Grand Forks herald. [volume] (Grand Forks, N.D.) 1916-1955, 1921-08-26

ASve: announcer pleasing feature IS the picture given
us OF the writer's friend, John Pershing, who COM
inanded the American armies, and who stands out
as a great figure, both as a soldier and as a man.
MANAGEMENT OF LEAGUE FINANCES.
An auditing committee was engaged some time
ago to audit the accounts of the Nonpartisan League
and that committee has just made its report. "A
summary OF that report is published in the Fargo
Courier News, the official organ of the League. Two
facts which stand out prominently in the report will
be OF decided interest to farm members.
= One of these is the direct evidence that more
than half of the money received by the League state
headquarters since March IA this year, when the
present committee took chargeuhas been spent III
paying old bills, contracted for under a former man
agement. This fact has been known to those who
have followed the subject at all closely, but it has
not been understood by many of the Individual
members. These members have been urged to con-
tribute money to the state treasury for the purpose,
as 1T was represented to them, of providing a fund
tor meeting the expenses of the recall. campaign.
From their own Official organ, they now have the
that out OF every dollar which they con-
tributed for this purpose, more than fifty cents has
gone tor other purposes. The report says that the
receipts of the committee up to July 9 were $49,-
;955.5l. A little over $4,000 has been paid out, and
OF this something more than $27,0 0 has been paid
tor Old bills, some of them, according to the report,
running from the primary campaign Of last sum
mer. The members of the League, therefore, who
have been contributing their money at this time have
now official confirmation of the information here
tofore published in The Herald, that while they sup
posed they were raising a new fund to meet the ,ex-
'plenses OF a new campaign they were in reality pay
ing the cost of an old campaign, leaving the present
|one to be financed as might happen.
The other especially interesting feature is the
evidence contained in, the report, and in the manner
in which it is handled by the official paper, of some
thing much more than the mere personal disagree
Inent which resulted in the explosion in the Courier
~ eWs Office some weeks ago. 1t will be recalled that
the people then in charge of the Courier News,
ineaded by George Iotten, Jr., who was the business
manager OF the paper, caused to be published in
that paper a scathing arraignment of the majority
the members OF the League state committee, the
three men under fire being Messrs. Liederbach, Kali
dor and Levang; The issue containing this ipublica-
ton was not allowed to bet into general circulation,
the Liederbach faction receiving information of
what was intended, selling the entire issue and de-
,stroy1ng most of it. Enough copies got into circuta-
non, however, to expose the attack made by the
management on the management of the
state offices. Totten and his associates were sum-
1narlly discharged and were threatened with crini-
nal prosecution. Under a threat of such prosecution
they formally withdrew the statements which they
had made, but did not declare those statements to
be untrue of unfounded. In the comment on the pub
llshed report, reference is made to mi"smanagernent
OF the Courier News under the former control, and
prominence is given to the necessity for meeting
the old bills, the evident purpose being to excuse the
present administration and to relieve it from respon-
,sibility for the Strengthened condition Of the paper
and the absence of more vigorous campaign work,
The relations among the individuals connected
with the management of the League and it's several
enterprises are so involved that it is practically i'm
possible to sift them out and catalog or classify
them. In this respect the management today is sim.
liar to the management ever since the League was
organized. There have been so many subsidiary
corporations and SO many wheels within the wheels
that it has been impossible to ascertain with any de-
gree OF accuracy who was who, and what was what
among the various people employed in responsible
positions. The fact is, however, that notwithstand.
ling all this confusion the affairs of the League have
been handled and all its policies dictated by two OF
three men, Mr.. Iownley acting in most cases as su-
tPreme dictator. There have been at times attempt
led revolts from his authority and each individual
associated with him has had his own views and his
own ambitions. Mr.. Lemke is doubtless ambitious
TO be the supreme dictator in North Dakota. He at
one time was president and treasurer Of the Fargo
Courier News. Whether the assertions of misman-
9agenent now being made are intended to reflect on
him personally, or. on Totten, toward whom Lemke
lis reported to have sympathetic leanings, is not en-
tirely5clcar Neither does it matter very much. The
thing that will interest the farmer chiefly is that
their bills have not been paid and that their affairs
have been mismanaged by men whom they trusted
"A little animal has been discovered in South
America which, in the opinion of natura1ists, retains
unchanged the form and characteristics which
marked its ancestors three million years ago. II
has been able 70 do this by keeping along in the
same old mi, never making an experiment, and new
er taking a8chance. If longevity were the prime
consideration this little creature IS a success. But
longevity of that kind is scarcely worth while.
Maxim has propounded a new set Of questions
to cap those Of Henry Ford, One Of them asks why
1t is that as a locomotive approaches, passes, and
then recedes, the note given BY its whistle rises and
then falls. in pitch. The answer given is that this
lis due TO the ratification of gases and the change in
atmospheric pressure, an answer which every high
school boy knows to be wrong. Maxim must have
Ihad one of his new boys write the answers.