The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, July 8, 1918, Page 7

i 5 B b 5 ol — & N (‘ja -~ s e B i S & | SR 4. b 5 B L ¥ -~ -8 o =% - o ® -k » i ¢ o (£ b ™ o - Pa? B R A 2 A B> 3 2 ' pe -~ private ownership of railroads and other public utilities. ' plundered and outraged by a wasteful, unfair, ex- - organization; and punish their state master for asking for fair play will see the system of government control of industry vastly ex- tended and even more rigid control placed over industries already directed by the government. " ' : Why has it been necessary for the government to take over control of the great industries and railroads? For years we have been fed on the alleged fact that our industries were the most ef- ficient in the world—that they were perfect in organization. We. were told that nothing could be more efficient and beautifull than t was said these public utilities could not be run merely for SERVICE, and not for PROFIT. Every attempt to remedy industrial abuses was met with the statement it was “interference with constitutional rights and private property’—that the captains of industry and money lords were running these things in the best way possible, Emd t{xatt anxthing else would be “socialism,” if not “anarchy” and ‘revolution.’ But along came the war. Our “perfect” industrial organiza- ' tion became merely a machine for unholy profiteer- ing that was destroying efficiency and bankrupting the nation. The government had to step in and try to put a stop to it, and has succeeded to a large extent. Transportation broke down utterly. Private ownership and operation—of transportation became a ghastly failure in the first real emergency the railroads ever faced. It took.the war to wake the American people up to the fact that we were being cess-profit-taking economic system. And so we have government control, “licensing” and price- fixing for the DURATION OF THE WAR, in cer- tain industries where the abuses were the most apparent and the damage to the nation the greatest. But shall this reform in industry and trans- portation, to make it efficient, be ‘“for the wa# only”? 1Is there not something inherently wrong —something that needs PERMANENT correction —in an economic¢ system that CAN NOT STAND UP UNDER AN EMERGENCY? If our industrial system was organized along right lines, would it not be able to meet an emer- gency? Is a piece of machinery PERFECT if it flies to pieces the first emergency it has to meet? Is an automobile any good IF IT WON’T CLIMB A HILL, even if we can get along with it on level roads? If railroads and industries are capable of robbing and oppressing the people to such an extent in war time that the gov- ernment has to step in, they have that same power in peace times, only their exercise of it is less noticeable. No, after the war we are not going back to the old wasteful, corrupt, robbing system of private ownership of public. utilities. We are not going to let industrial abuses exist in. PEACE times, - any more than in WAR times! It simply took the war to wake us up! A TEMPORARY VICTORY FOR HATE HE driving of the state convention of the Washington Grange ; from Walla Walla in the midst of its sessions was an act of unrestrained hate and gross injustice that can not be ex- cused or defended on any grounds whatsoever.: “The-servile press that has attempted the defense of Walla Walla has a hopeless task. - The 500 or 600 Washington farmers who attended the conven- : tion listened to a discussion of the program of the Nonpartisan league by prominent-Grange mem- bers who were also members of the League, and by others, some ment to organize farmers and to make their power felt politically. State Master Bouck in his annual address deplored the mob attacks which have been made in a few Jocalities in the state on League -workers, and recommended to his hearers careful consideration of the political and - economic re- forms sought by over 200,000 of the League. The Grange re- elected Bouck by a great majority. These are all the facts.. This is the only basis for the foul at- / RS i tack made 'on the Grangers by the newspapers and the anti-farmer interests during the conven- tion. Tt was demanded by these interests that the convention re- pudiate Bouck for his plea for fair play in regard to the League, -and that the convention specifically, by resolution, denounce the League. Very naturally and prog‘erly.'the ‘Grangers indignantly repelled this impudent attempt at dictation from designing enemies ‘of the farmers and from persons of hysterical tendencies misled by the vile and untrue attacks made on a farmers’ organization by _ newspapers that serve the big interests of the state. " The demand that the delegates repudiate another farmers” and a dispassionate hearing for that organization, did not come _from farmers or from members of the Grange. It came from out- ~ ' “to dictate to th to