The Plymouth tribune. (Plymouth, Ind.) 1901-1911, 1910-04-21
RETURN OF A SINGED CAT.

marked them as unavailable during
the reign of Organism and the rele-
cation of the tariff issue have taken
heart of hope. The special Congress
sional elections, in districts as far
apart on the maps as East Massa-
chusetts and West Missouri, are
bringing them out of long-enforced re-
tlrement TO offer themselves again
upon the affairs of their country. The
surface Of the waters everywhere is
growing dotted with the heads of
them. bobbing up serenely from be-
low, under conviction that the skies
above are clearing. They seem to feel
sure at last that there is again a pos
sibility for a conservative" Demo
crat to get something. They appear
to harbor the delusion that nothing
but tariff is to be talked in this years
campaigning And when tariff is the
paramount issue of a campaign, no.
body's heart can bleed for the plain
people and the common people like
that of a Democrat loaded up with
the gilt-edged securities of preda-
poor ultimate consumer like Demo-
cratic candidate for Congress who is
interested in enterprises for corner
ing the necessities of life
The late Senator German was the
spokesman of this class throughout
the making of the Democratic tariff
law during the uncertain, hesitating
doubtful years of 1S93-94-95, when
panic was precipitated. He had been
chairman of the National Democratic
Committee in one or two of its great
tariff campaigns. Preceding him in
the chair of the National Democratic
Committee had been William II. Bar
mum, of Connecticut, and Calvin S.
Brice, of Ohio, men as thoroughly
identified with corporate monopoly as
ever German was. A growing con-
seriousness of the inconsistencies Of
such leadership with Democratic
party professions of solicitude for the
masses was the root of Organism in
the Democratic organization. The
wretched performances of 1S93-95
brought conviction and clinched rad
ical action Since 1896 the great
Democrats who had so long yearned
to relieve the people of all other bur-
dens than those in which great DEM
ocratic leaders were financially in
terested, or could get an interest,
have had to lie low and wait for the
tariff question to rise again.
IL
try has prospered long and well under
the protective policy 1t has been
brought up out of the slough of de-
spond into which it sank during the
years of the early COS, in which a
Democratic administration at Wash
ington hesitated, trembled, and finally
split into fragments. But so many
new voters have come into the cleo
torate since then that it seems now
this old and hoary chestnut of an is
sue must be argued all over again.
The party or protection is as certain
lean intelligence is certain to take
care of itself. But in the meantime.
Democrats without any other hope of
getting into Congress than this false
issue affords them are already found
offering themselves in many States as
candidates for one or the other of
the houses. They are already sub
ordinating" all State questions and
all other national questions to what
one of them calls "the one supreme,
overshadowing issue of tariff reform
The workingman is to be given rest
by the millionaire Democrats who
gave him such a long rest before.
We are to wash away our sin with
the water of watered stocks. Bur-
dened consumers will be eased Of
their burdens in being deprived of a
chance to consume so much. All mo-
nopoly is to be charged against the
tariff and let ii go at that. The singed
cat is coming back 1t is badly
singed, and has many bald spots, and
its cry is not yet loud enough to have
aroused energetic protest in the two
neighborhoods in which it has been
heard But it is rising toward the
higher scales now, and when the en-
tire country is aroused the cat must
remember all of its lodges to escape
humiliation. They are all old lodges.
The singeo cat has learned no new
ones, for there are none to learn.-St
Louis Globe Democrat.