Omaha daily bee., 1916-12-05
Revising Our Pronunciation.

Russell, Kan. Dec. 2.--To the Editor
of The Bee: In The Bee of today, in
discussing the matter of considera-.
| ton of American and British forms of
the English language you suggest that
better would be an official convocation
Of dictionary makers to consider,
standard forms Of pronunciation and
| spelling"
You may be interested to know that
several agencies have striven along
the lines you so appropriately sug-
| gest Several times in fifteen years
| past, resolutions have been offered in
| congress to secure official recognition
| of world movement in the calling
| Of an international convention to
| consider the possibility, feasibility
and advisability of formulating def
| nitely standard set of characters or
alphabet to represent all sounds used
| in human speech. This has been espe-
cially urged as desirable for use in
| dictionaries of whatever language to
indicate pronunciation, instead of
leaving to each dictionary the formu
| lation of its own code of signs to in
dictate pronunciation. The National
Educational association has also done
much work to a similar end. For
about thirty years the International
| Phonetic association has labored all
| over the world to secure a permanent
| standard of sound-expression for uni
| versal use. BY code of its own, it
has demonstrated how useful such
| an alphabet would be.
No doubt many newspapers would
| gladly assist in improving pronupcia-
ton if that were easy, but at present
| it is too awkward and complicated to
express pronunciation, for newspapers
to attempt it except rarely and halt
| tingly ]. S. RUPPENTHAL.t-
Says Trustworthy; Not Blameworthy
Omaha, Dec. 4.--To the Editor of
| The Bee: Kindly give me space for
a few words in behalf of my good
friend and Sunday school teacher.
critioesd for allowing the marriage of
three couples under age. He has not
asked me to write this perhaps he
needs no defense; but he deserves it,
nevertheless.
The law is not to be lightly regarded,
| to be sure, even though 1t be bad
law: but even if good, if in a certain
case 1t would blast the prospects and
happiness of innocent babies and pos
sibly of all parties concerned. it
should be given a very liberal inter-
probation indeed. OF course there is
no real excuse in logic or morals for
the stigma which society places upon
the ilegitimate" child, but, consider
ing existing conditions, to shield a
| child from the unjust stigma is surely
the part of kindness and good sense
and good citizenship. Mr. Miller has
| given names to three children about
| to be born; he has shielded them in
the way indicated, and perhaps he has
| rescued from moral destruction the
child-parents responsible for their
coming. Mr.. Miller did right; not
wrong, and he ought to be praised
instead of blamed
EDMUND r. BRUMBAUGH.
Negro Disfranchisement in the South
Omaha, Dec. 4.-To the Editor of
The Bee: In discussing the very seri-
| GUS question of disfranchisement in
those southern states that joined in
the attempt to disrupt the union fifty
odd years ago, F. A. Agnew makes
use Of language that leaves no room
for doubt as to his position.
Il would be in favor Of the plan (of
electing presidents by popular vote)
were it not that it would not be fair
expression of the people so long as
SO many states suppress the votes of
many hundreds of thousands of citi-
zens. This is a question that should
have been dealt with many years
ago by the republican party when
the great stalwarts, Wade, Chandler,
ETC., were alive"
1t may not be amiss to mention a
few facts that bear directly upon this
branch of our subject. 1t would be
universally conceded that the provi-
sions embodied in the second section
of the fourteenth amendment to the
national constitution, If enforced
would prove an adequate remedy for
the foul political condition so preva-
lent in the south.
The first section of the fifteenth
amendment would certainly not be less
efficacious for doing away with the
vtiating and destructive practices