Twin city review. [volume] (Champaign, Ill.) 19??-1929, 1923-06-22
HARDING WRITES ON
VENERABLE AGE OF
OUR CONSTITUTION

By FRANK EVANS.

The chief executive of this glorious
nation was a newspaper man. The
fact is undoubted because he proved
his ability to write impossible Eng
lish as owner of country paper In
his home town. That he remains a
newspaper man is proven by the
slaughter of grammar and the massa-
cre of clarity of diction in presiden-
tial speeches and documents which
make "Gamalieless" as II. l.. Mencken
styles 1t, the wonder and amazement
of an attentive world.
Yet it is strange that any news
paper man should select, as our ex.
traordinary president has done, sub
ject of the venerable age Of the Unit
ed States Constitution as a headline
and a news feature. Yet Warren
Gamaliel "broke into" the headlines
of the daily papers one day recently,
with "rededication" and a discovery
of the Constitution of our founding
fathers" The line of inheritance
having brought forth founding
son."
However, If one delve below the
humor of the incident there is a good
reason for this presidential defense
of the Constitution. This is illustrat-
ed by the irony that two days before
Harding gave his official opinion that
the Preamble of the Constitution "is
the complete and noble statement of
our nations aspirations" Upton Sin
clair was arrested and charged with
criminal syndicalism" in California
for trying to read this Preamble, no.
BILE aspiration and all, on the streets
of San Pedro. This is symbolical,
because In the face of the open shop
onslaught, the Daugherty injunction
the lawlessness Of officers of the law
the indicative Imprisonment of war
opinion prisoners years after the war
the persecution of "reds" for mere
words and opinions as in the Michigan
communist cases, the whole campaign
Of capitalism disguised as patriotism
against organized labor generally In
cynical disregard of every "constitu-
tional right" of either citizen or alien
workers,--in the face of these facts
the opinion Is growing among the
masses that their government is the
chief viOlator of its own laws and that
its Constitution is as dead as the men
WIN WIotc ~. DO IL is only natural
that the president should try to pla-
cate this disconnected opinion, but he
is far from effective by having used
only fine words, when definite rever-
sal of policy is needed.
When the unspeakable Daugherty
who keeps w. j. Burns in power over
decent men while he keeps poets and
philosophers In Leavenworth prison, is
kicked out; when these victims of wal
hysteria are freed; when the infamous
criminal syndicalism" laws are re.
pealed, under cover of which the en-
ploying class Is attacking A. f. of L.
and other union men as well as COM
munists, as in California and in Michi-
gan; when the officials of government
federal, state and local who violate
laws and constitutional guarantees
daily, who rape justice and outrage
decency and fair play as coolly as
they light cigar or beat up a
strker-when these are punished for
their crimes and these wrongs are
adjusted; then, and only then will il
become fitting for our president to
moralize about the Constitution; but
then such moralizing will become un.
necessary. And the Constitution need
not be resurrected as first page news.