The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-11-23
JUDGE COLEMAN LAUDS UNDERWOOD Veteran Jurist Sends Re- grets for Inability to
 Attend Banquet


 his inability to be present;
 Eutaw, Ala, November 22, 1911.
 Hon. E. K. Campbell, Chairman of In
 vitation Committee:
 Dear Sir-I recognize and appreciate the compliment implied by the invi- tation to be present at the banquet to be given by the Chamber of Com merce to honor MT. Oscar W. Under wood To know MT Underwood is tc love him. Knowledge of his public service inspires admiration of his great ability. To be assured of constancy io his convictions of the right is but to recall his refusal to surrender them to the threatening demands of con stituents of great influence at his home That he may be relied upon to main l tain himself in the future finds full support in the past, in that without 1 other than his own merit and study, he satisfactorily solved questions vital to his party and the prosperity Of the whole country. Having quietly but thoroughly mastered these issues and understanding correctly the respective needs and rights of the agricultural producers and wage earners on the one side and the manufacturers and cap ital on the other, and realizing as but few have done. that the greatest pros perity to all depended upon such an ad- justment of their respective and con- hicting claims, so that neither would be oppressed nor neither unduly favored he has outlined policy solution appar- ently satisfactory to all except those who are the avowed protectors of trusts and monopolies.
 l His position on important policies as the leader of his party stands In con- trast with the leaders of the republican party President Taft represents tue standpat policy of that division of his nartv which has made richer the rich. and poorer the poor. and promises no relief. The leaders of the other divl- sion of that party, recognizing the lh- I justice of the standpat policy and the universal discomfort of the country, hope to find approval in extreme pro gressiveness.
 Underwood's leadership promises to the whole country a wise conservative policy, fair and just to capital, to the manufacturing interests. to labor and to that great agricultural class which supplies provisions, clothes and happy homes for our teeming millions and has furnished the great drawing force to population which has converted the wilderness of the great west into pop ulous, thriving communities.
 Alabama presents to the country a man for its chief executive against whom there can be no reasonable ob- lection and who measures to the 1uii standard of the high office. Let us contrast him with some of those now living who have occupied and who have aspired to that high position. Take | President Roosevelt though he had many bitter enemies, and even his friends were at times apprehensive that he would make precedents dangerous | to the rights of persons and states do- clared in or recognized by the consti- tuition of the United States-at the time | of his return from his great hunting excursion to Africa, was confessecly | the most popular man in America and perhaps in the world. The prominence | and ovations given him by foreign gov ernments on his way home and the re- markable reception accorded to him in New York caused dizziness and delu- sion and the rush of vanity to his head. He believed himself to be some mighty | "centurion" with authority over the people saying to this one, go and | he should go, to another come and he | must obey. Underwood Is too well bal anced too conservative, too modest ever to assume the roll of rule or ruin to his party.
 Take President Taft man lovely in | all the virtues of private citizenship, and a luminous star in the judicial Armament. Yet in the mixup and whirl of politics, l he so far lost control of his Judgment l and power of discrimination as to con- strue ''downward'' for upward" Though | committed by his own declarations that 1 the revenue bill should be revised down ward, he declared the iniquitous Payne | and Aldrich bill to be the best he had ever read When presented by Congress
 with a bill for approval, which was the beginning of a movement for the reliei
 of the country, and supposed to be 1T
 accord with his previous declarations, h'
 vetoes it, and for explanation proceeds | to inform the country that he has pri vate cabinet of his own appointment | which must first be consulted-accordfns to it more importance and weight, thai
 to the peoples representatives in Con
 gress Instead of reducing the price O
 bread, he says to the hungry, Depart II
 peace, and be ye filled" Does anyone
 believe the thoughtful, honest, sobe
 minded and straightforward underwood
 in the office of the chief executive woul
 have become so bewildered as to interpre
 down" as "up," or promise one thin
 today and by action contradict 1t to
 morrow. or to make tracks which wou
 puzzle the honest seeker after truth t
 determine whether "the tracks were goin
 in or coming out?" Not a bit of it.
 And then there Is the democratic Peer , less" with his unrivaled powers or SC
 ductive and misleading oratory. The crut
 scars of the crucifixion and crown
 golden thorns were scarcely healed, an the deep disappointment which followe , the failure of being made rich and happ , by the millennium which was to com
 from the free and unlimited coinage o
 silver and now recollected as pleasan dreams, the democratic party, condonin
 these failures because of other services gathered itself together for another tris of strength with the great Dragon the head of the powers which create | trusts, monopoles and oppression, fo | the benefit of the few, when the Peer less" on his return from Europe-fete | and petted abroad-without consultatio
 with any of his party, again projecte | his own views in accordance with the DO icy of monarchical and quasi republics
 existing elsewhere rather than in tn United States, the policy of governmer
 ownership of railroads by which ar | nouncement of the lieutenants of tn democratic party were paralyzed, an
 the party divided and scattered like shee
 without shepherd. He Is even no
 pushing forward ''the recall and refe'
 endum.'' as a question for the feder' Il <If1 1oox inc n