1896 and 1932
Sirs:
In your issue of Sept. 26, p. 11, reference is made to the campaign of 1896 as comparable in economic outlines with that of the present year.
May I call attention to the omission of any reference to the vigorous campaign in behalf of Palmer & Buckner, nominated as Gold Democrats at a great convention of notably representative Democrats duly chosen by State gatherings? The campaign in their behalf, waged under Congressman William D. Bynuni as Chairman of the National Committee, was prosecuted with vigor.
As one who had active part in that campaign. I have always been confident that the estimate of one million Democratic votes cast for Mr. McKinley, in consequence of that Democratic protest against the soc dollar, was not exaggerated. I have never doubted that the defeat of Mr. Bryan was due to the presentation by Democrats of the incalculable loss to Labor from an unstable and unsound currency. The relation of such a shift of values in wages, as well as savings and investments, was readily appreciated by the industrial masses, so many of whom were continually remitting to their families in Europe. I believe a consideration of the real economic issue presented in 1896, as compared with the present unemployment of more than one-fifth of the entire gainfully employed population of the United States will make clear the absurdity of any such comparison.
May I say further that the only true comparison with 1896 would be Mr. Bryan, then a young Congressman from Nebraska, with no record except extraordinary oratorical power, and a heart warm with sympathy for the farmer suffering from the serious economic injury of the Protective Tariff, asking for a change in the standard dollar from looc to ,soc. nominated unexpectedly without any previous suggestion even during the pre-convention campaign, and Mr. Roosevelt, with 20 years of active experience. . . .
GEORGE FOSTER PEABODV
Saratoga Springs, N. Y.
In 1908. George Foster Peabody voted for Eugene Victor Debs, the Socialist nominee for President, as a protest against Taft's subservience to Big Business and Bryan's oratorical fanaticism. Last week, writing to the New York Times, Mr. Peabody urged anyone who could not vote for Hoover or Roosevelt not to vote for Norman Thomas and his diluted Marxism, but for William Z. Foster, the Communist candidate, ''whose success through a large vote really would shock the body politic." --ED.
Poems Sirs:
Without doubt, this is the poem Mr. Hoover
is looking for (TIME, Oct. 3):
I think that J shall never sec A poem like the G.O.P.; A P. whose hungry mouth is prest Against the Treasury's flowing breast; A P. that gathers Tax each day. And makes us lift our arms to fay; A P. that thinks that we have got A pair of cltiekctis in each pot:
A P. that's Dry in sovereign Maine, But intimately Wet as rain.
Poems are made by fools like me-- I did not make the G.O.P.
Yours in all insincerity.
W. A. BREWER JR.
Berkeley. Calif.
Sirs:
In your edition of Oct. 3 mention is made of a request for a poem to inspire the schoolchildren. May I offer the following to be given to one of America's poets to use as a beginning for such a poem?
"Yon are not dead. You dead of ours
Who turned up your toes while on guard. You're merely resigned To the fate of the times. Content to let things bide." Being one of the army of unemployed, only morbid thoughts prevail and morbidity must be eschewed for a poem of inspiration. I offer the above to any and all.
J. B. RUSSAKOW Bradford, Pa.
Sirs:
I infer that you are on a short poem hunting party (TIME, Oct. 3).
Hence and herewith I add my game to the quarry and trust that you may find it apropos:
FRIENDS
Now all along life's bumpy paths There are so many tears and laughs That in the corners God tucks friends So when y'r going round the bends-- You get a lift--perchance a smile--They're little things--but help--a pile: And God hunts people just like you--- To fill those bends, and guide folks through.
LUCILE STEDMAX
Le Sueur, Minn.
Wads worth's Postmortems
Sirs:
. . . For the information of the editor of your Medicine department. Dr. Norn's' post-mortem record (TIME, Oct. 3), is far eclipsed by that of famed Dr. William S. Wadsworth. coroner's physician of Philadelphia since 1899, and author of the first authoritative work on post-mortems [Postmortem Examinations. Dr. Wadsworth passed his 5,000th post-mortem in 1916, has probably more than doubled it since. Extremely publicity shy, very testy with newspapermen, Dr. Wadsworth has won respect and prestige by planning the most modern morgue in the world (opened 1930), speaking out vigorously against industrial poisoning which he considers the greatest single menace to health in America. In 1929 he denounced American doctors as "know-nothings" in the field of toxicology at a meeting of the Homeopathic Medical Society of t State. His hobby is his carefully guarded museum of murder relics in his office at the Morg (13th & Wood Streets). He believes the field criminal and legal medicine to be 50 years behind the times. He also believes that schools medicine neglect toxicology, especially its indi trial aspect.
Noteworthy to the thousands who know Dr. Wadsworth is his manner of giving testimony. dry, calm, ultra-scientific, never expressing any opinion as to the individuals concerned, and absolutely immovable in the face of any attempts to heckle him. In fact, experienced criminal lawyers here, even the best of them, never cross-examine Dr. Wadsworth. . . . ROGER P. BUTTERFIELD Philadelphia, Pa.
