Class jl Co fe^. 
 Book ."^feDS 
 
 Gosiightl^^. 
 
 COPYRIGHT DEPOSrr. 
 
/ 
 
JERRY SIMPSON 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 JERRY SIMPSON 
 
 BY 
 
 ANNIE li. DIGGS 
 
 JANE SIMPSON, Publisher 
 
 WICHITA, KANSAS 
 
•Sells 
 
 MAY li> ii^U^ 
 
 COPY 6. 
 
 
 COPYRIGHT 1908 
 BY JANE SIMPSON 
 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 
 
 
 
 HoBSON Printing Company 
 
 PRINTERS AND BINDERS 
 WICHITA, KANSAS 
 
DEDICATION 
 
 This tribute to the memory of my hus- 
 band I dedicate to his friends in all walks of 
 life, the rich and the poor; the learned and 
 the unlettered; the widely kno^vn and the 
 great unknown, whom he held in close affec- 
 tion and to whom he was always loyal. 
 
 JANE SIMPSOK 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PART FIRST 
 
 Page. 
 
 Portrait, Jeriy Simpson Frontispiece 
 
 1. Jane and Jerry 7 
 
 2. The Warp and Woof 13 
 
 3. The Journey Begun 21 
 
 4. In Battle With the Storm 27 
 
 5. Little Hallie ^'^ 
 
 6. The Home in Barber County 41 
 
 7. Political Evolution 51 
 
 8. The Farmers Alliance 61 
 
 9. An Alliance Nemesis 71 
 
 10. The Peoples Party 77 
 
 11. The Personnel of the Peoples Party 95 
 
 12. Sockless Socrates and Prince Hal 103 
 
 13. Jerry Arrives at Washington 115 
 
 14. Senator Long and Jerry Simpson 123 
 
 15. Jerry in Congress 135 
 
 16. Populism Enroute 155 
 
 17. A Symposium 177 
 
 18. The Babes in the Woods 185 
 
 19. The Simple Life 193 
 
 20. Old Friends and New Days 205 
 
 21. The Journey Ended 209 
 
 PART SECOND 
 
 Portraits, Family Group, between 222-223 
 
 Tributes from Friends 225 
 
 List of Speeches in Congress . 272 
 
JAIs^E AND JEEKY. 
 
Jane and Jerry. 
 
 One night in the winter of 1869, at Jack- 
 son Center, Indiana, a little village close 
 swept by the breezes of Lake Michigan, a 
 social affair of heart-throbbing importance 
 was in progress. It was ^'Spelling School" 
 night at the village school house. The pret- 
 ty country girls had smartened up their Sun- 
 day frocks and maybe added a new ribbon to 
 their satisfying costumes. The stalwart boys 
 had greased their boots and, perchance, as 
 was the fashion of that day, smoothed their 
 locks by application of sweet scented oil. 
 The school room buzzed with happiness for 
 each girl and boy had earned this good time 
 by good days works; moreover, none in all 
 
 7 
 
THE STOKY OF 
 
 that neighborliood was far out circumstanced 
 by another. 
 
 On this especial night, a newcomer, 
 Young Simpson, a sailor lad, just in from a 
 season on the Lakes, was running gauntlet of 
 opinion. And jolly well he ran, for he was 
 readiest of all that company with quip and 
 jest. Good humored and as breezy as the 
 Lakes whereon he had spent years of whole- 
 some life. 
 
 ^'He's not like the others," said Jane 
 Cape. 
 
 ^ow Jane was a round, rosy, slip of a 
 girl who first saw daylight in Cumberland- 
 shire, England. She was the merriest, sauci- 
 est, daringest one of all that jolly company. 
 She was a bit imperious too, despite her small 
 person and her appealing, big, blue eyes. So 
 when Jane whispered to the big boy who was 
 choosing up sides: ''Choose Jerry Simpson 
 
 8 
 
JEKKY SIMPSON. 
 
 next to me/' she had her way. 
 
 "Why did they choose me," said Jerry, 
 "I can't spell." 
 
 "I^ever mind," said happy Jane, "I can 
 spell for both of us." 
 
