Middlebury register. (Middlebury, Vt.) 1886-1937, 1912-09-06
FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 6, 1912
THE PROGRESSIVE PARTY.
From the Deerfield Valley Times. I

For the benefit of those who were not
privileged to hear that distinguished
speaker, Clifford Pinchot, Tuesday after
noon, we publish below the speech in
full. AS a clear, concise and under
standable statement of the aims and
objects of the Progressive party, no
better has come to our notice. AS an
is given Mr. Pinchot to know Colonel
Roosevelt as few men know him. He
has also had experience under the pres
ent administration and its methods of
handling the affairs of the people. His
exposure of the land and timber pirates
is still fresh in the minds of the people,
and because of that exposure he was
summarily kicked from a position which
no man in the country was as competent
to fill, and even though vendicated by
subsequent investigation his reinstate-
ment by Mr.. Taft and his cabinet has
been awaited for in vain by country
which applauds his action and honors
his integrity in a position where tempta-
ton to remain quiescent must have been
tremendous. His address is as follows:
Why should we have new party? Is
it not wiser to continue working within
the lines of the old parties rather than
to attempt to establish new machinery
with which to accomplish the results
the people are set on getting?
The essential fact upon which the
new party is based is this: that the
country is not governed in the interest
of its people. From Maine to Califor-
MIA the underlying political fact is deep
discomfort with the results achieved
through the machinery of the old par
ties.
Are the people right? We have tried
both the old parties, and as to both we
have found that they are controlled by
a bipartisan combination of corrupt
bosses and corrupt business, and that
both have failed to do justice to the
people The record of the reactionary
Republicans is so familiar that it does
not need to be recalled. In congress
the Republican majority is controlled by
men like Penrose of Pennsylvania, who
will soon cease to disgrace that state in
the Senate of the United States Crane
of Massachusetts, whose sympathy
with the special interests became so
well known in his State as to compel
him to announce his retirement from
public life; Gallinger of New Hamp-
shire, through whom speaks the rail-
road monopoly of New England, and
many others of the same kind.
1t would be difficult to find man so
blind today as to deny that the bosses
are in control of the Republican party
unless indeed he is boss or the follow
er of boss himself. The Republican
party was tested at Chicago and it
proved under test that the one thing
the men who control it have most at
heart is to keep the rank and file of the
Republican party in subsection to the
bosses who have been using it for their
own purposes.
In the Democratic party if you change
the names the record is almost precisely
the same. When Speaker Cannon, the
representative of the special interests
in the House, was first in danger of be-
ing driven from power the votes which
saved him were Democratic votes. Pen
rose, Barnes and Crane in the Republ-
can ranks are balanced by Murphy,
Taggart and Sullivan in the Democratic
ranks. At the Democratic convention
at Baltimore, if the nomination could
have been made by majority vote as at
Chicago, Ryan, Murphy, Sullivan and
Taggart would have dictated the name
OF man satisfactory to them. In both
old parties the essential fact is that the
bosses and special interests are in con-
troll.
No better illustration of the truth of
this statement could be found than the
Payne-Aldrich tariff, the great fact
about which is that it is unjust to the
people When it was made the Demo-
Gratis and Republicans united to secure
or preserve excessive duties in the SER
vice of the special interests, who are
their masters.
During the session just closing Demo-
Gratis and Republicans in the Senate
made desperate and well-nigh success
full attack on the conservation policy
with the definite purpose of destroying
the national forests. They did so under
cover of an ostensible effort to protect
the homesteader, but so worded the
amendment which contained their at
tack that the homesteader would be
little helped, while the great interests
concerned with water power, lumber.
grazing and the control of natural re-
sources generally would reap the bene-
fit.
In the House, Democrats and Republi-