Atlanta Georgian. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1912-1939, 1912-06-12
SAYS TAI 7
IS NEAR TREASON
Assumes His Office a Gift at
Disposal Of Bosses in Defi-
anCe Of the People,

OYSTER BAY, June I'm state
ment in which he charges the conduct
Of the president Of the United States
with being dangerously near treason
Colonel Roosevelt again assails the ae-
tons of the Republican national com
mittee and the Taft forces. He says in
part:
The question at Chicago becomes
clearer with every vote of the national
committee. 1t is simply whether the
people have the right to nominate
Whomsoever they wish for the highest
office in their gift or whether by de-
liberate theft and fraud certain ma
chine leaders, acting in the interest OF
special privilege, ere to be permitted
to deprive the people of this right BY
an overwhelming majority where they
have had the opportunity to express
their wishes at the primaries the plain
people, the rank and file of the Repub-
ican party, have repudiated Mr.. Taft
Now we are face to face with the ques-
ton whether the people rule the Re
publican party or whether the party Is
to be ruled by the discredited bosses
whom the people have themselves re-
pudated.
Taft. Repudiated Appeals to Bosses.
Mr. Taft has been repudiated by the
people and he now appeals to his rep
resentatives in the national commit
tee. half Of whom have themselves been
repudiated. and asks them to force his
nomination on the rank and file of the
Republican party. who have declared
that they do not wish him Mr.. Taft
a one period of the campaign said |
was unjust to him because | stated that
the bosses were for him and the people
against him. Events have proved that
was right
How do these bosses hope to nomi-
nate Mr.. Taft? What they did in the
Thirteenth Indiana district supplies the
answer In this district the conven-
ton which assembled to elect two dele
gates to Chicago contained clear and
uncontested majority of Roosevelt men.
But the chairman, a Taft man. refused
roll call and declared the Taft dele
upon the majority OF the convention
elected two Roosevelt delegates. Yet
the national committee seated the two
men, the frauduleney of whose claims
had been thus shown.
Would Mean Prison Elsewhere.
unfortunately there is no law to
touch the astounding misconduct Of
which the national committee has been
guilty. and which it has sanctioned in
the cases which have come before It, II
the contest was one for the nomination
of an alderman in New York city, and
obscure men in the Democratic and
Republican parties who were acting as
election officers in given district We're
guilty of such conduct and their guilt
was proved, they would be sent to the
penitentiary But the great and pow
erful politicians. the representatives OF
bossism in politics and special privi-
lege in business, who are now perpe-
trating the same kind of wrong on an
infinitely larger scale, are immune be
cause as yet, unfortunately, the law
does not touch nominating conventions,
'Mr Taft assumes, and Messrs.
| Barnes, Penrose, Mulvane and company
assume. that the presidency is to be
treated as gift within the bestowal Of
the politicians in defiance Of the duly
expressed wish of the people
Such conduct comes dangerously
near being treason to the whole spirit
of our institutions, TO the whole spirit
Of democratic free government. do
49, 80
such conduct nor do believe that So
Der Republicans will consent to see the
Republican party sacrificed TO please
the bosses whom the party has repu-
dated.
IF the national committee continues
as it has begun, ! believe Its actions
will be repudiated by the convention
"A