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 |i', Labadan Family of the Philippines i- 
 
 in honor of 
 ^ Mario M. Labadan, Ph.D. '69 '; 
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 Mario C. Labadan, Jr. MS '96 P 
 
 
 
DISCUSSIONAL. 
 
 LINCOLN SAID THAT HE BELIEVED IN THE MAN AND THE 
 DOLLAR, BUT THAT IN CASE OF CONFLICT HE BELIEVED 
 IN THE MAN BEFORE THE DOLLAR. 
 
 San Francisco, California, 
 
 Monday, August 27, 1900. 
 
 To the Editor of the New York Evening Post: 
 
 Dear Sir — I^ooking over the reports of the conferences 
 at Indianapolis on the 14th and 15th insts. of the Anti- 
 Imperialists and Independents and reading Mr. Charlton T. 
 I<ewis' letter in 3'-our issue of the 20th, also considering the 
 present general attitude of your highly esteemed journal, I 
 confess to surprise at the return to the McKinley ranks of 
 certain distinguished citizens, who within the past two years 
 have pointed out most forcibly the iniquity of the course of the 
 Federal Administration in regard to the Philippine Islands. 
 In contemplating these retrogressions, I recall Prof. William 
 James' observation in his Talks to Teachers on Psychology, 
 viz : " When a resolve, or a fine glow of feeling is allowed to 
 evaporate without bearing practical fruit, it is worse than a 
 chance lost." 
 
 Metaphorical tears and apostrophic visions on the floor of 
 the Senate may tickle the ears of those who appreciate melo- 
 drama, but, unless backed by concrete action, they merely 
 breed doubt and disappointment — sophistication ; and this is 
 where the danger in general lies to the McKinley Anti- 
 Imperialists. They have, in effect, if not in so many words, 
 asserted that the administrative action relative to the 
 Philippines is a monstrous infamy ; and falling short of the 
 full measure of the courage of their convictions, they will be 
 laughed out of court ; for people, even though uncultured and 
 untrained, are keen to detect weakness and inconsistency. I 
 can understand the unwillingness of a gold standard man to 
 vote for Mr. Bryan, but I cannot understand the willingness of 
 an Anti-Imperialist to vote for Mr. McKinley. 
 
However, if the Independents propose to nominate Repub- 
 licans as candidates on a third party ticket, I suppose those of 
 us who intend to vote for Mr. Bryan should welcome such an 
 expedient as affording, so to speak, a half-way house or harbor 
 of refuge for natures not robust enough to make the whole 
 opposition trip. Our disposition to acquiesce in this means of 
 opposition is illustrated by a story told by Mr. Louis R. Ehrich, 
 of Colorado, at the Indianapolis meeting, of a man away from 
 home, who received a telegram announcing the death of his 
 mother-in-law, and inquiring, "Shall we embalm, cremate, or 
 bury?" He wired in reply, "Embalm, cremate, and bury — 
 take no chances." 
 
 The criticisms of Governor Roosevelt and Mr. I<ewrs upon 
 Mr. Bryan and his followers remind me of those inflicted upon 
 every leading Democratic candidate in the past. Each of the 
 four greatest of the century, Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jack- 
 son, Samuel J. TUden, and Grover Cleveland, when running 
 for the Presidency, was so assailed, and some of them even 
 more bitterly. 
 
 To the former a recent writer refers as follows: 
 
 Just one hundred years ago Thomas Jefferson was nominated for 
 the Presidency. The intellect, wealth, and culture of the country op- 
 posed him. He was denounced as the demagogue of demagogues, an 
 atheist in religion and a fanatic in politics. An historian has thus for- 
 mulated the prevailing political sentiment of that time: ' Every disso- 
 lute intriguer, loose liver, forger, false coiner and prison-bird; every 
 hare-brained, loud-talking demagogue; every speculator, scoffer, and 
 atheist, was a follower of Jefferson; and Jefferson himself was the incar- 
 nation of their theories.' 
 
 Nevertheless, Jefferson made a very good President. 
 
