none Of the many personal contro-
versies which have marked his career
during the last seven years has he ap,
peared to such sad advantage.
Time was when anyone who showed
q disposition to doubt the Rooseveltian
word, to maintain any but an attitude
of profound respect for the Roosevelt
ian gospel or to impute to Mr. Roose-
welt things that he might have said or
did say in confidence was swallowed up
and overwhelmed with an avalanche Of
torrential abuse aud cast summarily
into the outer darkness, to be thrown
mp by an angered sea on the rocks q
oblivion or something of that kind.
The corridors Of seven years OF time
are strewn with the mangled remains
OF the impetuous and misguided men
who have dared and been undone. Never.
before hns there been even remote sug-
sestion ofrrecourse to such towards
weapon as the courts Of justice. Never
before has there been a hint that Thso-
dore Roosevelt, panoplied with right.
ecusness and made invulnerable by MINI
bus of sanctity and omniscience, could
not defend himself against the world
and c6nfound his foes and detractors.
And what descent 1t Is! From the
majestic heights of individual sufficiency
with an alert finger on the hair trig-
ger, to the depths of the Avernus peo-
pied by common folk dependent on the
law! The chances are IL someone
should pick street quarrel with Mr..
Roosevelt he would turn the other cheek
and call policeman.-St. Louis Re-
public.
Cause of the Dencit.
For weary weeks students Of political
economy and writer's on questions Of
finance have been puzzling their brains
over the question of the large and grow
ing deficit in the national treasury.
They have tramped all around the
edges of the question, considered the
tariff as revenue producer, descanted
wisely on our foreign trade, gathered
statistics from far and near to show
that the commercial depression was
worldwide, and left the whole matter
In muddled condition.
Now along comes United States
Treasurer Treat and puts the whole
race Of politicians, statisticians and
economists to flight with single elo-
quent, illuminative sentence. The de-
felt is due to the increase In expendi-
lures. 1t is so plainly, painfully Sim.'
pie. But will the politicians, the Stats
ticians and the economists accept til,
They will not. On the contrary, they
will prove that In a two-billIon-dollar
country the expenditures have nothing
to do with such question. They Will
prove that just before an election It Il
indispensable that Congress work in-l
geniously to satisfy the populace, that
all questions Of economy be ignored and
that the appropriations be 30 framed
that the majority of the votes be won
for the party Of extravagnnce. The;
great expenditures, assigned by MI.
Treat as the cause. are of little interest
and no consequence. The dencit II
caused by Congressional conduct which
was entirely justified by the results Of
the election last month.-St. Louis Re-
public.
Short Weights and .Righ Duties.
The sugar trust is defendant in
series of suits by the government to re-
cover $3824.121 for forfeitures and
back duties on imports of sugar since
1901. The government alleges that the
trusts weighing scales at the Brooklyn
docks were adjusted to give short
weight.
But whether the sugar trust has been
"short weighting' the government OF
not there is no dispute as to Its system
attic plundering Of consumers through
tariff tax. =
Even Claus Spreckles, now an inds-
pendent refner, told the ways and
means committee the other day that alb
solute free trade would be better than,
the present unjust tariff schedules
under which the sugar trust Isl the
principal beneficiary and is able to,
exact special privileges and conditions
on sugars produced in Louisiana and
the Hawaiian islands,
1t is the same with all the predatory
trusts. Their tax on the necessities o.
luxuries Of life may seem innnitesimal.
It makes q colossal aggregate when ~
article u universally consumed