The Irish standard., 1919-01-25
is NORTH DAKOTA THE ONLY STATE
I'M STEP

In nearly every part of the world democracy
seems to be gaining ground except in Portugal and
North Dakota. In these two widely separated dis
tricts there to exist tendency to revert to
the monarchia or imperial systems of government.
Even the bolsheviki profess to aim to be govern
ent of the people, for the people and by the peo-
pie, but they restrict the meaning of the people"
to exclude persons who are guilty of owning
piece OF property having few kopecks saved up
tor rainy day, or having learned to read and write
10 be of the people in their acceptaton of the
term one must be simon-pure proletariat, free of
any monetary or property membranes, and more
or less of manual worker, and strictly illiterate
If they could be persuaded that all the people must
be dealt with fairly in the regime of government
their schemes of reform and reorganization of So
ciety might be entitled to serious considera-
tlon Nevertheless may be said of them that they
are cropping though in the dark toward those prr-
ciples of democratic administration which in the
future must lie at the foundation of all civilized GOV
ernments.
But with Kaiser Towney in the saddle in North
Dakota the trend OF things is distinctly otherwise
he Nonpartisan leader presides at Bismarck
with genuine Bismarckian methods He has matt
gurated in the Flickerta state series of reforms
that are we'll calculated to make the adventurous
firm OF Lenine and Trotsky green with envy" The
newspapers to be hog-tied by designating Off
clal organs in the several counties the exclusive
recipients of public business with the purpose of
starving out the independent publications and avoid
ing their criticism State and school funds to the
extent of $SOOOOOO0, are to be put under the sole
control of the Nonpartisan boss and his kitchen
cabinet, and may be diverted to any enterprise or
adventure they may take notion to plunge into.
Statutes have been already framed in anticipation
OF these financial orgies. They as broad as a
church door and as deep we'll; and their MALE
ability ductility and elasticity are guaranteed
against all legal tests nasmuch as the same powers
that enacted them also control their interpreter
ton and application in the courts.
Cooperative stores, mills factories, creameries,
packing plants, elevators and banking institutions
to be launched into business forthwith as "eer-
gency" measures, thus obviating the danger of a
referendum, that quondam Wanted panacea for all
the evils of legislation With one stroke of his all
powerful pen designating all the newfangled legis-
latlon as emergency" measures the impefious
Townley has nullfed the spirit and intent of the
referendum law thus relieving the electorate of the
state of the burden of thinking and judging of the
important issues involved.
Neither individual corporate bankruptcy has
any terrors for the great flax nancier He has faced
the nqusiton of his creditors so often that he
has become an expert in this line of procedure His
chief that the farmers of the state shall
ego along" cheerfully in paying their yearly tribute
of dues into the Nonpartisan treasury and that the
pay checks of the officials shall be Forthcoming
with due regularity and sufficiency AS long as this
procedure continues to yield the requisite revenues
for the maintenance of the organization there will
be no deficiency in the Wa1lingford financial prof.
ects and adventures supplied to the farmers in re-
turn for their credulity and coin.
And If bankruptcy happens to the state, why
Townley, like Mr.. Britling twill see it through
Bankruptcy is Towney's speciality He evidently
assumes that the great majority of the people Of
North Dakota of that class of which one is said
to be born every minute.