 Jerry went down the first round. Vain- 
 glorious Jane sat down the second, and would 
 have been mightily chagrined save that she 
 was so happy snuggled up to Jerry while he 
 told her, on this, their second time of meet- 
 ing, that he had ''thought about her," and, 
 might he see her home. , 
 
 The spelling match was long drawn out. 
 The two sides stood up bravely. The ''giver 
 out" turned on his list of catch words. Many 
 a boy and girl triumphed over the long, hard 
 words only to be tripped on some simple one, 
 until one by one the spellers sat them down 
 even as in the years since come and gone so 
 many of that company have dropped off to 
 
 9 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 sleep the good, long sleep. 
 
 Before the champion speller of that night 
 stood on the floor alone, all flushed with pride 
 and glad with hearty handshakes, it had come 
 to young Simpson to know that he wanted 
 more than all things else in life to have the 
 blue eyed Jane to be his own for all the time 
 to come. 
 
 In other, stranger years to come, this 
 sailor lad so broad of smile, so kind of heart, 
 so brave and quaint of speech, shall stand in 
 many a country schoolhouse, champion for 
 human rights and none shall spell him down 
 until his great story, bravely, quaintly told, 
 sets truth a-m arching on. 
 
 10 
 
THE WAEP AISTD WOOF. 
 
II. 
 
 The Warp and Woof. 
 
 In tlie late Sixties the people of the 
 Western States were for the most part poor 
 of pocket but rich in ways of industry and of 
 small possessions. Business integrity was 
 
 on top. 
 
 ^^Your word is good enough security for 
 me without a scratch of pen/' was answer 
 neighbor often gave to neighbor with a loan 
 of cash. 
 
 The ugly words graft and boodler had 
 not been spawned. 
 
 There be memories of such clean days 
 that sometimes clutch the heartstrings of mil- 
 lionaires stifling amidst their heavy scented 
 luxuries. The call of husking bee, of spelling 
 match, of singing school, harks back to simple 
 
 13 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 days before big money came to set up glitter- 
 ing things that lure young men and maids 
 to glare and blare of life, and trade them 
 feverish falsities for wholesome, homely ways. 
 
 In those good days when Jerry courted 
 Jane, it was enough for any girl if her young 
 man had strong right arm to till the fields or 
 was skillful at some handicraft and so could 
 earn a modest home for her. It was enough 
 for the young man if marriage dower of his 
 beloved were but a cow, a feather bed, and 
 some homespun things. Or, perchance, lack- 
 ing even these their sweet venture ran no risk 
 where health and hope stood sponsor for the 
 sacrament. 
 
 Those were days when men believed in 
 public men from Justice of the Peace to Sen- 
 ator, days when the Fourth of July meant in- 
 spiration to youngsters and reconsecration to 
 their elders. Good days they were for in- 
 
 14 
 
. JEEEY SIMPSOTT. 
 
 graining of character: good days to shuttle 
 through the loom of time and make the warp 
 and Avoof of life. 
 
 And good days and ways had gone before 
 for many Simpson generations back. There 
 are in the family today, official documents, 
 signed by Scottish dignitaries, which attest 
 the sterling w^orth and standing of Jerry 
 Simpson's ancestors given when they sailed 
 for the N^ew World. 
 
 Jerry was born a subject of Queen Vic- 
 toria, in Westmorland County, 'New Bruns- 
 wick, March 31, 1842. His father was a '^ 
 masterful man in mind and body; he was a 
 great reader and Jerry found at home many 
 of the best of the older English authors. 
 
 Jerry's mother was a Washburn of 
 Welch and English ancestry. A strong, self- 
 poised woman of most commanding presence, 
 of whom Jerry and all her admiring children 
 
 15 
 
THE STOEY OF 
 
 said: "She is remarkable; tlie blessedest 
 mother in the world." 
 