 The Post is doubtless aware, I am a gold standard man; 
 but I know the people of the West, be they Democrats, Re- 
 publicans, Silver Republicans or Populists; and when I read 
 such observations as Governor Roosevelt's or Mr. Lewis', on 
 the supporters of Mr. Bryan, I always feel disposed to ask 
 whether these gentlemen think the States of Montana, Wash- 
 ington, California, Colorado, Nebraska, Kansas, Texas, etc., 
 are made up of the kind of people that they decry. Although 
 Mr. McKinley got all but one of the electoral votes of Cali- 
 fornia, the seventeen States and territories west of the Missouri 
 River gave Mr. Bryan a majority of 645,000. 
 
 A widely extended business experience gives me some 
 right to speak, and I beg to inform any one interested, that I 
 
have had dealings with the so-called Populists, with whom on 
 certain points I differ, and can testify that I have found them 
 just as earnest, upright and straightforward a people, when 
 furnished with an honest statement of facts, as any I have ever 
 had to do with; in other words, wherever Populism has held 
 sway in this country, that is, west of the Missouri River, the 
 interests which I represent have never yet been harmed by 
 unfair legislation, or otherwise; and, for my part, I feel indig- 
 nant at the constant assumption of superior righteousness by 
 writers who set up bogie men evolved out of their distorted 
 imaginations. 
 
 I contributed some efforts toward Mr. McKinley's success 
 in the last campaign, and referred to him shortly afterwards, as 
 follows: "Certainly no Democrat, and probably no Republican 
 not blinded by partisan bigotry or prejudice, believed that the 
 election of Mr. McKiuley to the Presidency could bring pros- 
 perity to the country. What gold standard Democrats (of 
 whom I am one) did believe, has been well expressed by 
 Editor Richardson of the El Dorado County {Cal.) Republican, 
 as follows: ' The writer voted for William McKinley, not be- 
 cause of a belief that a protective tariff insures a country against 
 hard times, or even tends to permanently remove that condition; 
 but because the entire policy of the Republican party on the 
 tariff and finance was likely to give a temporary social stability, 
 that would enable work and business to be resumed as fast as 
 conditions of supply and demand would permit. Prosperity, 
 as people call it, is not poured out of a bottle into this nation 
 by any political doctor, McKinley or whomsoever he be.' " 
 
 But perhaps some will say: How about Free Silver? I 
 answer, the Republican platform proclaims: 
 
 We renew our allegiance to the principle of the gold standard, and 
 declare our confidence in the wisdom of the legislation of the Fifty-sixth 
 Congress, by which the parity of all oui money and the stability of our 
 currency on a gold basis have been secured. 
 
 If they have not been secured, why not ? 
 
 I further answer in the words of Mr. Alfred Austin: 
 
 "Free silver coinage, if it should ever be brought about 
 by Congress — not by the President — and which is altogether 
 unlikely, would, from a commercial and industrial point of 
 view, be bad. But "free slaughter" is infinitely worse. Free 
 silver is in the dim, distant and shadowy future, where it will 
 
doubtless remain, while the 'free slaughter' of innocent 
 people with all the dreadful horrors of war, and last, but not 
 least, the demoralizingeflFect of war on soldiers and people, and 
 our rulers discarding the Constitution and the teachings' of the 
 Declaration of Independence, are ever present, and most alarm- 
 ing to every patriotic citizen who utterly discards the old world 
 doctrine that the 'king can do no wrong,' and that 'might 
 makes right;' and whose pen and voice is ever on the side of 
 freedom, justice and truth; and whose dreams and prayers are 
 that the acts of the present administration may not be ' the 
 beginning of the downfall of the republic;' which was so nobly 
 said by one who a short year ago, was esteemed«as the 'noblest 
 Roman of them all ' — but who, alas, has gone out from among 
 us, and is now basking in the sunshine of oflScial recognition 
 and forgiveness." 
 
 JOHN J. VAI.ENTINE. 
 
Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of tiiis book is in 
 tine Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924101927204