A REVIEW of president wilson's administration by hannis Taylor, a life-long Democrat, who assails mr. wilson as an extreme federalist; as a defamer of jefferson; as an abnormally ambitious and dangerous revolutionist with monarchical tendencies, who is striving to build up in this country, in his own selfish interest, a political dictatorship entirely unfettered by all "promises and cove- nants" made by him in party platforms. Cicero said: "The foundation of justice is good faith; that is to say, a true and unswerving adherence to promises and covenants." Junius said: "As for Mr. Wedderburn {Lord Loughborough) there is something about him even treachery cannot trust." An old English chronicler, in speaking of King John, said: "He is a King whom no oaths can bind." X CONTENTS. &1U PAGE. THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY SUPERSEDED BY A POLITICAL DICTATORSHIP 1 THE NEW TYRANNY 2 MR. WILSON'S CONFESSION OF POLITICAL FAITH, IN WHICH HE CALLS THE PRESIDENCY "THE REAL THRONE OF ADMINISTRATION" 3 MR. WILSON'S LD3EL ON THE CHARACTER OF JEFFERSON . 5 MR. WILSON'S REVIVAL OF "THE KING'S SPEECH," AND HIS MARKED AVERSION TO PERSONAL CONTACT WITH THE PEOPLE 6 "COURT FAVORITES" INTRODUCED BY MR. WILSON INTO AMERICAN POLITICS 7 MR. WILSON'S FLAGRANT BREACH OF HIS SOLEMN COVE- NANT NOT TO BE A CANDIDATE TO SUCCEED HIMSELF . 1 MR. WHSON'S UNFAITHFUL CONDUCT A WARNING TO THE AMERICAN PEOPLE TO LIMIT THE PRESIDENT TO A SINGLE TERM 14 MR. WDLSON'S UTTER FAILURE TO UPHOLD OUR DIGNITY AS THE GREATEST OF THE NEUTRAL NATIONS . . 18 THE MEXICAN HORROR 21 PRESIDENT CLEVELAND AND PRESIDENT WILSON CON- TRASTED 23 MR. CLEVELAND'S ESTIMATE OF MR. WILSON ... 25 THE THINGS MR. WILSON STANDS FOR 26 Washington, D. C, September 5, igi6. To the National Business Men's Republican Committee, New York City. -Jo C5^ Gentlemen : I have received your letters in which you say : " May we have your name, endorsement, and moral support on committee for the election of Charles E. Hughes for Presi- dent ? * * * We should be very glad indeed to have you make your statement through this committee at the right time." Knowing Mr. Hughes to be a wise and progres- sive statesman, an exceptionally able jurist, a man of affairs, a fearless patriot with the courage of his convic- tion, I cannot doubt his ability to deal successfully with the mighty problems with which the world in general and our country in particular are now confronted. At this critical moment in our history, with the war drums beating in every quarter, certainly it will be a blessing to the country for the administration of a drifting and irreso- lute opportunist to be succeeded by that of a resolute statesman with positive convictions, whose firmness and moral dignity will be the best security for peace. But, admitting all that to be true, have I, a life- long Democrat who never voted a Republican ticket nor supported a Re- publican candidate, the right to support Mr. Hughes? THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY SUPERSEDED BY A POLITICAL DICTATORSHIP. I was invited to preside and did preside over a great political meeting held at Washington to ratify the first nomination of Mr. Wilson; I subscribed to his campaign fund; I gave him my cordial support in every way. In the only personal letter I ever addressed to him I told him I had nothing whatever to ask of him, a promise to which I have faithfully adhered. Living as I do at the seat of Government, with a large personal acquaintance with the leaders of both political parties, I have had exceptional opportunities to study at close range every act of Mr. Wilson's administration, foreign and domestic. I have watched all the currents and counter-currents that have influenced that incoherent mass of inconsistent acts which he is pleased to call his policy. Thus, against my will and political associations, I have been forced to conclude that no man who ever filled the Presidential office was so opposed to the basic principles for which the Democratic party stands as Mr. Wilson ; that he is at heart a typical and extreme Federalist, intent upon the abnormal exaltation of the powers of the Executive and the humi- liation of Congress. To use an epithet he once employed in stigmatizing Jefferson, Mr. Wilson is "a philosophical radical," intent upon transforming the Presidency of the United States into a Political Dictatorship with himself as its head. THE NEW TYRANNY. I have seen Mr. Wilson trample under foot, apparently without remorse, the party platform upon which he was elected, and which he pledged his sacred honor to the people faithfully to carry out. I was near at hand when he