Audubon Republican. [volume] (Audubon, Iowa) 1894-1925, 1909-11-11
CUMMINS REPLIES
TO SPEAKER CANNON
AND GIVES UNCLE JOE AS GOOD
AS HE HAD SENT
lie Says Insurgents VIII Accept The
Challenge And Are All Ready
For The Big Fight

Senator Albert b. Cummins made an
address on last Saturday evening before
the Marquette Republican Club of Chi
cago. In the course of his remarks he
went after Uncle Joe Cannon who had
touched up the Senator on several pre-
vious occasions We can give but brief
extract from a speech that would occupy
a full page of our paper:
A month ago a distinguished son of
Illinois came to Iowa obviously angry
and therefore in one of his hysterical
moods. He made speech ostensibly in
defense of the rules of the house of rep
resentatives but which was, in fact, an
assault upon those who had opposed the
republican majority in congress upon
the tariff measure. Not content with
burning us at the stake he scattered our
ashes TO thefour winds in order to make
sure that we would be lost to the repub-
lican party for ever and ever. Warming
to his work he made another speech a
few days ago at Elgin in which he re-
peated in all the colors of his rainbow
phraseology the denunciation of those
who committed the horrid crime of vot
ing against the tariff bill and again con
signed them to the lowest depths of
democratic perdition; and then to com
pletely satisfy his lust for blood he then
assigned to Senator LaFollette and my
self u superheated chamber i'm this region
of the damned With all these impre-
cations, explosions and determination
still ringing in my ears | feel like "a
member of the fated brigade of which
the poet sang;
Cannon to right of them
Cannon to left of them
Volleyed and Numbered.
Let it be understood once for all that
we accept the challenge and are ready
for the fight Our struggles will not be
to exclude anybody from the republican
party; but upon the principle involved
we ask no quarter and shall give none
The day has come for an inquiry into
the qualifications of a republican. | am
am willing to accept an arbiter, but it
| will not he Aldrich, it will not be Payne
| it will not be Cannon. They are all re-
publicans and hope they will continue
| to he republicans. assume they voted
according to their consciences; and while
| differ from them materially and en-
phatically | have no disposition to enter
the business Of eXpelling men from the
republican party so long rs they yield
even a nominal allegiance to republican
platforms and support republican candi-
dates
1t will not avail Mr.. Cannon and his
associates anything to declare that we
have joined hands with the democratic
party for every intelligent man knows
that this is simply an appeal to blind
passion and senseless prejudice. The in
surgents believe the republican party is
the best instrumentality to secure and
maintain good government. They are
proud of its history; they love its tradi-
tons; and | venture the prediction that
in the campaign of next year their voices
will be heard high above all others de
Tending its doctrines and sustaining its
candidates. Their struggle will be with
in the lines, but they will not hide the
truth as they see it; for they know that
if the republican party is to be perma-
nently successful it must be faithful to
its platforms and must meet courage
ously and justly the new age problems
and questions. 1t cannot any longer be
progressive in its platform and standpat
in its congress.
1t has been said the insurgents have
declared it to be the purpose to keep up
an agitation for a further revision, and
they are censured as disturbers of the
peace and quiet which business demands.
In this respect speak only for myself.
| never have advocated a general revi-
sion of the tariff and / never will. 1t
would he the extreme of folly for the
next congress or any congress III the
near future to attempt to pass another
tariff bill comprising every article of
growth or manufacture. In such revis-
ion the temptation put before a member
of congress to vote for what he knows
to be wrong in order to obtain what he
believes, to be right is too strong for
human nature.