The Colorado statesman., 1916-11-04
DEMOCRATS lNIMICAL
TO INDUSTRIAL PEACE
SAYS GOVERNOR
CARLSON FLANkS ENEMY, Ex-
POSING RECORD OF MlSRULE
AND RUIN.
PEKETRATES ENTIRE STATE
DEMOCRATS SEEK IN VAIN FOR
WEAK SPOT IN REPUB-
LICAN DEFENSE.

that the Democratic party in the state
and nation was inimical to industrial
peace, George A. Carlson, Republican
candidate for reelection as governor,
put in the busiest period of his cam
paign last week. He laid bare the at
titude of the Democratic party on pro-
hibition, declaring that its alleged
conversion is an indictment of it's po-
sition two years ago"
Carlsons whirlwind campaign has
carried him to every corner of the
state. He has used train, auto and
wagon, speaking morning, noon and
night Last week thousands heard his
comparison of the peaceful and pros
porous record of two years of Repub-
iicanism in the state with the indus
trial warfare that has written in let
ters of blood the history of his Demo
cratic predecessors. q
His two-fisted attack has driven the
Democrats to the ropes, gasping for
breath. AS rule, the administration
is on the defensive in a campaign.
This year the rule is reversed. The
Democrats have sought without avail
for weak spot in the Republican de-
fenses. Meanwhile Carlson has turn
ed his guns on the record of misrule
and ruin left by previous Democratic
administrations.
Republican and Democratic records
on industrial conditions and prohibit
tion are written too boldly to be mis-
construed. Carlson has needed only
the plain facts for ammunition, and he
has been using these to excellent eff
feet, as the Democrats can testify.
Here are some extracts taken froIn
recent speeches delivered by the gov
ernor:
when Democracy took charge at
the close of the Buchtel administra
tion eight years ago, it found our
state in condition of industrial
peace. Labor was employed; working
men and their bosses and superin-
tendents were companions and friends.
There was no strife, no strikes, no
turmoil anywhere. Contemporaneous
with their assumption of control, high
state officials began sowing seeds of
distrust and dissension between work
er and employer. Soon after, a great
coal strike broke in the northern
fields.
-Four years ago Democracy assum
ed control of the government of the
entire nation. Democratic congress
sional investigating committees and
federal boards began spreading the
doctrine nation wide that the employ
er was the natural enemy of the
working man. Soon after, rebellion
broke out in West Virginia, in Michi-
gan, in Colorado, then in Arkansas,
and finally in Arizona. More lives
have been lost and more property de-
stroyed due to internal disturbance in
the last four years than any time
since the beginning Of this nation, ex-
cept during the Civil War.
Disputes and strikes may natural
ly occur in the orderly evolution of
our industrial development. But l
maintain that there is every differ
ence between disputes and strikes and
conditions such as We have had in the
last four years.
Colorado labor what did this state
Democracy do for you, except to teach
terness and intensity? What did 1t
do for you except to permit many of
your members to meet violent deaths?
What did 1t do for you, Colorado coal
miners, except to heap misery and
hunger and want upon your families
and finally shrink your payroll five or
six million dollars a year? Property
owners, what did Democracy do for
you except to permit the burning and
dynamiting of your buildings and
plants, to place your lives in peril, to
undermine your business and blast
your reputation? Colorado taxpayer,
what did Democracy. do for you except
to throw a useless load of over a
thousand dollars a day for every day
in the long, last two years that 1t was
in, upon your already overburdened
shoulders? Good citizens, what did
II do for you except to make you think
that civilization had turned back 500
years, and that the weapons of saw
agery and barbarism were still of abb
solute necessity in this Christian and
civilized state?
THE doctrine that worker and en-
ployer are natural enemies and neces-
sarily antagonistic must inevitably de-
velop turmoil and insurrection. The
Republican party Of this state de-
clares that doctrine to be absolutely
false. The Republican party of this
state maintains that the truer inter-
ests Of labor and capital are identical
and not antagonistic. The Republican
party of this state seeks to promote
the mutually and harmony of inter
ests Of these great forces rather than
their antagonism. The Republican
party of this state maintains that sta
bility is the first Indispensable OF