The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, March 16, 1916, Page 8

BIGHT - . THE NONPARTISAN LEADER The Nonpart.isan Leader PUBLISHED. WEEKLY—EVERY THURSDAY Official Paper of the Farmers’ Nonpartisan Political League of North Dakota — e T R N e S S e S e O Entered as second-class matter Setptember 3, 1915, at the postoffice at Fargo, North Dakota, under the Act of March 3, 1879. D. C. Coates - - - - - - - - Managing - Editor Advertising rates on application. £ g@. Subscription, cne year, in advance, $1.50; six months, $1.00. Communications intended for the paper should be addressed to the Non- partisan Leader, Box 919, Fargo, North Dakota, and not to any individual. The Leader solicits advertisements of meritorious articles needed by Farmers. uack, fraudulent and irresponsible firms are not knowingly ad- vertised, and we will take it as a favor if any readers will a@ylse us promptly should they have occasion to doubt or question the reliability of any firm which patronizes ‘our advertising columns. 3 Discriminating advertisers recognize the Nonpartisan Leader as the best medium in the state of North Dakota through which to reach the wideawake and up-to-date farmers. o R0 (AUIROES. . - TRt SR e e T I e Ry SR MAKING HIS MEANING PLAIN TEN to the wail of the political shyster: “It don’t cost anything to split your ticket. You don’t have to belong to the League to be nonpartisan.” This is perfectly true, as far as it. goes. -But why stop there? Let us add what the writer of the above quotation thought, but didn’t say, so as to make his meaning perfectly plain. Let’s not hide anything. : Here’s the rest of the politician’s argument: “We politicians don’t care what you farmers do so long as you don’t get together. Just wander around from one party ‘to another, picking a man here and there, but do it each man for himself. Let us take care of the nominations, as we have always done, and we don’t care what you do with your votes, if only you don’t get together. “In union there is strength. We don’t want you to be strong and so we don’t want you united. We party bosses will have our little understandings behind the scenes, but not you farmers. That’s irregular and entirely wrong. j “It’s all right to be nonpartisan. We're familiar with that word and we know how to use it. The way for you farmer voters to be nonpartisan is to wander around as individuals in an aimless sort of way, without any idea where you are going or what you want. Then we can use you to good advantage, “But keep out of this league business. It's dangerous—for us.” ENFORCE THE LAW—WHEN IT'S CONVENIENT HAT happened to Little, the state railroad rate ‘expert, is in striking contrast to the fortunes of the men who were B87H] appointed by Governor Hanna to positions they had no legal right to occupy. Here was a man busy making investigations which might help to free the people of the state from the domination of the rail- roads. He was finding out facts to be used in proceedings to regulate railroad rates and to fix fair rates. The facts he was seeking will have to be found out if the farmers are to engage in the state or cooperative enterprises they are planning.- Public knowledge of the facts he was getting may bring about an over- whelming demand for different rate .schedules. His pay is held up on an opinion from the attorney general that his employment is irregu]ap. It is the merest legal quibble. The emergency board authorized his employment for two years, which have not expired. No state officer is willing to confess having asked the opinion, but the attorney general admits that it was “brought to his attention,” by the attorney for a political organization. 5 No one denies that Little was doing good work and that his employment was necessary, but they propose to cut off his head— with profuse apologies and “beg your pardons.” At the same time high state officials hold office illegally and nobody cheeps, until the Leader gets the facts and exposes them. THE HAIL INSURANCE WASTE HE impossible features of the present state hail insurance system in North Dakota are shown very clearly in a care- ful and comprehensive article in this issue of the Leader. It ought to be read by every farmer and by every other person in the state interested in state enterprises, The state has entered into this hail insurance business as a competitor of the private -insurance companies, but it has done 80 in a way that has tied its own hands and put a premium on rascality. It seeks business through agents who are offered no inducement and are under no compulsion to do the work faithfully or well. Worse than that, they are actually under pressure to be- tray the state in the interest of private insurance cempanies, If the state is to go into the insurance business on a com- ;petitive basis, merely as one of many insurance enterprises, let it do 50 in a business-like way. Every private company realizes that~ : it must spend something for getting business, that