The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, April 20, 1916, Page 3

933 < In the in.'ér_est of @ square deal for the farmer Nonpartigan Teade Official Paper of fhe Farmers® Nonpartisan Political League of North Dakota A newspaper that dares to print the truth VOL. 2, NO.16 ; FARGO, NORTH DAKOTA, THURSDAY, APRIL 20, 1916 WHOLE NO. 3i. On the High Road to Victory THILE a great clamor of attack on the Nonpartisan League and its officers was being made all over the state last week and thq week before, the two weeks following the state convention and mass meetings at Fargo, another r:nt]:arkable series of events was taking place in various cities of the state. : Along the route of the introductory tour taken by Lynn J. ~ Frazier, the farmer candidate for governor, with speakers from Leag_ue headquarters, citizens of the state turned out in throngs, packing _the halls choser} for the meetings, and rushing to shake hands with the man who is to be their next governor. They cheer- " ed the League speakers to the echo and without exception-they testified their unanimous approval of the program and plans of the Leagut_e. Never was there such a whole-hearted manifestation of the will and purposes, the hopes and the aims of the people of a whole state. Some individuals with their own axes to grind chose to re- gard the Fargo meetings with their tremendous enthusiasm as an accident, something that A Thriving Infant IT MEANS A NEW ERA FOR THE FARMER, A NE ALL THE PEOPLE OF NORTH DAKOTA. fai e “Let attack come,” they cry in unison. “We are ready for it now. We are united. We know our cause, we know our purpose and we know our leaders, AND WE WILL TRIUMPH. WE WILL NORTI DAKOTA FROM MISRUT T N A YR Yol FREE .. WE B OF THE NEW DAY.” NG THIEDAWY g FRAZIER AND THE SQUARE DEAL HE reception the farmers gave their candidate for governor is worth more than a passing mention. The farmers have seen this farmer who is to be their governor, they have heard him talk, they have shaken his hand, they have come to know him—and he suits them. They like him, they have con- fidence in him. They approve his history, his personality and his platform—a square deal for all the people of North Dakota. A SQUARE DEAL FOR THE PEOPLE OF NORTH DA- didn’t really represent the sen- KOTA! Heaven knows and the timent of the state. But if any & farmers know it’s been long of them learned the facts about == enough in coming. It’s been so this series of fourteen meetings 71 % long on the way that the people in the principal cities from one fiiies of the state had begun to doubt end of North Dakota to the 2[Ry that there could be any such other they know better now. N\ Ja thing. (= i A % They know that. the people of the whole state, from Grand Forks to. Williston and from Fargo to Beach, all are aroused, that they ~are filled with a mighty purpose, and that that purpose is to redeem the farmer from oppression and to bring back clean government to North Dakota—honest and business- like government in the interest, not of any special class, but of all the people of the state. ON THE ENEMY’S | OWN GROUND HE ‘most inspiring meet- ing of the whole series in many respects was that at Bismarck, the capital of the state. Here, in a sense. the League speakers, and the man whe in a few months you will know as “Governor Frazier,” met the enemy on his own ground. In the presence of old gang members from the capitol building and from all over the state, in the presence of political dictators come down - from Minneapolis especially for the occasion, in the presence of the adjutants of Big Business and corrupt government Presi- 66 dent Townley, Candidate Fra- zier and the others sounded the - call to political freedom for North Dakota. They spoke at times as if inspired—and they were inspir- ed by the purpose and: the con- fidence showing on the faces of the honest and sturdy farmers HEY will be at you will try to drive _who gathered there to hear them, defying the politicians and glory- ing in the opportunity to show that the farmers at last are awake and at last have reached the point where they can rejoice in having found the effective means to strike away the shackles of oppression. WHAT IT MEANS—VICTORY : EETINGS like these, at the very time when attack was the M strongest, when all the enemies of reform were united against the farmers and their cause as never before, carry their plain lesson. ' < = What does it mean that the farmers are no longer dismayed? What does it mean that they are filled with enthusiasm in the midst of a bitter and insidious attack? What does it mean that "they are defying their age-long political bosses and the enemies of their progress and prosperity? = - It means, that they are united at last. It means that they know their power. It means that they know they can not be stop- eans that they will stick to-theend. = ; IT MEANS VICTORY—VICTORY FINAL AND COMPLETE. %?d if they stay together. It means that they will stay together. e - . V»(‘\ )/’, A Prophecy - That Came True (From the Leader of September 30, 1915) their resources and all their weapons. “ ments, ambush you, trick you and foel you. But the thing they will most try to do is to array you against yourselves by the use of their Controlled Press.” They have heard and listened to the promises of the political parties and they have found them empty. They have found they didn’t mean a square deal for the farmer and the com- mon people of North Dakota, whatever they may have meant for big corporations and for Special Privilege inside and out- side the state. But here is a man—this candidate for governor—who is one of them, who talks square and is square, who has been square all his life, who hasn’t been in politics and knows noth- ing of the double-dealing of poli- ticians, but who has been engag- ed in working for his living and keeping inviolate his pledged word. . THEY ARE WILLING TO TRUST A MAN LIKE THIS. They don’t care if he has not at his tongue’s end the slippery palaver of the professional poli- tician. They like him all the better for that. They like him all the better for the fact that he talks in the plain and simple language of a man who means what he says— A MAN WHO HAS BEEN IN THE HABIT OF MAKING GOOD ON ALL HE SAYS. : The men who met Lynn Frazier on his first tour of the state now are certain that what President Townley said when he introduced their candidate was true—that THIS IS . THE RIGHT MAN FOR GOVERN- OR. HE IS GOING TO BE ELECTED. THE CASE OF THE DEVILS LAKE JOURNAL SINCE various publications in the state have shown that they with-all their power and all They mines under your entrench- can not or will not be fair and honest in their treatment of the Nonpartisan League many subscripers—.n}embers _of : the League and others—have been canceling their subscriptions. -Some, with subscriptions paid several weeks or months in advance, have refused any longer to receive into their homes sheets that will not tell the truth about the League. No one can blame them for that. No one can blame them any more thqn he _could- blame them for rejecting poisoned and adulterated food if their merchant was so dishonest as to try to palm such a product off on them. But there is another way of fighting for fair play, a still more effective way. It is for the farmers to remember their friends. What is the secret of the attacks on the League? Is it that many editors are deliberately unfair and hostile to the farmers of their own choice? .No, it isn’t that. The real secret is that some of these editors -have felt the pressure of Big Business, through the men or the banks to whom they are indebted. = They are fighting the League because their financial masters ordered them to do it. You farmers know just exactly how the thing is worked.