The Columbia herald. [volume] (Columbia, Tenn.) 18??-1935, 1912-06-07

ehu i"hIooIiC dttCmpI upOu Tie pdIl
OF fskers, seeking notoriety, assailed
our social structure. The muck-rak-
er with a strenuous example in the
White House was busy, and no per-
son or institution was left unmalign-
ed. We scarcely need learned au-
thority like DR. Allan McLane Ham
ilton, scion of two of the makers of
the Republic, to tell us that the
written productions of this army of
detractors partook of what Max
Nordau has called mania of hyper
bollsm. 1t became the golden age
of small men OF scant education and
the desire for Office and display, who
fairly reve!ed in cheap and false
Socialism, spreading the poison Of
discomfort and hatred of prosperity
ana success, engendering flabby, un-
healthy sentiment throughout the
country, so that ENVY and malice,
ana all uncharitableness" became
the order CT the day.
Among the reckless and ruthless,
the ignorant and the discontinued,
the glib-tongued demagogue obtain
ed recruits. Reading the speeches.,
or hearing these people speak, one
was reminded of the epigram Of
Rochefouoauld, LAS it is the mark of
great minds to say many things in
few words, so is it that of little
minds to use many words to say
nothing" But when such becomes
the pastime of a selfish demagogue
having a following, it becomes a
menace. Unsound subjects may be
known by their shallow oratory, by
the use of the slang of the gutter,
by hyperbole and anti-climax, by
flights of sheer bombast and invec-
tive, by a voluble overflow of words
with no real underlying thought, and
these have marked the utterances of
Theodore Roosevelt throughout the
present campaign.
SO the people, the real people, will
nave to determine once for all in the
coming Presidential election, wbeth-
er such a mailman and such methods
shall prevail, or whether we shall
still have u Government, a Constitu-
ton and Country worth living and
dying for.
In 1861 the existence of the I'm.
ion and tile integrity of the Govern
melt, bound up in, the Union, had
to face a supreme exigency. The
compact of States, not too strongly
or too securely joined together in the
first place, was rudely broken. The
Constitution, which proved but a
rope of rand, was invoked by 10th
Sections. They were equally sin.
cere, equally determined, equally
ready to fight. Happy for freedom,
happy for racehood and manhood,
happy for the self-governing prin-
cirle, the arbitrament of arms, met
in either side by well-nigh united
response, left us yet Nation
At length this Nation is World
Power. The issue precipitated by
Theodore Roosevelt is to decide
whether that arbitrament was in
vain; whether that sublime decision
Of the sword, with all that went be-
fore it and all that it carried with It,
shall be nullified; whether, become
q World-power, this Nation shall pro-
claim to mankind its own failure by
the Abandonment of its Constitution,
the overthrow of its Safeguards and
the naming of Dictator. He who
says this is not the issue, little recks
what he IS saying; he who thinks
it is not, we're prudent to question
his sanity In its ultimate analysis
and its last word, the Roosevelt pro-
pagan1a is the invocation Of a mad |
man to Civil War. (