Ottumwa tri-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1903-1916, 1912-03-07
mai questions, it had been a fail.

|ure.
| "Should the national republican VINO
! lives in New York be read out of this
! party" he asked, because he declines
to accept the referendum as the best
remedy to cure the abuses of popular
government in his own state?
ut only iconfuses and distracts to
drag into national campaign the
prejudices and shibboleths which have
arisen in the contests of the different
states. Mr.. Taft's administration must
be Judged by the attitude with which
he has approached and the success he
has attained in dealing with these ma.
tional problems, and not according to
the views which any of us may hold
upon these local questions of state ma
chinery" =.
Praises Taft's Tariff Activities.
The secretary of war drew attention
! to the investigations that have been
made under President Taft, into prob
lens. that had been the subject of Sc
rious controversy for years. The work
of the tariff board, the Hadley rail
way securities commission, and the
Hughes commission on second class
mail matter, we're typical, he said, OF
the methods sought by Mr. Taft to as
certain facts. j
Il doubt if there has ever been an
administration where so many vital
questions Of progress were under care
full, scientific investigation and scru-
tiny by commissions of competent ex-
perts." he said
There is nothing dramatic about
such a method, but reform accom-
plished in the light of such carefully
accredited facts is more likely to be
permanent. This is the very essence
of Mr.. Taft's method as a reformer"
President Taft has been most
falsely villified and abused" in connec-
ton with the tariff, said Mr.. Stimson,
and has, in fact, taken the republican
party out of the grasp of the special
interests benefited by the tariff and
has made part of the republican pro-
gressive policy the downward revision
of the tariff law schedule by sched-
ule.
SIS mot this tremendous achieve
ment In the direction of national prog
ress" asked Mr.. Stimson, ito complete
ly rescue his party from the methods
and influences which, if uncontrolled,
would inevitably turn it into a party
of special interests and reaction? Is |
he not right in standing to the utter
most, even to the exercise of all of the
executive powers of veto against the |
old privilege breeding methods of tar !
if revision employed by the demo
cratic house of representatives? Is he
not right in insisting, even against |
popular clamor, that we shall make a
clean break with the past and that no
tariff revision shall take place except
upon these conditions and after a
scientific study by a non-partisan
board Of experts?"
Secretary Stimson reviewed the adj
and it's achievements. He
said that the president had outlined
the system of trust reform which if
adopted would put the country in "a
fair way of solving our trust problem
and solving it right; that in the, cor
poration tax the president had turned
he flank of one of the most stubborn
'ortresses of reaction His interest
n human welfare was evidenced by
lis devotion to the progress of the Fill
pinos, said Mr.. Stimson, through his
Lctivity in behalf of the arbitration
reaties, his efforts for adequate
compensation and effective p.
employers liability laws and his sug-i -.
,estions for an industrial commission. !