the Grar NOTHING WRONG WITH THIS STEEL STETSON, LIKE T of whom opposed the new move- “just one thing, as expressed in - farmers of America-now members: vrC—————_ _political and economic questions. They attempted to intimidatéi the Grange farmers into accepting their dictation by veiled and. . open threats of violence. Tar and feathers and rotten eggs were :. mentioned in conversations which reached the ears of the delegates, and the newspapers, in editorials and articles, carefully and thor- cughly fanned hysteria and inflamed hate, with the plain intention of ereating a mob that would force the Grange to accept the collar of the anti-farmer interests. Under these circumstances, the blood of the independent Grang- ers boiled with righteous wrath. If they had tamely bowed to this impudent attempt at dictation by outsiders and quailed before the cowardly threats of violence, they would not have been’ Americans —they would not have been worthy descendants of the farmers who stood behind the stone wall on Bunker Hill with Israel Putnam and “waited till they saw the whites of their eyes.” The Grangers calmly went about the business of their annual meeting. The next day they were ejected in the midst of their deliberations from the high school auditorium where they were meeting, and were driven from the city through the closing of all halls and meet- ing places. The forces of hate and prejudice, egged on by the big interests, have temporarily triumphed over the Washington Grange. But a day of reckon- ing is coming. There will be “strict accountability.” THE TREASON OF THE PRESS INNESOTA is now reaping the full benefit of the untrue and damnable charge made by the newspapers of the state that the activities of the organized farmers have been dis- loyal and unpatriotic. These papers have sent broadcast over the nation base insinuations made for political purposes, that the Nonpartisan league is a pro-German, seditious organization. These in- sinuations have been enlarged and developed by repeating until many people throughout the coun- try, especially in the East, believe that there is or- ganized, well financed and open opposition to the war and the gov- ernment in Minnesota. ; . The natural result of this vile campaign by Minnesota’s own newspapers. is that hundreds of thousands of misinformed people outside the state now believe that the state is only half loyal. In the recent primary over 30 counties of the state went for the can- didates indorsed by the Nonpartisan league by big majorities— some of them-giving the farmer ticket a two and three-to-one vote; the League has nominated three-quarters of its candidates for the legislature and, most important of all, has piled up a vote of from 150,000 to 160,000. i If the charges against the League weré true, therefore, Minne- sota would be in a bad way. Out of every 34 votes cast in the entire state, 15 or 16, or practically half, would be sympathizers of the Ger-- man kaiser and interested only in knifing this nation in the back in this crisis, and over 30 counties of the state would be populated by large majorities of German agents. If the charge of disloyalty against the Nonpartisan league were true, then these things would Dbe true. .But everybody knows that Minnesota is deeply patriotic, that its war activities have been second to none and that it is prob- ably freer from disloyalists than most states. : ~ Yet the disreputable press of Minnesota, by its cry of dis- loyalty, made for political pur- poses, has-brought this stigma on. the fair name of the state and these papers can not escape -the responsibility. it Over 50,000 organized farm- ers of Minnesota, polling three times their strength in the recent primary, have been actively sup- porting the government in the war, and these farmers stand for their formal, written platform, so far as the war is concerned, and ‘that is to bring the war to the earliest possible successful conclusion. for America on the battlefield. The monster vote they piled up at the primary was a sentiment in favor of winning the war, just as much as was the vote piled up for the candidates B who opposed them. The only difference was that the candidates “indorsed by the League in addition stood for a definite program of ! political and economic reforms, unrelated to the war, except that they would make the nation more efficient in war-—and the candi- dates opposed to them stood for things as they are. R WHAT REALLY COUNTS ; ized labor will stick to its own candida : 2 Organized farmers will stand by their guns through thick and thin, Organized labor will co-operate with organized farmers THESE things the Minnesota primary dqmonstrated: Oréfifl-_ in politics. Organized farmers can and will co-operate with organ- ized labor. If the League had won everything else and not proved these things it would have been a hollow vicfory. = - tes and interests.’ AT T AR A TS