 The Simpson family circumstances were 
 quite above the poverty line but there were 
 many deprivations incident to time and place. 
 The father owned a saw-mill which did good 
 business for those days, but there was a large 
 family and in the Simpson gospel there was 
 a trinity of words that ran: Integrity, In- 
 dustry, Independence ; and Jerry bred on 
 these, hired himself out a year before he 
 reached his teens to a neighbor for six dollars 
 a month. The year he reached fourteen he 
 
 went as cook on a Lake steamer. From that 
 time on, save for brief intervals, for twenty - 
 three years the Great Lakes knew his sturdy, 
 
 faithful service as common sailor, mate and 
 
 captain. 
 
 Out on the solemn waters, under the 
 
 more solemn skies, Young Simpson queried 
 
 16 
 
JERKY SIMPSON. 
 
 miTch of life and destiny. 
 
 Among the books lie read were Dickens, 
 Carlyle, Scott, Burns, Shakespeare, Hugo, 
 Shelly, the Bible and Tom Paine. 
 
 He summed up all that his self-commun- 
 ings and his reading brought to him in his 
 ^'religious creed" which ran: Life is good; 
 Church creeds are a misfit ; I love my fellow 
 men. 
 
 And this sufficed for his early years. 
 
 Who can ever tell which shows the larger 
 balance in the make up of a man, the books 
 he reads, the happenings to his life; or the 
 native qualities — the timber and texture born 
 with him. However that may be, certain it 
 is, that Young Simpson saw life Dickenswise 
 to a rich and rare degree. So quick was he 
 to see the droll and humorous, so swift was he 
 with sympathy, so militant was he toward 
 shams, hypocracy, and injustice that he was 
 
 17 
 
JERKY SIMPSOK 
 
 in close fellowship witli the Engii Ii Master. 
 Did the fore-knowing fates see in all this 
 a preparation for a time when the whole na- 
 tion was, first to deride, and then to listen 
 to Jerry Simpson ? 
 
 18 
 
THE JOURNEY BEGUN. 
 
Ill 
 
 The Journey Begun. 
 
 Jerry Simpson and Jane Cape, a whole- 
 some, rollicking, care-free pair, were married 
 at Biiffalo,:N^ew York, October 12, 1870, and 
 for their bridal trip they went a-sailing on 
 the ''Summer Cloud." 
 
 Jane Cape had been well trained by her 
 good English mother in all housewifely ways. 
 She had been taught that idleness and un- 
 thrift were sinful. And so it seemed a fine 
 and fitting thing to go as cook on the schoon- 
 er. Summer Cloud, of which her husband 
 was First Mate. 
 
 On those glorious nights when the young 
 couple walked the deck encompassed by the 
 witchery that comes not elsewhere than upon 
 the waters it seemed to them as if there cou'ld 
 
 21 
 
THE STOEY OF 
 
 be no misery or meanness, but only joy and 
 kindliness, in all God's blessed world. 
 
 The world of books in wbicb Jerry had 
 lived so delightedly was an unknown world 
 to Jane. So for a time he closed the printed 
 page and read the sweeter book of life with 
 the blue eyed girl whose lot was cast with his. 
 
 AVith a ricli burr, his legacy from Scott- 
 ish forbears, he would recite, ''A man's a man 
 for a' that;" ''The Cotter's Saturday :N'ight," 
 and numberless choice things which his fine 
 memory placed at his command. And often- 
 est of all, like some refrain fitted to all tunes, 
 he would say : 
 
 " to thine own self be true; 
 
 And it must follow, as the night the day, 
 Thou canst not then be false to any man." 
 
 "I do not quite understand you," Jane 
 would sometimes say in response to Jerry's 
 
 22 
 
JEEKY SIMPSOE". 
 
 commentaries iipon the times and ways of 
 
 humankind. 
 
 ^^ISTever mind, Jane, you will some day/' 
 
 he would reply with smile so broad and with 
 
 such perfect patience that the little wife did 
 
 not feel chilled by any gap between them. 
 
 There was a flavor of chivarly — a defer- 
 ential, old-school mannerism in Jerry Simp- 
 son's demeanor toward women. There was 
 indescribable gentleness in his ways with 
 little Jane as if he felt that his abounding 
 health and strength were given him in trust 
 to serve and shield the weaker one. 
 
 Days when the seas ran high poor little 
 sea-sick Jane declared that she could tell, 
 though groaning in her berth, just when Jer- 
 ry took the wheel from another and steadied 
 the boat with his more masterful hand. 
 
