The Leavenworth echo. [volume] (Leavenworth, Wash.) 1904-current, 1911-07-14
SENATOR BOURNE TO RUSSELL
A Mild But Biting Rebuke From Progress
i've to Standpat Republican

dent OF the National Progressive Re
publican League. recently made pub
lie the following self-explanatory reply
to caustic letter from Charles H.
Russell, a member of the Republican
Club of the city Of New York:
Dear Mr.. Russell:
I have received your letter OF July
10Th saying that you are lifelong and
devoted Republican and deeply regret
the division that exists between the
members Of your party in Congress. Ii
is amazing to me that any man who
believes in progress could regret a di-
vision in opinion, either within or with
out the ranks oi any party. Please tell
me how there can be any progress
whatever in science or government or
in any human activity unless some peo-
pie first take advanced ground and
augment their forces until they have
secured the adoption of methods and
the establishment of conditions better
than that which has gone before. II
there were to be no division in the
ranks OF the Republican party, then
we would be today where we were
when the Republican party was first
founded.
If you believe it unwise to have a
division in the ranks Of the Republican
party, then you also believe it to be
unwise to have division in the ranks OF
the Democratic party. You would have
each party remain, year after year, ad-
vocating the same principles, present
ing the same methods, electing and re-
electing the same candidates. If it
is wrong to have division of opinion
among members OF party, it is also
inadvisable to have division of opinion
among members of any profession.
Pursuing your line OF reasoning to its
necessary conclusion, you would have
the doctors and the lawyers agree as to
principals and methods each should
recognize and you would discourage
any of them from taking advanced
grounds and creating divisions and dis
cussions as to the best methods to be
pursued.
You ask whether the so-called pro-
gressive organization exists to promote
the personal ambitions Of men, and
without hesitation I answer you in the
negative. You would know this with
out asking if you had taken the trouble
to read the declaration OF principles OF
the organization, copy Of which l en-
close herewith. This organization was
formed to promote the adoption of five
principles of legislation, and as you will
observe it is expressly forbidden to
enter upon any other activity.
You ask whether the progressive or
ganization has turned its back on the
Republican party because it cannot
make the majority bend to its will.
The majority of the members of the
Republican party by tremendously
overwhelming number are already in
sympathy with the principles and pol
icies for which the League stands. The
difficulty is that a minority being in
control OF party machinery prevents
that majority from writing its opinions
into the party platform and nominating
party candidates. We have turned our
backs upon the past and our faces to
the future. You are still gazing in
alteration upon the past. We are striv-
ing for something better in the future
than this country has enjoyed in the
years that are gone.
The principal trouble with you is
that you cannot distinguish between
the party and the party machinery. The
Republican party is made up of seven
and half million members throughout
the United States. The party machin-
cry is composed Of few individuals,
who by methods we'll known to you,
even if you will not admit it, perpetuate
themselves in party control, debating
elections OF delegates to national con-
ventions, making that body misrepre-
sentative of popular will and subordinat-
ing general wilfre to selfish interests.
This was done in the last convention
when there was voted down plank
Continued on last page)