drafted a second party platform which he sent to St. Louis from the White House by one of his agents, with an imperious demand that it be accepted by the Convention as its act and deed. If he should be re-elected he will claim of course the right to repudiate, in whole or in part, that second party platform, which is, in a very peculiar sense, the work of his own hands. Thus the old Demo- cratic party to which I have belonged all my life, and which has heretofore expressed its corporate will through rep- resentatives chosen from its ranks, has been for the moment abolished or at least superseded by a Political Dictatorship, created by an arrogant usurper, who has demonstrated his utter inability to play the pretentious role he has prepared for himself. I cannot, without a sacrifice of my self-respect, consent to support this new and pre-eminently undemocratic system of political tyranny which would be a real menace to the country and the Constitution, were it not for the feebleness and inefficiency of its creator. The only thing that has ever justified dictatorships in the past has been the pre-eminent ability and authority, in moments of supreme peril, of the dictator himself, qualities whose conspicuous absence has rendered Mr. Wilson's unprecedented performances really gro- tesque. If our Democratic system of Government is to be overthrown, let it be done by a masterful man, not by one so timid, so silly as to compromise us in the eyes of the whole world by the false and ridiculous assertion that we are "too proud to fight." MR. WILSON'S CONFESSION OF POLITICAL FAITH, IN WHICH HE CALLS THE PRESIDENCY "THE REAL THRONE OF ADMIN- ISTRATION." Mr. Wilson's bitterest enemy will not dare to assert that, in his efforts to exalt abnormally the powers of the Presidency and to humiliate Congress, he is at all incon- sistent or unfaithful to the political creed which he pro- claimed at the beginning of his career as a public man. In his well-known work entitled "Congressional Govern- ment," 5th ed., his thesis is that the Presidency was in an ideal state under the Federalist party, when Congress was opened with the spectacle of a cavalcade and Presi- dential oration ("a King's Speech" of which he is so fond), followed by legislative responses and precessions in imi- tation of the ancient pageantry of the British Crown con- ducted by the gentleman usher of the Black Rod at West- minster. In those good old days Mr. Wilson says: "He [the President] was constituted one of the three great co-ordinate branches of the Government; his functions were made of the highest dignity ; his privileges many and substantial * * * and there can be little doubt that, had the presidential chair always been filled by men of commanding character, of acknowledged ability and of thorough political training, it would have continued to be a seat of the highest authority and consideration, the true center of the Federal structure, the real throne of administration, and the frequent source of politics" (p. 41). But, according to Mr. Wilson's view, the evil days came with the development and assertion of the power of the people as vested in Congress — to use his own words, the "prestige" of the Presidency was "belittled by growth of Congressional power" (p. 341). Again to use his own words: "That high office [the Presidency] has fallen from its first estate of dignity because its power has waned; and its power has waned because the power of Congress has become predominant" (p. 43). Mr. Wilson's persistent and sincere purpose, since he was clothed by Democratic votes with the executive power, has been to put in force his Federalist theory of government as ex- pounded in his first book, with "the King's Speech" in the center of the stage, and with Congress prostrate at the feet of the presidential office. Some faithful artist should give to the American people a graphic picture of our so-called Democratic President as he appears when, wrapped in the solitude of his monarchical tendencies, he delivers his "King's Speech," from "the real throne of administration" to an awe-stricken Congress! It is this new condition of things which Mr. Wilson is now asking the American people to make permanent. MR. WILSON'S LIBEL ON THE CHARACTER OF JEFFERSON. As all the world knows, Jefferson assumed the Presi- dency firmly resolved to abolish, at once and forever, "the King's Speech" to Congress, with all the other mon- archical flummery which Mr. Wilson so adores. Jeffer- son's now obsolete theory was that "the real throne of Administration" should be, not in the White House, but in Congress where the voice of the people could be heard. He