it must send- Friday, ‘out good men to the right places at the right time and must make it worth their while to give faithful service, .No matter how‘gqod its proposition the state can’t sell its insurance any other way. It couldn’t sell gold dollars for 90 cents under the system it now uses for selling its hail insurance. : : But the state doesn’t need to compete with the private in- surance companies in offering a service that is a necessity all over the state. It will be just as good businessiand just as sensible to tax uniformly for adequate hail ingurance as it is to tax for pro- tection against criminals. ' The farmers of the state have been ‘paying nearly twice over for their insurance. They are paying - the ébst_; Aof expensive solicitation, an: expense multiplied by the number::of companies operating in the state, and handsome profits for the insurance companies besides. : ) It is sheer folly to go on doing this. There are 1o ysteries about hail insurance, The figures which will show on just.what basis it can be successfully operated are easily available.The ex- perience of the state, of the private companies and of the 'Cangflxan - system is at hand as a guide. The farmers will have a sensible, economical and adequite’ state system of hail insurance just as soon as the politicians who devote their time to the service of private interests are kicked out of the way and the people’s will put into effect through a legis- lature and state officers which really represent them. STAND BY YOUR COLLEGE OLLEGES used to be for “eulture” only. They didn’t take much stock in teaching plain folks how to do their work better and with less effort. They were not planned to help the sons of farmers and working men to better posi- tions and happier lives. The idea was that those who had time and money to go to college could be educated to be gentlemen. The “lower classes” could stay down. That was European\ and aristocratic. ; The American ieda in higher educatién—college training, that is—had its birth way back in ’62, when old Senator Morrill got through congress his bill to establish the “land grant” colleges. These were run by the different states and the government gave ‘grants of federal land to help support them. It was ordered that they were to teach things in a practical way. They were to educate the sons and daughters of the farmer and the workingman. These boys and girls were not to be denied “culture” studies, but along with them they were to get some- thing that would earn them a better living so they would have .time for “culture.” ; The result has been the biggest change in education the world has ever seen. These colleges have put science to work to serve the people and science has done more than millions of slaves could have done. : : . Whenever anything good comes up from below somebody up above tries to grab it. Universities all over the land are adopting . or seeking to adopt the “technical” courses of the land grant col- lekes. It is not only in North Dakota that attempts are being made to rob the people’s school of its best courses, “Let the land grant colleges teach farming; we’ll attend to : the rest,” say the friends of the universities. This is a movement to wreck the land grant colleges, of which the North Dakota Agricultural college is one: It must be fought by the farmers. They should stand by their school and insist that it be allowed to fill the whole field that belongs to it. HANNA’S CHEERFUL CONFESSION OVERNOR Hanna, back from the Ford joyride, sat in his office in Bismarck last week and cheerfully, smilingly, (998 made a confession that would politically damn him for- ever in most any other state than North Dakota, Per- haps it may yet do so here. Who knows? “Yes, I appointed Overson on the state board of control,” says Hanna. “Yes. I knew it was against the law.” “Yes, I appointed Purcell. I know he’s drawing salary in violation of the state con-" ~ stitution.” : Here is his defense: “I thought theé s‘fiiflt"o'f'f,»i;he constitution was being observed.” e T Why did he think this? Because Overson and Purcell each had served. in two legislatures and were Aot eligible to serve in the legislature again. e e N g Is Hanna such a child in politics that. he“can be sincere in a statément like this? If a8 governor ean make these appointments and get away with it he can eontrol every-venal vote in the legis-- lature; he can control every man who hopes to get a fat state job for himself when the legislature is over. That is the very thing the constitutional convention tried to stop—and did forbid. Im Purcell’s case he himself voted to create the position he now fills and helped to fix the salary. S . o - The governor pleads guilty to trampling on the constitution ‘and does it cheerfully, even gaily. ‘ ! 7 b “Others got by with it; why shouldn’t I?” he says. " party bosses. March 81, is the date and Fargo is the place. Have you arranged to come? Be on hand to swat big busin‘es_s and the Fsos »