South Bend news-times. (South Bend, Ind.) 1913-1938, 1916-11-02
PROGRESSIVE Tells
Why He Supports
Woodrow Wilson
BY ALVIN f. EWING.

I'm 1910.
To the strict partisan. there is no
greater object of contempt than the
man who changes his party afiha-
tions. I know, because I have been
both the protective and the objective
Of such contempt
/ admire stability. but / hate a
rut; revere loyalty, but I detest the
riYeted collar. / respect leadership,
but it must not put me in the
shackles. i cOncede the propriety Of
! organized authority, but l refuse TO
be sold by il in the slave market.
Such conviction, disease. or atti-
t1de. whichever you wish TO call il,
made it very easy for me 70 enlist
under the Roosevelt banner of 1912.
l hailed him as a hero. l credited
his conduct as self-sacrificial, and his
motive unselhsh. IL was as comfort
ing as a Psalm of David to read from
Beveridge's great speech in Chicago:
Knowing the aprice we must
/ pay, the sacrifice We must make,
the burdens we must carry. the
assaults we must endure-know-
ing full we'll the cost-yet we en-
list, and We enlist for the war,
for we know the justice of our
cause, and we know, too, its GER
tain triumph"
Knocked Into n Cooked Hat
This prophetic vision was knocked
into cooked hat in just exactly four
| years. The eye OF the head and the
eye Of the heart. rightly focused. per-
ceive ideals Roosevelt treasured US
when ne said:
Il will never abandon the
principles to which we progress
sives have pledged ourselves and
1 will never abandon the men
and women who drew around
me TO battle for those principles.
They and / stand with our faces
! toward the morning; we will
never be sundered from one an
other, and we will never yield
the ground we have taken or
finch from the fight to which
we are pledged"
We prOgressives accepted these
words at their par value. Yet we
find the men who gave expression to
them accepting the protection of the
enemys trenches today. Yes, sir, the
trenches OF the very enemy they con-
demned 10 death in 1912.
AS late as Sept so, 1914, Colonel
Roosevelt said at Bay City. Mich:
IF so years hence the pro-
gressive party has fallen under
! the control of men like Mr.
Barnes, Mr.. Penrose, Mr.. Smoot,
the individuals who stole the
convention here two years ago.
and their like, and my children
and grandchildren do not leave
IL. 1 will turn over in my grave"
Evidently the colonel did not like
the looks of his political offspring
at the age Of four years so he had
| il suffocated in order that his chill
dren and grand children" might be
saved the knowledge of the brat's
I parentage, and he, permitted 10 lie.
unturned in his grave.
The COloncl's sincerity at Issue
Who could have imagined that
within two years Colonel Roosevelt
would be occupying the same dugout
with the very felons whom he &C
| in the day time of the republican
convention in 1912?
The colonels sincerity is at issue.
For four years the republicans at
tackled denounced and hated Roose-
welt. while we defended and lauded.
both sides carried their point For
| four months the progressives have
/ been willing TO concede that the
colonel is just as insincere and un-
/ trustworthy as the republicans paint
ed him during the preceding four
years. and the republicans pretend
to hail him as the hero and the man
of the hour" which the progreSsives
formerly claimed for him.
incidentally, both sides intuitively
distrust him, because his actions do
not square with his words. Not since
he entered public life. until now
| has il been possible for Colonel
| Roosevelt TO make his appearance
/ before a throng of people without
| being cheered TO the echo.
That Battle Greek ThrOng.
I am told by one personally pres
ent at the recent Battle Creek rally
\ lndN. dlluOuSu a ldIEt NUMBER Oh
people congregated at the depot
when his train pulled in, there was
not so much as a hand of applause
/ when he expectantly made his ap-
pearance upon the platform. And
the so. persons summoned on red
I posters 10 meet the colonel at cattle
! Creek. dwindled. as a matter Of UNI
published fact, TO an understood cir
! Gus crowd.
How have the mighty fallen, But
what else could be expected? The
I following words of the colonel which
were cheered TO the echo at Bay
City, are still ringing in our ears
The standpat delegates rep
| resented nothing whatever but
! successful swindling, successful
theft. that Is all. And these peo-
pie ask US TO come together with
them. We will come together
] with them in exactly the sense
/ that policeman comes together
with a burglar"
/ I have been seriously bordering Of
/ late, which OF the two personages
Colonel Roosevelt conceived himself
I 10 be. In the light Of subsequent
! events. having seen the republican