Omaha daily bee., 1910-03-21
Speaker Hurts
Defiance Into
Enemy's Camp
Bitter Denunciation Made by Cannon
on House Majority" at Illinois
Banquet.

WASHINGTON, March s0.-with eyes
glowing defiance and voice laundering at
his enemies with all the days pent-up
bitterness, Speaker Cannon made a vitriolic
attack on the house majority" at the an
nual dinner of the Illinois Republican asso-
citation tonight.
His face was worn from the force Of the
terrific assault made upon him and his
voice lacked lis old jauntiness and
resonance. He was Uncle Joe" in fight
ing trim.
A startling statement made by the
power-shorn. but defiant. speaker was
that the republicans no longer have a ma
jority In the senate.
my God" he cried with great solemnity,
suppose this $50 pounds OF common clay
should drop dead tonight. what would the
newspapers and magazines do then? Ny
daughters, grandchildren, my son-in-law
would be sorry. But the balance of the
world would not have time to be sorry.
There never was a truer word said than let
the dead bury It's dead II that were not
true then the world would be one vast
house Of mourning.
Il know people who think they monopo-
lie the wires from the earth up to the
great white throne. They don't give the
majority OF US a GRANGE, 1ney nave cure
alls. they think God and one constitute a
majority, forgetting that God alone is a
majority and can do without their help.
We're thankful for Christian morality.
once in a while we find people who have
a monopoly Of all knowledge and therefore
should be indicted and prosecuted under
the Sherman antitrust law.
ITS uncomfortable sometimes to live in
a government by the people. There will
always be some who are feeble minded,
abnormal-insane, or, to use a shorter and
more common word, are cranks. But we've
got to have them.
"There was a new majority made today.
1t consisted Of the democrats and a Is per
cent slough from the republican party.
They destroyed the committee on rules.
"A resolution was presented declaring the
office of speaker vacant Then what did
these men do who have been ~denounclng
my personality, these slmon-purc followers
Of Senator LaFollette, do then. Only eight
of them had tho courage of their convic-
lions. The result was that, while 1 was
elected speaker by a majority of twenty
six last March they refused to turn me
out by a majority of thirty-slx.
That was the way this republican slough
started out in new attendance. And the
SUNDAY papers Will De out III the HlOIllnB
with stories about the end OF Cannonisu
and czarism and perhaps a few Of them
will say what l said about the house being
simply a government by majority.
This combination abolished the COMMITTEES
on rules. which has after all, the power to
report to the house, although some seem to
think 1t is like the biblical example of Let
there be light and there was light You in
Washington know differently. But the
people in the country apparently believe
the uplifting magazines and the cowardly
members of congress who wrought such
havoc today. / am thankful 1 belong to
the party Of Lincoln and Grant and Gar
field. and Roosevelt, and Taft, and when
ever any charge is made upon 1t, whether
from pulpit or magazine or chautauqus
circuit, / will defend 1t. i would rather
keep the republican faith and fail than to
march with men who would disrupt the re-
publican party.
THE country believes we have a ma
jority Of forty-four in the house, whereas
we have none. Nor have we a majority ir
the senate. But this news is not given tc
the country by certain publicists. They
suppress it and distort it and talk only
about Cannonism and the defeat and re-
buke of the car today.
Some of us pray for the millennium. Blu
1 do not want 1t to come at any time unless
the Almighty reaches down His finger and
changes the human animal"