The Topeka state journal., 1909-01-18
He CALLS NAMES
Willett of New York Attacks
Roosevelt in a Speech.
Full of VituperatiOn and Severe
Criticism.
SAYS HE'S A GARGOYLE
And Tyrant But Always to BE
Laughed At.
A SOlecism, a Mixed Metaphor.
Vivants an Impossibility.
HOUSE IN AN UPROAR
He Is Voted Into Silence by I26
to 7S
But Not Until He Had About
Ended His Speech.
And a Tyrant But Always to BE
Laughed At.
A SOlecism, a Mixed Metaphor.
Vivants an ImpOssibiIity.
HOUSE IN AN UPROAR
He Is Voted Into Silence by I26
to rs
But Not Until He Had About
Ended His Speech.

Washington, Jan. 1S.-Character-
izing President Roosevelt as a gar
goyle and as the pigmy descendant OF
Dutch trades people, and charging
him with having ''esta olished a court
in the White House which would have
delighted the heart of Alexander
Hamilton Mr.. Willett of New York,
in the house of representatives today
made one of the most bitter attacks
on the chief executive ever heard in
that body. Mr.. willett took for his
theme ''the passing of Roosevelt" and
I'm speech of great length, dealt with
numerous of the presidents acts since
he came into office and scathingly de-
nounced them.
After declaring that in the face OF
all sorts of conditions Americans were
possessed of a universal sense of hum
or, Mr.. Willett said that to such a
people "It must be confessed, a chief
magistrate who has himself no sense
of humor, moving like a horse tedder-
ed over the hay field of American ac-
tivities; stirring up every drying blade
of once green grass, to let it fall dry
er than before; quarreling one day
with the practical politicians, then
with the part-your-hair-in-t in the middle
reformers, then with the socialists
then with the great industrial corpor-
ations; wrestling in agony of spirit
with Noah Webster and our glorious
English tongue; taking a fall out of
nature takers; exhorting our women
to avoid race suicide, can not be an
unmixed nuisance.
'He plays the tyrant. to be sure, but
he is a tyrant who fears the carnival
tickler. He sees things that have a
bad smell, but the fresh breeze of
capitol hill does not let the odor lin
ger.
ways good-to- laugh-at- Thank Heaven
for the things that make us laugh
Without them we might easily become
raw, untamed Anglo Saxons maxi
ing much of Magma Charta. believing
about an effete bill of rights or even
ready to fight for freedom of thought,
freedom of speech, and freedom of the
press, as did our uncivilzed ancestors
at Lexington and Bunker HILL"
Mr. WilIett gave brief biography OF
Mr.. Roosevelt beginning with his ex-
periences as cowboy down to the
present time and accused him, in his
poSterouS notions, of having knitted"
Secretary Long, of being a warrior
alone in Cuba of having won the gov
ernorship of New York by a mere
fiuke when the false halo of San Juan
hill was above his head; the beneficiary
of assassins, and last and crowning
piece of luck, the nominee for president
when all the aggressive elements OF
passion wanted to see their own candi-
date defeated. The mammoth jocular-
ity has got to laugh with every appear
ance; the gargoyle has been funny
from the hour it left its native
quarry"
Continuing Mr.. willett said:
"And Mr.. Chairman, should the gen.
tlemen who view this curious figure
with feigned admiration ask me how
any son of Adam can be at the same
time a hay tedder, jocularlty and n
gargoyle. can only answer that TINS
4- nj RI
ton to all rules, q solecism sui-generlss
a mixed metaphor-vivant, an impossi-
bility; comet that roves at VIII re-
gardless of the limitations OF order and
law that apply to earth ana mooh' !"
stars and planets
"He boasts of Irish blood, but no
historic Irishman would have treateo
an ally as he treated Mr. Hartman.
''He exults in a strain of the oln
Huguenot but the French gentleman
does not fly into a passion and lash
the horse of timid young girl whose
only offense is inadvertently passing
the royal party in public highway.
Even Louis XIV was not that sort OF
a tyrant and Henry ~, Henry or
Navarro, the great Huguenot king.
wore the white plums of noblesse
oblige.
ssHe tells us that southern aristo-
crats were among his polyglot an
cestors: but can inform him that Il
the wife of Robert Toombs or OF a
i
him as Mrs. Minor Morris was, ne
would have been called out or
branded as a coward If he had been
a thousand times a president.
"He is proud to insist that the
family whose name he bears comes
from Holland; but his ready surrender
to the politicians of his own party
makes it clear enough that rat
burghers who put up their shutters
at the first beat of the war drum
must have been his progenitors ne
beats the Dutch, however. as even
his severest critics must confess.
"Are you shocked that a CHIEF
magistrate should Justify such
characterization? I am shocked. too
DO you say that the place he holds
should make US all dumb before him
Hear what this foundation OF BILL
Iingsgate has said of his predecessors
in that high office, and own that no
mans tongue should be stilled by such
a consideration
"Of course said Mr. Willett, these
condemnations roar us gently as any
cooling dove when compared with his
denunciation of John Paul Jones as
pirate of Napoleon the Great as
utterly unscrupulous, of New Eng
-, E.tohfa