The Topeka state journal., 1909-03-20

4
mind. He has left the best for the
middle and the last, for, with all due
! respect to Mr.. Allen who has JUST
! made splendid speech, he really rep
resents only the salted peanuts, the
| celery and the stuffed olives. me
| course of the present speaker Is ma
turally in the soup, while the piece oe
| resistance with McNeal, and the desert
| the last and best from Herbert, follow.
THE Kansas City spirit is surely in
evidence here tonight That spirit
which Sorentino put into that fitting
harmony which exists where good mu-
the Kansas City spirit is the Kansas
city spirit with a lower case &c. 1t
is really the spirit of Wichita, the
peerless princess, Of Topeka the beau
tiful, and of Hiawatha with her old
Nokomis and Minnehaha and her
Laughing Water.
The Kansas city Spirit.
THE spirit of your city is exem
plifled by the men who have come
from Kansas and made it a great city.
There is Long from Columbus who put
up your tallest building. There are
Ridenour and Baker, your big grocers,
who came from Lawrence; the Jones
Brothers from Stafford; the Emerys
and Bullenes from Lawrence; Kemper,
who has kept you straight, from VAL
ley Falls; Gleed of Topeka at the
head of your fine Kansas City Journal;
and then the Star people, host of
managing editor, from Kansas, and
his better half who was formerly my
society editor, and Walter Evans, that
straightforward, honest, able reporter
no paper can have better than he
a former political reporter on my own
paper, and others too numerous to
mention, for at the State Journal office
and the Beacon office and the Eagle
office and the Hiawatha World office,
we are simply running kindergarten
for the Kansas City Star and Times
and Journal.
"This Kansas City spirit is shown
in the eight millions of dollars you
have spent. on your beautiful parks
and boulevards. It was shown in the
Convention hall which you built in
ninety days. It is not shown in your
new Union station which you are
building in ninety-nine years. [ have
been told that your depot is the long
est union depot in the world, and from
my experience tonight it takes the
longest time to get into it. I know in
deed that your new depot is the long
est building of any depot in the world.
Kansas Produces the ''Stuff"
What could you of Kansas City do
without the Sunhower state. Kansas
furnishes you your bread, your but
ter, your beef and your pork. The re-
ports of Secretary Coburn elate or de-
press you as they are cheering or
gloomy. When Kansas sneezes you
have bad cold. If there is a hot wind
in our state, the cold chills run over
you. We produce the material which
feeds you and which governs you
once in generation at least
Railroad Doings April 1st.
''The railroads I notice have an
nounced that on April first, a date on
which people are fooled, they will
advance the rate from two cents to
three cents, and do other stunts. Gov
ernor Hadley knows that the two cent
rate in his native state is not confisca-
tory He has tried to prove it in Mis-
souri,, but Judge Mcpherson with all
due respect to that able jurist, was OBJ
liged to show the low percentage of
earnings on the capital stock furnished
by the railroads, whereas on the real
capital stock there might be a very
that the railroads are making a serious
mistake in adding fifty per cent |
to the passenger rate, and in advanc-| I
ing the freight rate. That is not a good |
uplift to advertise. The public be-
lieves that the two cent fare has come |
to stay and it believes that upon a fair |
capitalization the railroads will make |
good money at that rate. The railroad |
companies in opposing this march of
events are encouraging drastic 1egfsla- |
tion and utility commissions.
What the Katy Did in Oklahoma.
cat Oklahoma yesterday observed |
the NJ K. & T. has put in a rate on |
first class freight which is twenty-sev-f
is to Kansas City from New York. |
City naturally does not like it; I
the Oklahoma people are pleased. |
They say see what the Katydid.' Now |
it is not a question of the likes or dis |
likes of these two cities, but the ques- |
lion is: Has any natural law been vio- |
lated in putting this new rate into ef-
feet. If Oklahoma City is nearer an !
ocean port than Kansas City, should |
it not have a lower rate? Why should |
10 af fO
which it is shipped, than at Garden |
City, where it is made? 1t is because |
the railroads arbitrarily make it so |
by violating a natural law.
kansas City has many natural ad- |
vantages and she is entitled to profit |
by every one of them. She is a great |
city-the hub of this great American |
there are the spokes and |
the fe1loes which are just as important |
to keep the chariot wheels of progress
moving. other cities are entitled to |
consideration and their natural advan- |
tages as well as the hub.
'Mr. Ellis who is speaking tonight |
at another meeting in this city is re-
ported to have said that in the efforts |
to provide a fitting waterway to Kan |
sas City everything that has been Sc
cured in Washington has been the re- |
suit of the ability to show that the in |
terests are not your private ones, but |
are for the good of the entire terri |
tory. A few months ago Mr.. ]. Logan |
Jones. who with his brother Lawrence ce |
M. was running store in Topeka as
we'll as in Kansas City, told me that |
there was a big reduction in cotton |
bats. I did not know just how cotton
bats affected Topeka, but he seemed |
to think 1T was important. He said |
the reason he was able to sell these
cheaper than ever before was because |
they were brought up from ST. Louis
to Kansas City by water on the City
Of Chester
what is good for Kansas City is
good for all the territory about it,
Some Advertising Uplifts.