Composite Bull Dog
Sirs: As a citizen of Louisiana and one of your constant readers, I want to formally protest against the very discrediting photograph of our Hon. Senator Huey P. Long, and the story contained in your issue of Oct. 3, under caption "Incredible Kingfish." If you wanted to be fair and honest why didn't you at least give Senator Long a chance to be dramatized correctly and not show him at the worst possible angle as you have in this photograph. You would have the public believe from this photo that Senator Long is a "Wild Blustering Radical";--whereas, we who have fought unselfishly for this Progressive, Dynamic, Constructive, Individualistic, Humanitarian, fighting "Bull Dog," know by "Deeds and Nat Words," that Long is the composite of a Jefferson, Lincoln and Teddy Roosevelt. Witness his fighting for Jefferson's Individualism, Lincoln's Humanitarianism, and Teddy's Aggressive Fighting for the Rights of the People! Yes Sir, that is the Real Huey P. Long; as we ardent enthusiastic supporters of Senator Long feel, and for no other reason than that we know from facts that Long's Wisdom, Courage, and Confidence, has put into Louisiana a leadership that is almost unknown in the South and, that is, an aggressive Fighting Spirit, that we like so much to associate with the true characteristic of a Real American! . . .
Let the Common Masses see and hear this "Crank Long" and after they see him and hear him, you will see them "crank" up the old car and go vote for the sound common sense Demo-cratic principles he has advocated. . .
JULIUS DUPONT
Houma, La.
Sirs:
I was much interested in your article in the issue of Oct. 3, about Louisiana's Senator Huey P. ("Kingfish") Long. Not interested in the accomplishments of the man but in his personality and its bearing on our national government.
I cannot imagine anyone of fine sensibilities and ordinary breeding, reading this article without a feeling of disgust. Your picture of Long and his henchman Allen in the State Capitol showed the crudeness of the man's makeup. A little private cursing is permissible even among governors and their ilk but no gentleman will boast about his power in public, nor will he attempt to embarrass another under such circumstances. Such behavior indicates only crass ignorance.
I have always considered Mr. Roosevelt as a typical American gentleman and it is indeed to be regretted that he must, for political reasons, tolerate such trash as Long among his supporters.
But this is not only aimed at the "Kingfish" but at thousands of other rotten politicians throughout the country who rule us by virtue of their powerful machines, dependent on the "spoils system" for their hold on the voting public. I would be willing to wager that every-one who reads this can mention at least one instance where a political "boss" who makes and breaks public officers and servants, cannot read or write. . . .
PAUL R. PINKHAM
Bridgeport, Conn.
Sirs:
Your Huey Long write-up "Incredible Kingfish" (TIME, Oct. 3) is a mess. No doubt you view with alarm Long's splendid chance to, within next 16 years, sit in the White House.
E. D. SlBLEY Tucson, Ariz.
Sirs:
Is TIME lowering her moral standard? Is TIME losing its sense of decency? Or, is TIME just catering to that lower strata of society who delights only in cheap, vulgar outpourings of our two-by-four-simmering-gas-pot, political braggarts?
In TIME (Oct. 3) you've gone to great lengths in quoting the loquacious Huey Long, whose profanity, and ostentation (more than anything else), has put him in the limelight but, in the sight of your most discriminating readers, is in nowise TIMEworthy.
It should be remembered that TIME, because of its superlative quality (originally), and brevity (always), is read not only by adults, but by a host of college and school students, whom it should strive to help by presenting the highest type of statesmanship, rather than by smearing its pages with the cheap verbosity of indiscreet politicians. McKlNLEY ROBBIXS
High Point, N. C.
Sirs:
I have read with interest your magazine since becoming a subscriber, a splendid periodical for busy folk. But I take serious exception to the article on Kingfish Long. Give us the truth about politics but please don't quote the politician when he becomes sacrilegious. . . .
C. E. BURR
Lakewood, Ohio iiber Alles
Sirs:
. . . And, as a matter of information, please. In the Sept. 12 issue, p. 47 TIME uses the expression, "England iiber Alles," labeling it a Kipling creed, which should mean, England first, or England above all others.
Yet the New York Times has translated the German National Hymn to mean, "Germany United" or as "the nation above its component states." Which is correct? . .
W. B. OTIS Pasadena. Calif.
While the German Empire lasted, its national anthem (sung to the same music as Britain's "God Save the King") was Heil dir im Siege skranz--"Hail thou whose victor's crown safeguards thy realm's re- nown; all hail to thee [i.e. the Kaiser]!" After the Fatherland became a Republic, its Socialist first President, Friedrich Ebert.
decreed as the national anthem: Deutschland, Deutschland liber Alles, liber Alles in der Welt! Of this no hard & fast translation is possible, since Germans themselves have meant several different things by iiber Alles since the words were written in 1841.
At that time no united Germany or reich existed, and the words were unquestionably an appeal to the Germanic peoples to place "[united] Germany above all [other ideals], above all in the World!" After Bismarck achieved the ideal of unity by creating the German Empire, many of the Kaiser's subjects sang the old song in the sense of "Germany, Germany above all [other lands], above all in the World!" Some German pacifists object as strongly to Deutschland, Deutschland iiber Alles as do U. S. pacifists to "the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air .
--ED.
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