therefore informed both houses in writing on December 8, 1801, that "the King's Speech" would henceforth be superseded by the Presidential Message, which continued, as a purely American institution, for more than a century until abolished by Mr. Wilson in favor of the monarchical usage of Federalist times. When his habitual bitterness towards all who oppose him or differ with him is taken into account, can we wonder at the cynical and contemptuous spirit in which he claims that Jefferson was merely a poseur, a deliberately insincere demagogue, an aristocrat masquerading in the garb of a leader of the common people? In his History of the American People, Vol. IV, pp. 3 and 4, Mr. Wilson says: "Mr. Jefferson, an aristo- crat and yet a philosophical radical, deliberately practised the arts of the politician and exhibited oftentimes the sort of insincerity which subtle natures yield to without loss of essential integrity. General Jackson was incapable of arts or deceptions of any kind. He was, in fact, what his par- tisans loved to call him, a man of the people, of the common people. Mr. Jefferson was only a patron of the people: appealed to the rank and file, believed in them, but shared neither their tastes nor their passions." There is a crystal lake in the high Sierras so fathomless that it reflects only the image of the traveler who looks into its depths. And so, when the autocrat, with monarchical tendencies, who now misrepresents the party Jefferson founded, looks into that fathomless mind he can not comprehend, he sees only his own image, which he has unconsciously painted. What Mr. Wilson has said so viciously and so unnecessarily of the dead Jefferson, whose shoes he is now attempting to fill, is simply a precious bit of self-revelation. The "aristocrat," the "philosophical radical," who "deliber- ately practices the arts of the politician" is now the Presi- dent of the United States, seeking re-election in defiance of his solemn pledge not to be a candidate to succeed himself. MR. WILSON'S REVIVAL OF "THE KING'S SPEECH," AND HIS MARKED AVERSION TO PERSONAL CONTACT WITH THE PEOPLE. If specific proof is demanded of that assertion, it is to be found in Mr. Wilson's sudden and arbitrary abolition of the Inaugural Ball and of the New Year's receptions which, since the foundation of the Government, have been the sacramental ties binding the Presidency to the rank and file of the people. Even the cold and exclusive Adamses were willing to mingle with the people at inau- gural balls and New Year's receptions. But Mr. Wilson cannot go that far. He has become so proud, so pre- tentious, so monarchical in his habits of life, that he con- siders it necessary, even in the summer season, to set up "the real throne of administration" in the great palace of Shadow Lawn, the vulgar and ostentatious creation of a multi-millionaire. Since Mr. Wilson's abrupt and ruthless abolition of the Inaugural Ball and New Year's receptions — institu- tions as old as the Government itself — the uninvited masses of the people have been deprived of the privilege of approaching, on such occasions, "the real throne of administration." Those who enter the White House, when entertainments are given, must be specially invited by a gilded and embossed card, delivered, not through the mails, but by Presidential messengers. And even when the President delivers "the King's Speech" in the hall of the House of Representatives, the general public is severely excluded. No one can go even to the galleries without a special card of admission. We may confidently expect that, after the inauguration of the new President on the 4th of March next, he will announce at once, as Jefferson did, the abolition of "the King's Speech," with all the mon- archical flummery attending it; and the revival of the Inaugural Ball and New Year's receptions, which had become cherished parts of our national life. "COURT FAVORITES" INTRODUCED BY MR. WILSON INTO AMERICAN POLITICS. After the abolition of the two Democratic institutions just mentioned, Mr. Wilson resolved to fill the vacuum not only by the revival of "the King's Speech" but by the introduction into American politics of "Court Favorites," an institution imported into England from Scotland by James I, a monarch often spoken of as the intellectual and political progenitor of the dictator under whom we now live. Following in the path of his great progenitor, Mr. Wilson drove from his cabinet, at a time when they were most needed by the country, the two dominating minds that refused to bow to his insolent and self-seeking dictatorship. Thus the way was cleared for the com- pletion of