Audubon Republican. [volume] (Audubon, Iowa) 1894-1925, 1911-09-21
THE RECORD HERALD
ANSWERS SEN. CUMMINS
That Paper Claims The President Is
A Progressive Statesman By
Every Essential Fact.

The Record Herald of Chicago taking
up the really relevant points made by
Senator Cummins against President
Taft answers them as follows:
Taking up the really relevant points,
what is the case against Mr.. Taft?
l. The Canadian reciprocity agree
ment, Senator Cummins says, is not pro-
gressive: it was passed pursuant to an
understanding with the worst standpat-
tiers, and its price was the vetoing of all
tariff revision bills. This is indeed a
scoop" Ii will be strange news to the
democrats who would never have fur
nished single vote for reciprocity if
they had shared the senator's belief"
1t will be news to the chambers of com
merce, to the economists, the editors, the
educators, the moralist, the liberal ele-
ments of the country generally. The
truth is the standpatters swallowed reci-
procity because they could not Quarrel
with the president or defy public senti-
ment; at heart they had less ''use" for
1t than the insurgent ants. The talk of
a secret bargain is naive. If the broad,
comprehensive treaty with Canada is not
progressive nothing is, and the term
becomes an empty catchword.
2. With regard to the peace treaties
the point is, of course, that no man who
was not progressive enlightened, demo-
cratic, idealists by nature and instinct
would have conceived, proposed, and
strenuously urged unlimited arbitra-
ton" What the preternaturally suspi-
cious and jealous senate will do with
the treaties has no bearing on the ques-
ton of the high-mindedness and moral
'radicalism" of their author.
3. As to the wool and free list bills
Senator Cummins does not even mention
the cotton steel chemicals concoction-
many progessives, independents and low.
tariff democrats recognize that the vetoes
were proper and consistent.
Senator Cummins chooses to assume
that the democrats, who are willing to
yield to Mr. La Toilette, will not yield
to the president; that they will play very
poor politics and refuse to cooperate ia
passing general revision bills based on
tariff board data. Thisi is prophecy, not
fact. We think better of democratic
leadership. We hope revision bills will
be passed on their merit at the next ses-
sion in obedience to true expediency as
we'll as plain duty. At any rate the
president will play his part with candor
and sincerity; he will endeavor to redeem
his promises in good faith. The people
will not hold him responsible for the
follies and blunders of others if such are
perpetrated.
4. With reference to the recall we did
not say that Senator Borah acted with
the president in the matter" The 'in-
accuracy" is in the senator paraphrase.
We used these words: "On the judiciary
recall he 1.-THE president) is at one with
progressiyes like Senator Borah and
Woodrow Wilson. : He is at one with
these men, and others in regarding the
judicial recall as dangerous and I'M
necessary; whether another progressive
would, as president, have signed the
statehood bill in spite of all objections is
speculation, not fact. Is it reactionary
for an executive to veto measure which
he thinks vicious and impossible? What
a state" may do is irrelevant to the
question of what responsibility a presi-
dent may feel that he has for legislation
admitting a territory to statehood.
5. We would add, briefly, that Mr..
Taft's views on the desirability of an in
come tax amendment, ON the test of pro-
lection on legal procedure, on employers
liability, orinterstate commerce and fur
Their trust regulation, on conservation, ON
postal banks and the parcels post are un-
questionably progressive. " To deny this
is to whistle against the wind. TO de-
mand agreement in details is to demand
the impossible. By every essential, vital
test Mr.. Taft is progressive thinker
ana progressive statesman.