Jamestown weekly alert. [volume] (Jamestown, Stutsman County, D.T. [N.D.]) 1882-1925, 1916-02-17
CuMM|NS CR|T|CISES
= DEMOCRATIC POLICIES
Repubs T., Presidential Candi.
date h. Il, at St. Paul.

date h>S> At St. Paul. :
St. Paul, Feb. Ex-senator A. r..
Cummins of Iowa criticised Presi-
dent Woodrow Wilson for what he
called his "vacillating views" on pre-
paredness and for his policies toward
the Mexican and European situations
in a speech last night before the Lin
coin Republican club in the St. Paul
hotel, St. Paul. He expressed him
self as opposed to the adoption of any
new policy of preparedness" until
the present war is over and it's les
sons understood.
Regarding Mexico, he said: mo
real red-blooded American ever will
turn to the page which records the
conduct of this administration to-
ward Mexico without blushing. I do
not charge the president with wrong
doing, but weakness and vacillation
are sometimes worse than wrongdo-
ing"
He prophesied that, as a result OF
the presidents weakness" the Unit
ed States must intervene to furnish
a nucleus around which the remnant
of decency and liberty can gather.
One sentence on vacillation was:
ION his preparedness trip, the
president began at Pittsburg with a
moderate appeal to the people to
speed up a little, so that in five years
we might have a navy like Germany's s
or Japan's. BY the time he got to st.
Louis he abandoned every American
conception, and boldly declared the
United States should have navy in
comparably better than any nation
on EARTH
Five hundred were present, some
of them men from over the state who
have filed as Cummins delegates. Be-
fore and after the meeting there was
some electioneering, but nothing like
a get-together of the Cummins fore
es.
1t was the first and only western
address of the Republican pre-con-
vention campaign. Senator Cummins
left last night for Des Moines. He
will be back in Washington Tuesday
to sit on the senatorial committee
which has the Brandeis supreme
court appointment to deal with.
Urges Party Union.
Abraham Lincoln furnished the
text for the address in his famous
utterance, "a house divided against
itself cannot stand" "The house OF
Republicanism," said Senator Cum
Minis, must not fall; but to stand, it
must not be divided against itself.
1t has become our highest and most
imperative duty to see that it is not
divided, and that it shall endure for
the glory of free institutions and the
welfare of the people"
One by one Mr.. Cummins reviewed
the mistakes" of the administration.
1.-The tariff law" he said, neither
gives protection to our home mar
kets nor yields revenue for the main
tenance of the government. Had it
not been for the hideous war which
has paralyzed the industries of Eu-
rope, it would have put this country
into bankruptcy. 1t gives the manu-
facturers of the east some protec-
tion, inadequate it is true, but it re-
morsely exposes the agricultural pro-
ducers of the great West to the un-
restrained invasion Of the whole
world"
The Democrats themselves, he said,
are beginning to see the hopelessness
of the law and are seeking to change
it. One proposal .is a full duty on
dyestuffs, without which capital will
not invest in the business. Another
is an anti-dumping provision and the
president is now urging a tariff COM
mission.
The banking law, Mr.. Cummins
said, has some good in it, but it has
made powerful combinations among
banks lawful, and the authority given
to the federal reserve board is arbi-
trary and "full of menace" The ad-
now, he said, is in q
state of chaotic confusion"
Cropping for More Taxes.
ut needs money and does not
know where to get it," he declared.
1T is blindly cropping around amidst
further stamp taxes, gasoline taxes,
taxes, income taxes and
the like, but lacks the courage to lay
it's hands upon anything. 1t is so
conscious Of the general dissatisfac-
ton <hot ~ fooro IN ooh tho kovnou-