The Birmingham age-herald., 1912-04-14
Governor Wilson Speaks

Governor Wilson was likened to Jeffer- l soh by the toastmaster's introduction. | He is one of the leading scholars of the | day and, like Jefferson also his democ- | racy is unquestioned and his capacity | as a public officer is conceded, he said. l Governor Wilson was received with cheers. Governor Wilson spoke to the toast: What Jefferson Would Do." He said in part; ITO determine what Jefferson would have done therefore requires only that we should ourselves clearly see the facts of our time as they are, whether in the field of government or in the field of our economic life and that we should see how Jeffersons principle of the rule and authority of the people stands related to those facts We are constantly quoting Jeffersons fundamental thought; 1t was that no policy could last whose founda- tion is narrow, based upon the privileges and authority of q few, but that It's foundations must be as broad as the in- terests of all the men and families and neighborhoods that live under it. Monop- oly private control, the authority of privilege, the concealed mastery of a few men cunning enough to rule without showing their power-he would have at | once pronounced the rank weeds which were sure to choke out all wholesome
 
 can detect these things In our time; if we can see them and describe them and touch them as they are, then we know what Jefferson would have done He would have moved against them, some times directly, sometimes indirectly, sometimes openly, sometimes subtly; but whether he merely mined about them, or struck directly at them, he would
 have set systematic war against them | at front of all his DlrDOSe.
 l 'As regards the economic policy of the | country it is perfectly plain that MT
 Jefferson would have insisted upon a | tariff fitted to actual conditions, by which l he would have meant not the interests of l the few men who find access to the | hearings of the ways and means con- mittee of the House and the finance com mittee of the Senate, but the interests of | the business men and manufacturers and farmers and workers and professional | men of every kind and class. He would | have insisted that the schedules should | be turned wrong side out and every item | of their contents subjected to the general
 scrutiny of all concerned. It is plain. l also, that he would have insisted upon a l currency system elastic indeed and suited
 to the varying circumstances of the 1 money market in a great industrial and | trading nation, but absolutely fortified l and secured against a central control | the influence of coteries. and leagues of banks to which 1t is now in constant
 danger of being subjected. He would l have known that the currency question 1 is not only an economic question but 1 political question, and that above all
 things else, control must be in the hands l of those who represent the general in
 terest and not in the hands of those
 who represent the things we are seeking
 to guard against.
 I've as democrats are particularly l bound at this season of expectation and
 of confidence to remember that it is only
 in this spirit and with this vision that | we can ever serve either the nation or l ourselves AS we approach the time
 when we are to pick out a President l for I believe that is to be our privilege
 we should fix our thought on this one great fact, that no man is big enough
 or great enough to be President alone. | He will be no stronger than his party. His strength will lie in the counsel of l his comrades His success will spring out of the union and energy and unselfish co-operation of his party, and his party
 must be more than half the nation. It must include and genuinely include, men of every class and race and disposition. I If he be indeed the representative of his i people, there may he vouchsafed to him through them something of the vision to conceive what Jefferson conceived and understood-how the vision may be car
 ried into reality"
 Mr. Bryan Is Applauded
 MT. Bryan was received with big out