Evening times-Republican. [volume] (Marshalltown, Iowa) 1890-1923, 1916-06-05
MANY MEN BUSY DODGlNG POS
slBLE STROKE OF VICE PRESl
DENTAL LIGHTNING.
SOME JcRLESS HUMANS
WILLING TO BE HIT
More Listed Among Dodgers Than
Among Those Trying to Steal Sec
ond Place on Ticket - No United
States Senator laundering For Place
Somebody Must Bear the Burden.

Washington, June 3. - P. s.: The
subjoined story is about the vice presi-
dental nomination; but it isn't the
regular. foreorda ined predestined and
painfully inevitable quadriennial wall
about The National Necessity For
Rescuing the Great Office of Vice
Presidency From the Disrepute Into
Which It has Fallen"
l have reversed the established or
der and put the postscript at the front,
out of consideration for the gentle
reader. He mightn't be, if he thought
was going to write that lovely ole
bromide.
If recollection is not awry. it is about
twenty years since the undersigned
first took up his pen from the press
Ia Bile of a national convention and APP
pealed with intense earnestness TO
patritic fellow citizenry to grab root
and rescue the vice presidency. 1t
seemed a theme worthy the best
thought of the great American nation
but the event seemed mildly to suggest
that nobody else was much excited
about ii. l have since been told that
the first reporter who appeared at the
first national convention. back in 1873
or therea bouts, wrote his first piece
about the decadence of the vice presi-
dental office; also that every bright
young man appearing for the first time
at a national convention ever since
has written that same piece over
again.
So III not write II this time.
Shy at the Job.
But the fact seems to require mar
re- ton. just as part of the day
work, that the time has come when
folks who have better jobs-that is
other jobs-are getting scared about
the possibility of the vice presidential
nomination being SHE'D at them. Also,
when the folks who have no better
jobs-that meaning those who haven't
anything to do at all-are beginning to
agitate themselves with the thought
that maybe they might grab off this
one and escape with 1t in the con-
fusion.
1t is a real testimony TO the moral
superiority of the American politician,
that more of him are lodging this JOB
than are trying to steal it. and that Is
! always the case. There may De some =
| thing that these politicians would be
willing to pilfer; but not the vice
| presidential nomination. You may talk
! till you're black in the face about the
| fact that about one-third Of the pres :
| dents of the United States, from the
! beginning to date, served first as vice
PRESIDENT: and almost everybody seems
willing to serve as president in case
there's en- insistent national demand
! Possibly excepting Mr. Justice Hughes
| He hasn't said yet.
However. the time is at hand. any
! how when the people who don't want
! it are beginning TO dodge, apd those
who do want il are pretending to
| dodge in order that they may keep
their existence in mind. The Missouri
advance guard burst into town with
wild report that they would like to De
shown how to get the nomination foi
Charles Nagel. who under the Tat adj
ministration was secretary of com
merce. They pointed out how nict
/ and easy it would be to nominate
man who served with Taft 1t woult
be further testimony that reconcile
ation was complete: and maybe i
would strengthen the party. too, II
Utah and Vermont. That seemed ;
powerful argument. Just how Nj
Nagel felt about It. or whether ne hal
been warned of the JOB his suppose
friends were setting up on him wa
not disclosed.
There are others in just as bad
scrape. Common Report-a very ami
mated old lady in a place like this
, palavering with the names, among tn
rest of these publicists:
Charles W. Fairbanks former vic