that system of political absolutism under which our Government is now carried on by a group of obscure and inefficient individuals — Mr. Wilson's per- sonal creations, "dependent ministers," who are "mere agents of the King's will." At the head of "the Court Favorites" thus introduced by Mr. Wilson into American politics stands his Duke of Buckingham, Colonel Edward Makepeace House, con- nected only through his middle name with the august office of Ambassador of Ambassadors, with which he could 8 not possibly have been associated through even the remotest knowledge of diplomacy or international law. We know that Carr and Villiers were elevated to supreme power by James I by reason of their personal beauty, but, as Colonel House does not seem to possess that quality, the source of the unbounded influence of this obscure and untrained person over the President of the United States is a sealed mystery which it seems must remain forever unbroken. At a critical time in our diplomatic history, when an unselfish, patriotic and unfettered President would have summoned Mr. Olney, Mr. Choate, Mr. John Bassett Moore, Senator O'Gorman, or Senator Hoke Smith, Mr. Wilson turned to an obscure personal favorite, unknow to the people and never trusted by them, who is about as well adapted to the delicate functions of high diplomacy as a cobbler to the work of a mathematical astronomer. No great office is ever rilled in the cabinet, on the bench, or elsewhere, without loud suggestions of the dominating influence of Colonel House; and when the office of Secretary of State was made vacant by the resignation of Mr. Bryan, the newspapers heralded the fact, never denied from the White House, that it was entirely at the Colonel's disposal if he would deign to accept it. Mr. Wilson is so obsessed by the " Court Favorite" idea, that he does not seem to understand that the great offices of state are not his personal per- quisites to be bestowed upon obscure and incomptent individuals, entirely unconnected with our public life, simply because it suits his personal interest and conveni- ence so to bestow them, but the property of the people held only in trust by him for their benefit. Mr. Hughes has done well in denouncing in his cam- paign speeches the indefensible selfishness which has prompted Mr. Wilson to fill very many of the highest offices in the Government, at home and abroad, with fameless and incompetent persons, to many of whom he is obligated by reason of political services of a journalistic character. All the world knows that, at the most critical moment in our diplomatic history, our diplomatic service has been weighted down, with a few exceptions, by such inexperienced and obscure persons as were never before accredited to the great posts. If any one is sceptical on that subject, let him but turn his eyes to the capitals of France and the British Empire, where the most critical diplomatic work is now being carried on. Mr. Wilson, who has thus dragged our diplomatic service down to a point never reached before, refused at the beginning of his administration to give either aid or comfort to a bill carefully devised for its improvement, and introduced in the House by Mr. Henry of Texas, Chairman of the Committee on Rules, arid in the Senate by Senator Bacon of Georgia, then Chairman of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations. But Mr. Wilson's capital offense in the rewarding of personal retainers who served him in the public press is represented by his grossly unlawful eleva- tion to the headship of the Government of the District of Columbia of a journalist with no possible connection with the District in the way of residence or property, in open defiance of a statute declaring that only an actual and bona fide resident of the District, a home man, shall be eligible to that office. The question of Mr. Newman s eligibility has been tried by the courts and juries of the District, which have exclusive jurisdiction ovER it, and it has been solemnly adjudged by those tribunals that he be ousted from his office on account of his lack of legal capacity to hold it. And yet, in open defiance of such judgments and verdict, Mr. Newman has been kept in office by Mr. Wilson ; and the people of the District of Columbia have been thus deprived by his act, aided by a technical flaw in legal pro- cedure, of the only scrap of local self-government they possessed, simply because the President of the United States IO owed a political debt to a political retainer. Surely the new President will not be slow in redressing this outrage, v/hose author seems to be devoid of all sense of legality. MR. WILSON'S