The Bottineau courant. (Bottineau, Bottineau County, N.D.) 1895-1929, 1920-09-02
OUR COLONIAL POLICY

| LTdIlSpOICdClOn.
OUR COLONIAL POLICY
Franklin D. Roosevelt, now assist
ant secretary of the navy and candi-
date for the vice presidency, has been
Dragging about writing the constitu
tiono for Haiti in his campaign
speeches. A first class politician
would have known better than to
make such a statement, because the
American citizen as a rule believes
that the only persons who should
make constitution. for people are
those same people. But Roosevelt
does not do more than hint at the
actual truth of our government of
small countries we have recently
seized.
If he had told the whole truth,
he would have told the public
that he not only wrote the constitu-
tion for Haiti but adopted it and is
enforcing it for them. San Domingo,
Guatemala and Guam, as we'll as
Haiti, are absolutely ruled by naval
/ officers, and the local people who
have anything whatever to say about
government are those willing to say
"yes" to anything which pleases the
said naval officers. The great island
of Porto Rico, with it's more than
100000 people, is ruled by broken
down Kentucky politician. This kind
of colonial rule, which harks back to
the earliest days of English and
Spanish colonization of America, has
as it's chief motive the seizure of
sugar and fruit lands and of public
utilities by great American corpora
tions, and the avoidance of labor
troubles for these same corporations
through the use of outside military
force.
Since 1915 large sugar syndi-
Gates and the American Fruit COM
pany have been acquiring the lands
of the small farmers throughout the
West Indies, including Cuba, because
governments maintained by Ameri-
can military power have made it
practically impossible for the small
farmers to continue as independent
producers. During the last year
these sugar interests have repaid the
American people for assisting in
their robbery of the West Indies with
80 and 35-cent SUGAR
And these naval governors do not
neglect acts of petty tyranny. His
democratic majesty in Guam has for
hidden whistling in public. A native
of San Domingo who wrote patriotic
verses is under sentence of death.
A "FRIEND" OF LABOR
How little the fine words for labor
uttered by politicians actually mean
is indicated by the retention of Will
bur W. Marsh, president of the Iowa
Dairy. Separator company, Waterloo,
Iowa, as treasurer of the Democratic
party. Marsh is a notorious labor
hater and has fought labor organiza-
ton by all possible means, even to
the extent of disregarding the laws
of his own state. At the present
time his factory is engaged in an
effort to break up the machinists'
union, and Frank M. Shelley of the
Iowa District International Associa-
ton Of Machinists is touring the
country to put the local facts before
labor bodies.
In the Democratic Manual in 1918,
page 45, we find: "The right of
workers to organize into trade unions
and to bargain collectively through
their chosen representatives is rec
ognized and affirmed. This right
shall not be denied, abridged or in
terfered with in any manner what
soever." Again on page s of book
let issued by the national Demo-
cratic committee, entitled progress
of Labor in Wilson Administration
and Democratic Congress" we find:
"The right Of laboring men to form
unions should be upheld by govern
nent authorities" News reports Of
the San Francisco convention, on the
other hand, told us, "The reelection
Of Wilbur Marsh Of Iowa called for
ringing applause from the convention
floor. Marsh is deservedly popular =
i Marsh, it must be said, has es his
primary motive political career;
manufacturing is only a side issue to
provide pin money for the family. It
would seem as II organized labor
should take care that he does not
smite labor with one hand while he