Alarums and Excursions

Alarums and Excursions

The progress of a week's campaigning found the combatants one week nearer election.

P: Calvin Coolidge sat tight and held his peace.

P: Charles G. Dawes wended his way into the "radical" Northwest. His first stop was at St. Paul, seat of the American Legion's annual Convention. He announced that he was not there on politics and marched with his Evanston post instead of reviewing the parade. Then he swiftly went home, only to set out again for Sioux Falls, S. D. At Freeport, Ill., he promised, from the back platform, to "spill enough beans to break the bean market." At chilly dawn, at Rock Rapids, Iowa, from the rear platform, he exclaimed: "Here is where I feel at home." The big talk at Sioux Falls was before 8,000 people in the Coliseum. On the stage with the General sat Senator Peter Norbeck and also Governor W. H. McMaster, who is supposed to have radical leanings, but is nominally a Republican and incidentally one of eight candidates for Senator in South Dakota. Mr. Dawes denounced the demagogues, "blatherskites," "peewit politicians" and "political quack doctors" of all parties who made promises to farmers which they could not fulfill, who wanted to undermine the U. S. Constitution. On the way home, he made more speeches, with major stops at Dubuque and Galena.

P: John W. Davis left the Bunceton home of Dr. Arthur W. Nelson, Democratic candidate for Governor of Missouri, after making a speech and attending a giant barbecue. He carried away with him a sore and swollen arm from shaking hands. Next day, at Syracuse, Mo., he recuperated, conferred with Edwin T. Meredith onetime U. S. Secretary of Agriculture, took a long breath and went on to speak at Des Moines. There, before 8,000 auditors, he hammered the Republican tariff, pounded their farm policies and mauled their theories of taxation.

Then once more he set out--for Chicago. He was given a reception at the railroad station, several times as vociferous as that on his arrival in Chicago 16 days earlier. That night, he addressed 12,000 in Dexter Park Pavilion. He winced when his hand was shaken, saying: "I hurt it at the Battle of Bunceton." He denounced Republican corruption, urged his hearers to "leave the poor old sinking wreck [the Republican Party] and pull for the shore," repeated the principles of the Democratic Party, received a tremendous ovation when he came to "personal liberty." "Light wines and beer, John," called a Celtic voice. "I'm glad that there is life in the old words yet," said Mr. Davis, referring to " personal liberty."

He stayed in Chicago to have an X-ray of his arm taken, then went on to Gary where he told 3,500 steel workers: "I don't concede one single state to the Republicans without a battle."

He went farther into Indiana, spoke at South Bend, Fort Wayne. "Keep cool with Coolidge?" he exclaimed. "The President's failure to act on the Tariff Commission's advice to reduce the duty on sugar is costing the American people $145,000 a day. And yet there are gentlemen in this country who believe that the greatest duty a public servant can perform is to keep cool!"

Fort Wayne ended the excursion; the Davis special rushed away, abandoning its halting and countermarching course across the plains, and sped like an arrow for Manhattan and rest.

P: Robert M. LaFollette celebrated by going to Manhattan to make his second major speech of the campaign. His managers had chosen Madison Square Garden--scene of the Democratic deadlock last June and July. The 14,000 seats of the place were filled, and about half of them had been sold for from 550 to $2.20 apiece, bringing an income of about $12,000 from the effort. A number of local Socialist and LaFollette Progressive leaders opened the meeting. Ten minutes of applause were devoted to the Senator. Then he spoke:

"In this campaign, within the corrupt and decadent old parties, we find the political descendants of Hamilton and his Tory followers, who call the American people a "mob," deny that they are masters of their own Government, believe that government exists to protect the few in their encroachments upon the rights of the many, and denounce as destructive Radicals all Progressives who dare assert the democratic doctrines of Jefferson and Lincoln.

"Opposed to these two old parties is the great Progressive movement which within the last few months has taken form in this country. It has taken years of betrayal and a long line of shameful abuses on the part of the Democratic and Republican Parties to convince the people that they must organize for political action outside both old parties in order to find relief from intolerable political and economic conditions.

"The policies and the candidates of the Republican and Democratic Parties are as like as two peas in a pod, and for that reason I shall hereafter refer to them in this address as 'our opponents.' "

He referred to the proposal that Congress should have the right to override the Supreme Court:

"'We favor submitting to the people for their considerate judgment a constitutional amendment providing that Congress may by reenacting a measure make it effective over a judicial veto.'

"The only question raised in this campaign on this subject, is whether the people shall have the right to have such a constitutional amendment as we propose submitted to them for their action. If they do not desire such an amendment, then of course they will vote against it when it is submitted and that will end the matter."

His speech grew lengthy and when he began to cite cases in which he believed the Supreme Court had abused its powers, people began to leave the Garden in numbers. Nevertheless, he had succeeded in getting some 7,000 people to pay to hear him.

P: Burton K. Wheeler campaigned in Pennsylvania, drew a Pittsburgh audience of 2,000 (at 50-c- each). Speaking of one of Pittsburgh's native sons, said he: "I need scarcely tell you that Mr. Mellon is of the class which regards property as sacred and feels that the bigger the property the more sacred it is. Raised in a bank, big finance has been his ideal. It has been his religion and Wall Street his mother church."

Then Mr. Wheeler went to Chicago, made a series of speeches, spoke even more harshly of General Dawes.

A couple of days later, at a Steuben Day celebration of the Steuben Society of America, Mr. LaFollette addressed some 18,000 German-Americans at the Yankee (baseball) Stadium in New York. He said that Carl Schurz, one-time Secretary of the Interior, was an Independent and a Progressive, and that he was typical of the greatness of German-Americans today. He said that German-Americans had done great things for the Government. Seats were sold at from 50-c- to $2.00, programs for 25-c-, the speech for 10-c-, and a collection was taken for the party campaign sheet. Afterward, several turnvereins exhibited gymnastics and German singing societies sang.