FLAGRANT BREACH OF HIS SOLEMN COVENANT NOT TO BE A CANDIDATE TO SUCCEED HIMSELF. Mr. Wilson enjoys the very unenviable distinction of being the first President ever accused, so far as I know, of breaking the solemn "promises and covenants" made with the people in the party platform upon which he sought and obtained their votes. Under our rigid and complex con- stitution the honor system, under which the people give their suffrages in exchange for the "promises and cove- nants" given by nominees in party platforms, is at once vital and fundamental. Senator N orris hit the nail on the head when he said in a speech delivered at Washington a few months ago: " The greatest evil in American politics today is the dishonest nominee." The question of questions involved in the approaching election is this: Is Mr. Wilson a dishonest nominee? Despite the labored and sophistical efforts made by his partizans and apologists to obscure the real facts involved, they are too plain to be misunderstood. Unless it is legitimate to argue, as De Ouincy did, that "murder is a fine art," it is unnecessary to say that, when a nomination is accepted under our American honor system, the nominee pledges his sacred honor to observe every part and clause of the party plat- form as completely as if he took an oath to that effect in a court of justice. Such has always been the distinct understanding of the American people since our honor system began. The plain facts in Mr. Wilson's case are these: The Democratic platform of 191 2, to every clause of which he solemnly pledged himself, provided: "We favor a single Presidential term, and to that end urge the adoption of an amendment to the Constitution making II the President of the United States ineligible for re-election, and we pledge the candidate of this convention to this prin- ciple." If ever a man had the right to speak for another, Mr. Bryan, the political creator of Mr. Wilson, who took the nomination away from the Hon. Champ Clark in order to give it to him, had the right not only to speak for Mr. Wilson but to bind him by his words. As his ac- credited representative and spokesman, Mr. Bryan can- vassed the country in his interest, making many speeches, in all of which he declared to the people what his [Mr. Wilson's] understanding was as to his candidacy for a second term. At a great meeting held at Indianapolis on October 17, 191 2, Mr. Bryan said: "We present him [Mr. Wilson] not only qualified in every way, but we present him pledged to a single term, that he may be your President and spend no time dividing patronage in order to secure delegates ; that he need spend no time in planning for re-election; that he may give you all his thought and all his heart and all his energy. I believe that when a man is lifted by his countrymen to this pinnacle of power he ought to tear from his heart every thought of ambition and on his bended knees consecrate his term to his country s service. That is our ideal President, and we present to you a man who measures up to that ideal." I was in Indianapolis at the time, and heard those words as they were spoken by Mr. Bryan to at least seven thousand people assembled in front of the State House. When that part of Mr. Bryan's speech, pledging Mr. Wilson to a single term, was republished in Collier's for November 6, 191 5, I called his attention to it, and he said that he had seen it. So far from questioning the accuracy of the publication, he added that he had said the same thing in all his speeches everywhere. Will any honest man undertake to say that after Mr. Wilson permitted Mr. Bryan, as his ac- credited representative and spokesman, to canvas the 12 country and pledge him to a single term, as his [Mr. Wilson's] construction of the Baltimore platform, he was not as completely bound in honor as if he had made that pledge to the people in his own words? If that is not so, then the political morality of Machiavelli governs here; then the American honor system is at an end ; then all such pledges as Mr. Bryan gave to the people as Mr. Wilson's representative are absolutely worthless. Nobody has ever claimed that Mr. Wilson protested, at the time, that Mr. Bryan was not authorized to pledge him to a single term, as his [Mr. Wilson's] construction of the Baltimore platform. Painful and humiliating as the fact must be to every high-minded Democrat, it cannot be denied that, despite the solemn pledges made to the people by Mr. Bryan in his name, Mr. Wilson, while President-elect, set himself to work to find some loop-hole through which to escape from the double obligations by which he was bound hand and foot. A sensitive