Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1923-12-29
FARMERS PETITIONS SENT
TO CONGRESS IN BOOTS,
JOSEPHUS DANIELS SAYS

Frazier, Wheeler and a score of
others both in the senate and in the
house
Two years ago the western farm
ers were told that high tariff on
wheat was the remedy. Now that
they have had it, they see it was
gold brick. They are like the boy
whose mother said:
Johnny, will you have another
waffle?"
Johnny with pains in his stomach
from having eaten too many: NO,
ma am, I don't want them what
I have already ct"
No more tariff pabulum for the
wheat growers. They see it is about
as good a diet for them as sawdust
for their horses.
Petitions in Boots
These progressive legislators from
the west-these petitions in boots
have hard task. They are nearly
all Republicans, or eX-Republicans,
or dissatisfied Republicans who are
sweating blood in Washington. The
Democratic members of the bloc
are not happy either, but they are
III SOMEWHAT DeIl6I SlldotIOll bS
cause they find the bulk OF Dem
Gratis in congress sympathetic, While
the Republican progressives find
their associates are adamant ana
unsympathetic.
There is as much concord of views
between Magnus Johnson and Hen
ry Cabot Lodge as between Elbrldge
Garry and Samuel Gompers, or NICK
Longworth and Representative Mel
son. They simply do not speak the
same language and do not live in the
same hemisphere. They can no
more understand each other than
Skotty Briggs understood the Ian
guage of the eastern parson, the
duck that runs the doXology shop,
a Mark Twain describes, when Scot
ty wanted the parson to conduct
the funeral Of Buck Fanshaw.
When these Republican Progress
sives sincerely resolved THAI some
thing" should be done to end the
drift to confirmed and hopeless peas
antry by the farmers Of the west,
they fond themselves against a
stone wall. They not only found the
White House had been Mellonlzed
and the old guard a modified hos"
fifty, but they felt that in the rules
and organization hurdles had been
erected so high they could see no
way at all for them to get into the
Enclosure where anything could be
obtained. The committees were pack
ed with the old guard, hand in hand
with privilege. The rules of the
house were believed by them to eff
fectually deny them a fair chance
even to get g, hearing or a vote on
the reform measures they were in
cubating.
Breaks Down Barrier
They decided, therefore, that they
must break down the barrier that
denied them a place in the seats Of
the mighty. If committees, as they
believed, were packed against them,
they must change the way commit
tees are named. I'VE must have
change in the rules" they said, land
if we don't get it, although we are
Republicans, we will not permit the
Republican candidate for speaker to
be elected"
That was their ultimatum. And
they held up Gillett's election for
two days. Not until then did the old
guard consider them or make any
concessions. Then Longworth and
Nelson had conference, the result
Of which Gillett was elected. 1t doth
not yet appear whether the Progress
sives got anything worth having by
their course. Some think they were
outmaneuvered and were induced to
go into carp with an undated hook.
They think they will obtain fair rep
resentation and reform of the
rules. Will they? If so, what good
will it do them? The answer to these
questions is as yet in the lap of the
gods.
Will the insurgent Republicans get
a change in rules to suit them? Their
contention is that today the leader
and the committee on rules, packed
by old guard members, have about
the same autocratic power, not quite
so directly, as the speaker formerly
exercised. They are right if the COM
mittee on rules can dominate the
majority as has been done since the
Republicans organized the house in
1919.
,It-yT7rrT not be as easy now for the
8rocre sssives to convince their con-
stituefnts that a change of rules is
the big thing as their predecessors
in 911-13. They want help about
lcr~F prices for their crops. Can they
see any relation between that urgent
need and places on committees and
a change in legislative rules?