Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1915-09-25

MORE than once before have had occa-
1Nl sion to hold up my friend Mr.. Andrew
McGilligan to public approval. As Mr.. Nc
Gilligan is still under ~, and gives promise
of improving still further upon the excel
lent man he has always been, the occasion
is very apt to occur again.
AT every election the cynios among us have
plausible reason for procaming that the
average American never thinks; that he
has his thinking done for him, as he has
his hair cut and his boots polished. Mr..
McGilligan refutes this foul calumny. He
refutes 1t in himself. don't mean that he
cuts his own hair But he certainly does
his own thinking. And Mr.. McGillgan is
much more than prosperous Philadelphian.
He is certainly more the typical American
than the traditional Uncle Sam OF the daily
cartoon He is forever examining his life,
and American life, all life, for that matter,
with everlasting curiosity and with consid-
cradle skill. And always he turns up some
thing of value.
Flicking Ashes Where They Please
For instance. one evening not long ago,
McGilligan fell to talking about war.
do you know what causes war?" said
Andy
YES" said I.
L
of war is-wives."
I gasped
TITS true I don't mean that men like to
kill each other. But they do like the camp.
They like to get away together, where they
can flick their ashes where they please, and
express themselves as forcibly as they like
when things go wrong. and cut away the
foolish distinctions that creep in among
them at dinner parties and everywhere else
where the influence of wives is dominant
They get tired of the everlasting necessity of
having to be slicked up and polite-polite to
Brown because he Is rich and his wife is
in society, and impolite to Jones because
he is not rich and his wife is not in society.
That's why men go to war. For a chance
to break away and be dirty and be friends
with whom they like. When they get tired
Of that, too, they get a shave. and run
home. and take up again the burden and
the bore of being civilized"
That profound truth resides in this novel
idea, no husband will deny. Not that it
refers to anything in the days news I
merely throw It out in the hope that little
of II will soak into our wives and assist
them to temper the tyranny Of their re-
fnement.
Last evening McGilligan had been reading
the newest muruer trlal ne nad seen re-
ported In his paper II moved him to sew
eral profound observations. and TO what
thought a rafting good story. The Frank
case, the Carman case and few other cele-
brated trials of recent history passed un-
der Andy's review. And he came out OF
IT with the opinion that with the newspaper
what It is now, no murderer will ever again
be tried by a jury OF 10 men, The news
paper has seen to II that every murderer Is
tried by Jury Of the whole country.
1.-THE real Judge in all courts today"
said Andy, 'is public opinion It never
mattered for a minute what the ~ men
who heard the case against Leo Frank de-
cided. The. country sat on Frank and pro-
nounoed him Innocent Or anyway. Il de-
cided that he was not TO be hanged"
But" said I, "the public may be wrongl"
"why more so than any ~ OF its men %
was Andy's retort "A single man-and ne
not judge-may be right Listen to this:
One day when was boy, Just old enough
to remember well, a very old man OF my