mind, fully conscious of the obliga- tions of "promises and covenants," would have been appalled by the difficulties then in the way of such an undertaking. On June 4, 191 2, Mr. Clayton, of Ala- bama, as Chairman of the Judiciary Committee of the House, had offered an amendment to the Constitution making the President ineligible for a second term. It was that pending amendment to which the Baltimore Convention that met on June 25th directly referred. Mr. Wilson was therefore bound by every principle of honor and of duty to insist that the then pending amendment, to which he was pledged, not only by the platform but by the solemn promises given to the people by Mr. Bryan in his name, should be made at once a part of the funda- mental law. Under such circumstances what did he actually do? Did he strive to secure the adoption of the Amendment, or did he deliberately and actively intrigue to defeat itf Let the answer to that question come from his 13 able and experienced advocate and apologist, Mr. George Harvey, who, in attempting to make a case for him in The North American Review for February, 191 6, made in- stead admissions that render all future attempts to defend him hopeless. Mr. Harvey said: "but after the election of Mr. Wilson upon a platform pledging the candidate to ' the principle' avowed, the proposition was revived in the Senate, and on February 1st, 191 3, it was adopted by that body, seventeen anti- Roosevelt Republicans voting affirma- tively and only one Democrat, Mr. Shively of Indiana, voting in the negative. The sentiment of the House was overwhelmingly in favor of the resolution, but the Demo- cratic leaders, feeling that their newly elected President was entitled to consultation upon a matter of so much importance and having no late information respecting his attitude, deferred action untie his views coued be ASCERTAINED * * * MEANWHIEE THE PRESIDENT- ELECT INTERVENED IN THE LETTER TO Mr. A. MlTCHELL Palmer dated February 13, which was duly ex- hibited to Chairman Clayton and other prominent representatives, who promptly bowed to the wish of their new leader and buried the resolution." Thus, in by far the most studied and formal effort ever made to apologize for Mr. Wilson's wanton conduct in this regard, his advocate admits that the Amendment, to whose adoption he was so solemnly bound by a double pledge, after its adoption by the Senate, was defeated in the House, where the sentiment "was overwhelmingly in favor" of it, by the active personal solicitation of Mr. Wil- son, intriguing through a letter directed to Mr. A. Mitchell Palmer, not as an in-dividual but as Chairman of the Demo- cratic caucus. In describing that letter, Collier's for November 6, 1915, said: "Mr. Wilson dictated a long reply, about 1,500 words in length, and sent it to Repre- sentative A. Mitchell Palmer of Pennsylvania, then Chairman of the Democratic caucus." Thus even Mr. Wilson's advocates and apologists are forced to admit that the machinery of the Democratic Party was actively employed by him to defeat its and his solemn pledge to the people to limit the Presidency to a single term. MR. WILSON'S UNFAITHFUL CONDUCT A WARNING TO THE AMERICAN PEOPLE TO LIMIT THE PRESIDENT TO A SINGLE TERM. Mr. Wilson has demonstrated by his conscienceless conduct, as described above, the lengths to which an abnormally ambitious and selfish man, lustful of power and office, may go in chasing the phantom of a second term. He trampled upon those things which most men hold most dear by actively intriguing to destroy the single term plank of the Baltimore Platform, through the use of Democratic party machinery, even before his first term began. How pathetic and humiliating it all is when we recall Mr. Bryan's golden words: "We present him [Mr. Wil- son] not only qualified in every way, but we present him pledged to a single term, that he may be your President and spend no time dividing patronage in order to secure dele- gates; that he need spend no time in planning for re- election ; that he may give you all his thought and all his heart and all his energy. That is our ideal President, and we present to you a man who measures up to that ideal." Honest and noble-minded as he is, how sore at heart Mr. Bryan must be when he looks down on his fallen idol who has done all the things he said he would not do. The best work Mr. Bryan has ever done has been embodied in his efforts to protect his country against the terrible and growing evils of a second term. In the Indianapolis speech, in which he pledged Mr. Wilson to a single term, he said: "Eighteen years ago when I was a young man, a member of Congress, I