 Thus was begun their long journey on 
 
 the buffeting sea of life and neither one had 
 any care or sorrow. 
 
 23 
 
m BATTLE WITH THE STORM. 
 
IV. 
 
 In Battle With The Storm. 
 
 The waters of the Great Lakes some- 
 times lash themselves into a great storm-fury, 
 as if to rival in ferocity the raging temper of 
 the ocean. On such a deadly time, one of 
 the largest trading ships afloat the Lakes, the 
 ^'J. H. Rutter," Captain Jerry Simpson, was 
 in tow of a steam harge off the west coast of 
 Michigan. The fierce duel between the crew 
 of the Rutter and the angry storm waged 
 evenly a whole day but when night came the 
 storm had gained and held the ship and the 
 ship's crew at its mercy. The two crafts 
 v/ere torn apart, the Rutter's steer mg- 
 
 27 
 
THE STOKY OF 
 
 geer became useless. The men on that 
 helpless vessel saw death's face staring in 
 their own. Captain Simpson's alert devices 
 kept the ship alive through that long night of 
 deadly peril. At break of day the Rutter 
 ran aground. The storm abated; the life 
 peril passed, then the Captain, unheedful of 
 the stress and strain of the soul-and-body 
 wrenching hours, betook himself to the saving 
 of the ship. The Rutter was aground off 
 Ludington, Michigan. Captain Simpson 
 went ashore with his small boats and soon 
 persuaded forty landsmen to help unload the 
 cargo. The men worked with a will under 
 the spell of Captain Simpson's cheery com- 
 mands until, the task half done, the defiant 
 wind arose and baffled CA^ery move. The 
 landsmen were unable to keep their feet and 
 Captain Simpson, aided by his brother 
 James, lifted the men bodily to safer 
 
 ?8 
 
JEEEY SIMPSOE". 
 
 places and lashed them to the rigging. From 
 this perilous plight thej were rescued by a 
 life saving crew. The owners of the Eutter 
 were notified of the struggle for the salvation 
 of their ship while its outcome was yet un- 
 certain. They sent hourly messages to the 
 little village in Indiana where the Captain's 
 wife, with their little one, listened to the 
 storm with such cold fear as only a sailor's 
 wife with husband on the wild sea can know. 
 It is a prime business disaster for a 
 captain to lose a boat entrusted to his com- 
 mand. But Jerry Simpson was a game, grace- 
 ful loser. Those hours of battle with the 
 storm etched lines that never left his face 
 but he never whined or whimpered in his 
 life. He fully expected to lose his rank and 
 his engagement with the ship's owners. 
 
 Instead they gave him a larger, better 
 boat. 
 
 29 
 
LITTLE HALLIE. 
 
Little Hallie. 
 
 If life had been full and satisfactory for 
 Young Simpson, First Mate of the Summer 
 Cloud, with his days' works well done, with 
 his growing popularity among his employers, 
 with his steadily increasing knowledge of his 
 craft and its related business ashore, and, 
 above all with his adoring, blue eyed Jane, 
 what must it have been when Little Hallie, 
 his own, little, little child, came to make for 
 him a larger heaven on land and sea. 
 
 'No prosaic pen should try to tell of those 
 ecstatic hours when the young father held his 
 child in his strong arms. His watchful care 
 and his great tenderness were such as rarest 
 mothers show. Over and over in softest 
 
 33 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 tones he sang to her, ''I'm dreaming now of 
 ITallie/' and that song so full of melody and 
 sentiment gave the little one her name. 
 
 Those who were with Jerry in those 
 days said : "How odd he is in his ways with 
 Hallie. He talks to her, laughs, jokes, and 
 quotes verse as if she Avere a grown up com- 
 panion." They tell how, v/ith a queer catch 
 in his voice, as if he were choking with joy, 
 he would say, "See, just see, how Hallie 
 understands ! She knows, she knows just 
 what I say to her." And truly it would 
 seem, by time the child was two years old, as 
 if she did understand. Her great serious 
 brown eyes, her fine forehead, her w^insome 
 and expressive face and her quaint ways 
 placed her in a class not common. As is the 
 Avay of men adrift from home, the ship's crew 
 idolized her. She learned to walk first on 
 her little sea legs, and so she had to learn a 
 
 34 
 
JERRY SIMPSOK 
 
 second time, another kind of walk, when she 
 went ashore, for there at Grandma's house 
 the steady, stupid floor jumped up and hit 
 her hard. 
 
