ROOSEVELT'S ADMINISTRATION. 1267 LXXX. and which have been fostered and promoted under CHAP. Republican rule, are a menace to beneficial competition and an obstacle to permanent business prosperity." "We approve the measure which passed the United States Senate in 1896, but which a Republican Congress has ever since refused to enact, relating to contempts in Federal courts and providing for trial by jury in cases of indirect contempt." "We favor liberal appropriations for the care and improvement of the waterways of the country." "We favor the election of United States Senators by the direct vote of the people." "We favor the admission of the Territories of Oklahoma and Indian Territory. We also favor the immediate admission of Arizona and New Mexico as separate States." "We demand the extermination of polygamy within the jurisdiction of the United States, and the complete separation of Church and State in political affairs." "We denounce the ship-subsidy bill recently passed by the United States Senate as an iniquitous appropriation of public funds for private purposes. We favor the upbuilding of a merchant marine without new or additional burdens upon the people and without bounties from the public treasury." "We favor liberal trade arrangements with Canada and with peoples of other countries where they can be entered into with benefit to American agriculture, manufactures, mining, or commerce." "We favor the reduction of the army and of army expenditures to the point historically demonstrated to be safe and sufficient." "We deprecate and condemn the Bourbon-like, selfish, and narrow spirit of the recent Republican Convention at Chicago, which sought to enkindle anew the embers of racial and sectional strife, and we appeal from it LXXX. CHAP. to the sober common sense and patriotic spirit of the American people." This refers to that paragraph in the Republican platform which demands that representation in Congress and in the electoral college be proportionally reduced in those States that limit the franchise. 1904. July 4. The Convention nominated Alton Brooks Parker, a judge of the Court of Appeals of the State of New York, for President, and Henry G. Davis, of West Virginia, for Vice-President. Before it adjourned, Judge Parker addressed to it a telegram declaring his belief that the gold standard had been made irrevocable. The People's party offered a platform that called for postal savings banks; abolition of child labor and of convict labor; a shorter work day; the initiative and referendum; prohibition of alien ownership of land; government ownership of railroads and telegraphs; abolition of "government by injunction"; and suppression of trusts and monopolies. Thomas L. Watson, of Georgia, was nominated for President. There were nominations also by the Prohibition party, the Socialist party, and the Social Labor party. The campaign was quiet in comparison with some of recent years. In the latter part of it Judge Parker went into the field as a speaker, in the face of the fact that no Presidential candidate that has done so has been successful in the election. The result was that Roosevelt carried all the States except the solid South, receiving 336 electoral votes to 140 for Parker. The total popular vote was smaller by 460,078 than in 1900, the falling off being almost entirely in the Southern States. Roosevelt received 7,627,632 of the popular vote, and Parker 5,080,054. Roosevelt's majority over all was 1,746,768. The Socialist ticket, headed by Eugene V. Debs, received 391,587 votes; the Prohibi ROOSEVELT'S ADMINISTRATION. 1269 tion, 260,303; the People's party, 114,637; and the CHAP. Social Labor, 33,453. The only Presidential elections that resembled this in the overwhelming nature of the victory were those of Monroe in 1820, Pierce in 1852, and Lincoln in 1864. The reasons for this result that were generally agreed upon were, that no important issue was sharply set forth between the two great parties; that many voters, mindful of the present prosperity of the country, were unwilling to risk a change; and that a large portion of the Democratic party still favored free coinage of silver and were not pleased with the repudiation of this principle by the Convention. LXXX. Dec. President Roosevelt's message, on the opening of 1904. Congress in December, 1904, was received with general favor at home and with marked commendation abroad, as a clear, honest, and temperate discussion of living issues. Perhaps the most important of these, the one that most urgently calls for settlement, is that of the true, final, and amicable relation between capital and labor. If this vital question is capable of a satisfactory settlement, it would seem that our free and enlightened country offers the most promising field in which to seek that solution. The President, in his message, thus discussed it. "In the vast and complicated mechanism of our modern civilized life the dominant note is the note of industrialism; and the relations of capital and labor, and especially of organized capital and organized labor, to each other and to the public at large, come second in importance only to the intimate questions of family life. Our peculiar form of government, with its sharp division of authority between the nation and the several States, has been on the whole far more advantageous to our development than a more strongly centralized government. But it is undoubtedly respon LXXX. CHAP. sible for much of the difficulty of meeting with adequate legislation the new problems presented by the total change in industrial conditions on this continent during the last half century. In actual practice it has proved exceedingly difficult, and in many cases impossible, to get unanimity of wise action among the various States on these subjects. From the very nature of the case, this is especially true of the laws affecting the employment of capital in huge masses. With regard to labor the problem is no less important, but it is simpler. As long as the States retain the primary control of the police power the circumstances must be altogether extreme which require interference by the Federal authorities, whether in the way of safeguarding the rights of labor or in the way of seeing that wrong is not done by unruly persons who shield themselves behind the name of labor. If there is resistance to the Federal courts, interference with the mails or interstate commerce, or molestation of Federal property, or if the State authorities in some crisis which they are unable to face call for help, then the Federal Government may interfere; but though such interference may be caused by a condition of things arising out of trouble connected. with some question of labor, the interference itself simply takes the form of restoring order without regard to the questions which have caused the breach of orderfor to keep order is a primary duty, and in a time of disorder and violence all other questions sink into abeyance until order has been restored. In the District of Columbia and in the Territories the Federal law covers the entire field of government; but the labor question is only acute in populous centres of commerce, manufactures, or mining. Nevertheless, both in the enactment and in the enforcement of law the Federal Government within its restricted sphere should set an example ROOSEVELT'S ADMINISTRATION. 1271 to the State governments, especially in a matter so CHAP. vital as this affecting labor. "I believe that under modern industrial conditions it is often necessary, and even where not necessary it is yet often wise, that there should be organization of labor in order better to secure the rights of the individual wage-worker. All encouragement should be given to any such organization, so long as it is conducted with a due and decent regard for the rights of others. There are in this country some labor unions which have habitually, and other labor unions which have often, been among the most effective agents in working for good citizenship and for uplifting the condition of those whose welfare should be closest to our hearts. But when any labor union seeks improper ends or seeks to achieve proper ends by improper means, all good citizens, and more especially all honorable public servants, must oppose the wrong-doing as resolutely as they would oppose the wrong-doing of any great corporation. Of course, any violence, brutality, or corruption should not for one moment be tolerated. Wage-workers have an entire right to organize, and by all peaceful and honorable means to endeavor to persuade their fellows to join with them in organizations. They have a legal right, which, according to circumstances, may or may not be a moral right, to refuse to work in company with men who decline to join their organizations. They have under no circumstances the right to commit violence upon those, whether capitalists or wage-workers, who refuse to support their organizations, or who side with those with whom they are at odds, for mob rule is intolerable in any form. "There is no objection to employés of the Government forming or belonging to unions, but the Government can neither discriminate for nor discriminate against non-union men who are in its employment or LXXX. |