introduced a resolution submit- ting an amendment limiting the President to a single 15 term in office. Three times when I was a candidate for office I announced immediately after my nomination that if I were elected I would not be a candidate for a second term." Mr. Wilson has manifested his ingratitude for all Mr. Bryan has done for him not only by forcing him out of his cabinet and becoming a candidate for a second term, but by wrecking the cause for which Mr. Bryan has battled so long and so unselfishly. In Mr. Wilson's so-called St. Louis platform there is not a word about a second term. Those who understand Mr. Bryan's character know perfectly well that he has a courage that can, when aroused, rise to the height of any occasion. The great moral and patriotic duty of his life is upon him now. He knows, as no other man knows, how wretched and faith- less Mr. Wilson's conduct has been in violating his solemn pledge not to seek a second term. He therefore owes it to himself, to his reputation for consistency, to stand by the gospel he has preached so long and so forcefully. He owes it to the American people, he owes it to truth and justice, to rise in his high place in this Nation and, sink- ing partisanship in patriotism, denounce Mr. W T ilson's candidacy because he knows he is a "dishonest nominee." In the presence of Mr. Wilson's broken vows to the people, for whose performances he solemnly pledged himself as guarantor, how can Mr. Bryan support him for a second term? M. Clemenceau certainly had Mr. Wilson in mind when, in defining a symbol, he said: "A man about whom the people still believe what was never true." Is it possible that such a man as Mr. Wilson, who, to promote his inordinate and selfish ambition, has deliber- ately violated the solemn "promises and covenants" for whose performance he plighted his sacred honor to the American people, can, for a second time, be elevated by their votes to the chief magistry of this Nation? That is now the question of questions, the issue of issues, which, i6 as it involves the moral dignity of the people of the United States, can neither be concealed nor ignored. Mr. Wil- son's partisans within the Democratic party, who have been recreant in their duty to the ancient and historic organization which Jefferson founded, may shout as they will, but — "Nor florid prose nor honeyed lines of rhyme, Can blazon evil deeds, or consecrete a crime." No matter whether Mr. Bryan does his duty or not, the American people must and will do theirs'. For more than thirty years I have made a special study of our complex American Constitution; for the last fourteen years I have lived at Washington, where I have watched its practical workings, day by day, just as a machinist might watch the movements of a Corliss engine. In the light of that study and experience I do not hesitate to say that, in my humble judgment, the gravest defect in our National Constitution, that brings more evils to the people than all others combined, is represented by the lack of that amendment prohibiting a second term which Mr. Wilson's selfish ambition has for the moment defeated. His almost insane desire to succeed himself has deprived him of the power to be really useful at a critical moment in our history. His ceaseless pursuit of that will-o'-the- wisp called a second term has led him into all kinds of bogs and morasses; it has entangled him in hopeless inconsistencies; it has put him on both sides of nearly every public question; it has forced him to do things no other public man would have dared to do. The typical illustration of course is his sudden and violent change of front as to the exemption of American vessels from tolls in a canal built by American brains and American money through American territory. Representative Meeker of Missouri says Mr. Wilson is "the greatest President Great Britain ever had." I have not a word to say now 17 as to the merits of the tolls question, as to which good and wise men have disagreed. It is not necessary to go farther than the statement that honesty and decency forbade Mr. Wilson's departure from the positive man- date on that subject of the Baltimore platform, which he specially and earnestly advocated before the people in order to catch heir votes. Then, when the wind shifted, and it appeared as if more votes were to be had by facing the other way, he turned about with a ruthless cynicism that would have put Machiavelli to the blush, entirely ignoring that part of the Baltimore platform, repeated in speeches by him, which declares that " Our pledges are made to be kept while in office, as well as to be relied upon during the