The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1922-06-12
ON SECOND THOUGHT
BY JAY E. HOUSE
CFrom Philadelphia Public Ledger.)

Daily we make casual search for $he
gentleman who appears to be the big
gest sap" in the days news. Our
choice for this date fails upon Justice
William Caffrey, of the municipal
court of New York. In a denunciation
from the bench of women who smoke
Justice Caffrey said: 1.-The health
commissioner says, God bless herr I
say God-something-e her. Down in
my district there is a certain type of
female that parades the street day
and night, smoking, and I denounce
her. 1t is the people who say let EN-
alone who are responsible for 80 per
cent of the looseness that exists in
this country today. Talk about the
drug habit and then about cigarets.
One is as big a drug habit as the
other
A great many women smoke; others
are acquiring the habit. The practice
is rapidly spreading. Doubtless it will
continue to spread. Every sane man
who knows the comfort and consola-
ton there is in tobacco recognizes that
fact. Most of the women who smoke
are good women. Some of those who
voluntarily sit in judgment upon the
practice object to it. Perhaps an
equal number care nothing about it
one way or another. The man who
INDUCES in wholesale denunciation OF
the women who smoke is a sap" The
man who asserts that the cigaret is a
drug in the common acceptance of the
*
norance or mental bias so lament
able that he makes a spectacle of him
self.
Very properly, we think, the ques-
ton as to whether they shall smoke
will be settled byN the women them
selves. If they find enjoyment in the
practice they'll go on with it. If they
don't they won't There is nothing the
men can do about it. In five years
smoking on the part of women either
will have ceased to be a matter of
controversy or women will have
stopped smoking altogether.
decide to do will be satisfactory to
this column.
We have no information bearing
upon the assertion by the Berlin
Zeitung am Mittag that Mr. William
Randolph Hearst was one of Ger
manys few friends during the war.
But it is interesting to know the
Zeitung am Mittag finally has realized
what pretty nearly everybody thought
of Germany.
And, just as matter of curiosity,
we'd like to have the Zeitung tell who
the other two were.
General Horace Porter, who died
dollars, a fine war record and a death
less phrase behind him. 1t was in the
Blaine-Cleveland campaign that Cen
eraI Porter characterized a Mugwunp
as one educated beyond his intellig-
ence. Since then it is roughly esti-
mated that more than five million
persons have fitted the thought to
their own pet diversions.
Nobody knows where General Por-
ter got it, Doubtless it may be found
somewhere in the lucubrations of
Homer or Pliny; but there is no way
of determining where they found the
inspiration for it.
Meanwhile, the word "Mugwump''
has become obsolete and awakens no
echo in the consciousness of a ris-
ing generation. Even to us the mental
picture it conjures is faded and in
distinct. We do recall that the mug |
wumps were the little group of serious
thinkers of the eighties. But they
differed from the present lite group |
of serious thinkers in the respect that |
they were bathed, freshly shaved and |
laundered, and that they observed the |
little proprieties of life to a meticulous !
nicely.
We leave the Interpretation of the |
supreme court decision to ADLER minds !
All we know about it is that the right |
end perquisites of union labor gradu-
courts and common consent and that |
the end probably is not yet. We can |
foresee time when the head brake |
man will deny TO the honest working |
man the privilege of riding a freight |
train on his union card.
1t is not a personal matter; it will I
not affect us. We ride the cushions |
now. Likely we shall always do so. !
But if the idea could be made retro
active it would cut the total of our
mileage nearly in half.
We shall follow the fate of John
Licato, who slew his cellmate because /
the latter wouldn't let him sleep, with |
an interest that is keen and extremely |
personal. And there is also a fish
and yegeta BILE vender who frequents
the alley between Chestnut and Sam
son STREETS in West Philadelphia who
has more at stake in the outcome of
Licato's case than he magines.
| GEORGE Matthew A dams