The Richmond Virginian. (Richmond, Va.) 1910-1920, 1915-07-01
WILLIAM ALLEN WHITE
SIZES UP REPUBLICANS
Progressive Leader Says G. o. p. Is
Like Statue, without Heart or
Bowels.
WONT RETURN TO Ft
Says Republican Idea of Chief End
of Man Is to Lick Democrats and
Enjoy the Ofice Forever-Reason
For Prospective Failure.

New York, June 30.---A Republican
campaign to bring the Progressives
back to the mother party is being
engineered from an office at 10
Broadway by Ormsby McHarg. the
lawyer. The campaign presumably
has the approval of Republican Ma
tional Chairman Charles D. Hilles.
Mr. McHarg is chairman OF what
is described on his letter--heads as
general Committee, lis Broadway
Walter l.. Barnum is the secretary.
and on the same Ietterhead appear
the words, Republican League OF
Clubs of the state of New York,
John A. Stewart. president"
MIR. McHarg Is the signer of many
letters which have gone out to Pro-
gressive leaders throughout the coun-
try. and which say that the two par
ties ought to he able TO get together
next year on the real issue to beat
t'ne Democrats He got a slambang
reply from william Allen White, Pro-
gressive national committeeman. for
kansas In the July Metropolitan Mr.,
White prints Mr.. MeHarg's appeal and
his own defiant and sarcastic analysis
of what he deems an unregenerate
Republicanism.
This. in part, is Mr.. WHITES reply
in the magazine article:
1.-THE land is full of gentlemen who
were thoroughly discredited and re-
tired from public life five years ago,
but who are now bobbing up serenely
from below. talking glibly or time
honored Republican principles and
proclaiming that the chief end of man
is to lick the Democrats and enjoy
their offices forever,
| Nationally the Republican party is
! like the bronze statue OF Louis XVI.
in the Tuilernes. without heart or
bowels.
THE Republican party as 1t stands
today is exhibiting no vestige OF In
terest in anything but the accumula-
ton of wealth: prosperity rather than
justice is teh Republican aim. Prop
erty is its god. To own. to control,
to nave and to hold---these are Re-
publican ideals. To give, TO serve, to
broaden life and gladden. livingvAthese
in the composite Republican mind are
! things of the child. They have been
put away along with the Progressive
leadership that passed out of the party
in 1912.
But the figures prove that of the
four million who voted for Roosevelt
two million have returned to the Re-
publican party. Probably more than
two million have returned. But they
have returned TO reactionary lead
ership. The Republican party today
has in II no fighting progressive lead
ership. The Progressives who have
returned have their tails between their
legs. They came back to lick rae
Democrats and they are making no
fight for the things which interested
the progressive Republicans four years
ago.
Those who left the Republican
party three years ago are broadly di-
/ vided into two ciasses--those who left
because the party leadership was un-
fair TO Colonel Roosevelt. and those
| Who left because they knew why the
party leadership was unfair to Col
onel Roosevelt The first group has
gone back--two million OF them. The
second group will stay away--approxi-
mately two million of them. Those
who voted with the Progressives last
| autumn don't care whether the Re-
publicans whip the Democrats. or the
Democrats whip the Republicans In
1916"