The Liberal democrat. [volume] (Liberal, Kan.) 1911-1924, 1919-11-20

problems; and count his popularity
as more important than his plat
form. Popularity is poor test
of character. A man who has Of
Tended no one has fought no one.
Democracy is being done to death
by speech makers. Action is being
smothered in oratory. Discussion is
degenerating into drivel. AS this
is written the country is facing
music, listening for some inspired
note of leadership to which it can
quickstep ahead, but the Silver
Cornet Band keeps right on playing
In the Sweet By and By with
variations, while the very children
in the streets are being taught to
dance the turkey-Trotzky.
If all this talking and spouting
were done to full benches, to an
alerty listening and interested House
and Senate, it might be justified,
but the argument and speechifying
usually goes on to empty seats. 1t
is almost always addressed to men
whose positions were taken, whose
minds were pretty well made up
weeks before. Deliberation on i'm
portant matters is wise, but not
after the possibility of any new light
being thrown on them is over.
Many able and useful men in
natioal and local government are
only half effective by reason of
the system and lack of system.
Legislative bodies have been
steadily degenerating into debating
clubs in which not even the de-
baters are interested. By the time
one of these debauches of speech
making is over the public has usual
ly forgotten what it was all about.
Nothing would so expedite public
business as a rule that every men,
Der of legislative body should sit
through every speech made. No
one has so little federation for a
bore as his fellow bores.
The man who is responsible for
this condition and the only one who
can remedy it is the voter. Here
tofore the hustings have been a
combination Of stage and arena, and
speech something to shout over
rather than something to think over.
The voter has demanded pep, no.
KUN and the emotional appeal in
stead of a straightforward, COM
nonsense discussion of the real
issues-and the demand has created
an overplentiful supply. In re-
Spouse to it we have the boy orators
the silver-tongued spellbinders, the
e-hundred-and- twenty-four-minute
men who can play Home, Sweet
Home on their larynxes and who
operate with a full set of stops
from the fake vox humana to the
bogus thunder, all resulting in the
election of conversationalists and
government by conversation. II
would be we'll worth the voters
while to secure stenographic re-
port of one of these political
speeches and to read it over in
cold blood the morning after-away
from the crowd, the cheers and the
brass band; to strip it of its ad-
jectives, its flag waving, it's sol
stuff and its generalities in order to
/ see what it contains of genuine
constructive, unequivocal horse
sense.
This plague of oratory has moi
only kept many of the best mer
out of politics and befuddled thu
voters, but it has made hot air thu
moving force in many fields be
sides the political one. We pas
over the curse of after-dinner speak
ing and the rapidly growing habi
of comforting" over many things
that we are afraid to look squarely
in the eye and settle with one stiff
punch. Much of this comforting il
simply deferring. We doubt
whether a conference of more thai
a dozen people ever really got
anywhere or decided anything. W.
refer to the growing ascendenc!
of the blatherskite over all classes
of people; to the setting up Of thu
soap box in all classes of society.
If one is an orator one mus
crate; and if one crates one mus
please; and if one is to please ont
must agree with his crowd and de
nounce its adversary; and in de