San Antonio light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1911-1993, 1924-03-02
Candidate of Land Party Is
First Nominee in the Field
William ]. Wallace For
President Away to Flying
Start While Other Parties
Still Debate on Candi-
By ALEXANDER HERMAN.

Newark, n. j.. March 2.-The first
presidential nominee for the 1924
race has stolen n lap on the field.
He is William ]. Wallace, named
as the standard bearer of the Com
monwealth Land Party, formerly the
Single Tax Party. His running mate
is j. C. Lincoln of Cleveland, selected
for the vice presidency without any
opposition.
At the party's national convention,
in the Engineering Societies building
in New York, delegates from IA
states, among them Alabama, Cali
fornia, Connecticut, Delaware, Mary
land, Massachusetts,, New Jersey,
New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Okla
homa, and Rhode Island-named
their candidates, drew up their plat
form, and started right out after
votes while the members Of the
major parties are still juggling
around for delegates to the nominat-
ing conventions.
They expect to campaign In 30
states and poll 100000 votes.
Which is some improvement over
the several hundred votes Tailed in
1912, when Wallace ran for the first
time.
Made Debut in 1912.
1t was his debut in politics, and
his party's entry into the national
field
ave called it the Land Value
Party then," he recounts smiling,
land had less than Is workers in the
group. We couldn't get our names
printed on the ballots. So we wrote
them in ourselves.
"But this year it will be different. {"
Wallace is kindly man, Ga years
old, who is manufacturer of electric
motors, when he isn't studying up on
the land question.
He was born on the West Side of
New York and started work when he
was Is.
Il never gave politics much
thought" he went on. Il was too
busy making n living. But the panic
OF '73, unemployment and poverty
with its consequences, set me think
ing about the precariousness of our
situation.
Il wanted to know what brought
such conditions about. l wanted to
find out how they could be avoided.
But ] couldn't find out what ! was
looking for. My teacher at night
school couldn't help me. The books
L read didn't enlighten me, until one
day / ran across Henry Georges
Progress and Poverty
81 found the answer. 1t lay in the
solution of our land problem.
From 1888, when l first read the
book, until 1910 | did nothing politi-
cally. ! voted, of course. casting my
ballots for those candidates who /
thought to be best.
Psrty Is Founded.
"But in 1910 a group headed by
Joseph L. Darling, a former assistant
district attorney of New York, got
together at conference and founded
the Land Value Tax Party.
81 was named its candidate in the
1912 election.
"Darling's death in 1916 put n
icrimp to the party's activities in the
next presidential campaign.
But in 1920 we put up candidates
in sixteen states. The name of the
party had been changed to the Single
Fax Party. and Robert c. Maeauley
of Philadelphia was named the presi-
Dental candidate.
1--WE polled some $4,000 votes.
"But we are going to get many,
many more this year."
The naLle was changed again.
"For the Commonwealth Land
Party" says Wallace, "better ex-
plains our idea than the Single Tax.
This party would free the land of
the country from private ownership,
and by renting it lift the burden of
taxation from the people.
"All evils arising out of our unjust
economic conditions" says its plat
form, "such as business depressions.
hard times, unemployment, poverty
and the fear of poverty, bad housing
conditions and the crime, vice and
diseases due to these conditions are
the result of the private ownership
of the earth and the appropriation of
its products by the few.
"War and strife, now and always
due to- economic maladjustment,
would disappear with the elimination
of private ownership of land, which
has ever been the basis and the cause
of all the worlds economic troubles. !"