The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1914-03-20


 than the West; it is just about as 1 much worse as it is older. The Wess looks worse, but that is because the corruption is new ,crude, noisy and 1 incomplete. There is opposition to 1 it; there is friction. It is not the set | tied custom of the country. Ihe 1 grafters. haven't agreed among them selves; the methods have not been re- duced to a routine and public opinion l is not yet reconciIed to the effects or corruption upon fthe govern naent which is the same everywhere Tne governments of Connecticut, Rhode Island. Vermont, New Hampshire a nd Maine are corrupted by, and they rep resent their railroads, public ser-v1ce l and other special interests
 There are sturdy people among them still Relatively large as com pared with younger states1, the de- | generacy and insanity among them is absolutely small. The purchasabIe some parts Of Rhode Island they are 1 a minority effective, of course, at an election division, but a minority none 1.-the less. And this minority, deprav- ed though it seems to be, responds to sentiment; 1t talks about one bird in the hand being worth a brace in the bush but it covets the two. Practical it has it's ideals, too. The New Eng land Conscien1ce is mot dead even in New England, it only sleeps; 1t has been put to sleep.
 Che people of New England are corrupted, not corrupt. Even the bribe-takers among them are bought We must not forget that We must not forget that wherever there are brfbe takers, there also are kribe -giy- CTS, and the purchase of voters on Ia, erf means an organized fund managed for the purposes of corruption. and that implies carefully planned scheme Of deliberate debauchery, old and there fore necessary. but carried on az gressfvely still with foretIoug oE.- der, ability and wealth by refiecting shrewd. rich men. believe that if the sources of this corruption were to be stopped up these people would re- sive.
 The English criminals transported to the convict colony of Austr aIia proved that when they had the oppor- tunity. They demonstrated to all the world and for all time that. given a l5chance from the conditions that degraded them and allowed free access to natural resources even the so-ealled sscrin1inals- born will be- come natural and resourcefui human beings
  But Ohio, Oregon, Washington and other Western states bring the truth nearer honae New Englanders, straight from New England, settled them, aTld,. under the new, natural fconditio ons,x they also blossomed and bore fruit just as their forefathers did when New England was new. It was not the ssbest people, from New Eng 1 land that went to the Western re-  families at home That broke the soil of Ohio. Yet that state has given us Presidents and statesmen, master ful politicians and eloquent preach CTS, writers and attorneys, to say nothing of merchants traders and 1 great captains of industry.
 
 For-to repeat-New England is 1 ahead, not behind, the rest of our states. It has passed through all Ithese stages of progress and 9except- ing Massachusetts) is in the next to l the last stage is we should have to look abroad to see; England, for ex- ample; no American state has reach ed 1t yet
 Connecticut is as far as we have gone There we have abandoned farms. owned. but unworked; ar i'm lpoperisI1ed soil (which the educated 1 farmers of Wisconsin and Illinois I.could make productive); a govern
 ment. antiquated in form. by a cor rupt railroad. which rules absolutely a contented people who have surren- l dered to corruption that is not only political, economic and moral. but mental.
 The, minds of men and women are corrupted; they think wrong the, | iS izrf1f n, x1,s,- for example, that they are about right The Connecticuters, and most New Englanders, have not the rer1otes, I suspicion that they are the bottom so1 the United States
 Which goes to prove my charge Most communities think their govern. 1 nent the worst, and that is a prettS l sure sign that it is not, It shows . hopeful discontent New Englanders think of New England as the best o1 the nation; not as perfect, of course but about the best that has happened so far And this is a pr city sure sigr | of the approach of theefnaI stage O, lcorruptian; complacency, the complet. 1 submission of thought to environ ment. the establishment in the mind. of men of good government with out good living conditions, without z good people and without the hope O. these good things.
 Let me illustrate this state of r,1int
 with a bit of documentary evidence fthe testimony of ex-GoyeFnor, and la ter U- s. Senator, Morgan G. Bulkele. l before a committee of the Connect
 cut legislature. which was pretendin, l to consider bill to punish bribery
 The Corrupt Practices Act of Englan,
 wess the model proposed, and Mr
 Bu1keley was called as an expert t,
 give advice upon it, He was opposed
 to any such legislation.
 .I don't believe this Act of EngIan, | is applicable to this country he said
 4t isn't the money, gentlemen, bu the ignorant voter in this country I who makes the troubIe.', He propos Il ed a limited suffrage. sIf you wan
 to remedy the evil. strike at the ig | norant voter