 When Hallie was in her third year, First 
 Mate Simpson won his promotion to a Cap- 
 taincy. He was given a larger boat with 
 more important business. The purchase of 
 ship supplies, the hiring of the crew, the lad- 
 ing of the cargo, were done at Chicago. In 
 a little village forty miles away, little Hallie 
 fell ill of scarlet fever. Captain Simpson's 
 arduous and responsible work proceeded day 
 by day without interruption, but so soon as 
 his day's work v/as done he boarded a train 
 v/hich took him but part way to his sick 
 child, the remaining eleven miles he v/alked 
 across a lonely, unfrequented stretch of coun- 
 try. He relieved the mother of the care of 
 the little one during his stay and before the 
 
 35 
 
THE STOEY OF 
 
 dawn of day took the return walk and went- 
 to work on time : this he did each day for two 
 v/eeks until little Hallie Avas past all danger. 
 
 The purpose was growing with Captain 
 Simpson to become a landsman, although he 
 greatly loved his work and life upon the 
 water. But his little Hallie must have a 
 more befitting home — the best surroundings 
 find advantages he could earn for her. All 
 that he and Jane had missed, their little child 
 should have. He had a few thousand dol- 
 lars, the savings of twenty-three years. So 
 he gave up the sea, and betimes a pretty 
 home was built in Kansas for Jane, Hallie 
 and a baby boy. Besides this farm home 
 Jerry owned a small saw-mill. 
 
 One day, little Hallie, the chum, confid- 
 ant and comrade of her happy father for 
 seven wonderful years stepped gaily forth to 
 walk home with papa from the mill. Jerry 
 
 36 
 
JEEKY SIMPSOK 
 
 saw her coming, lie also saw a great log roll- 
 ing toward her, and then, O God help him, 
 he saw the crnel log roll over her and crush 
 ont all her sweet, young life. How did he 
 live and breathe a-seeing this ? God only 
 knows. He lent his strength to help the 
 men raise the log from the crushed form. 
 He took all that was left to him of his little 
 Hallie and held her close, close as in those 
 first, ecstatic days when they brought her to 
 him on the Summer Cloud. He held her 
 thus for hours, while he lay prone on the 
 floor of the home he had built for her, resist- 
 ing all efforts to take the little form from 
 him. 
 
 He could not bear the torture of having 
 any stranger speak his well meant words of 
 comfort, so they had no minister for the 
 funeral. Just as the little coffin lid was to 
 be fastened do^^ni, Jerry stepped forward 
 
 37 
 
THE STOEY OF 
 
 and looked at the sweet face again and the 
 words he uttered apostrophizing the child 
 linger in the memory of those who heard ; so 
 marvelonsly beautiful were they, that the pity 
 iS; no record was ever made of them. Doubt- 
 less the memory of them lingered not with 
 
 the stricken man after that hour of exaltation 
 passed. 
 
 From that day on, it could not be written 
 that Jane and Jerry had no sorrow in their 
 lives. 
 
 38 
 
THE HOME IK BAEBER C0U:N'TY. 
 
VI. 
 
 The Home in Barber County. 
 
 One morning, years ago, just as the day 
 was breaking, had you been passing the 
 Simpson ranch in southern Kansas, you 
 might have said, here is isolation, here is 
 lonliness. But had you stepped inside the 
 Simpson home you woukl have found no 
 lonliness — not even dullness; indeed you 
 Avould have joined in the laugh with Jane 
 and Jerry over their prank of the night just 
 passed. They had sat up all night a-reading 
 the Arabian ISTights. When the night ar- 
 rived they had settled themselves for the 
 usual evening reading aloud. The hours 
 raced -away; in all reason, and remembering 
 the morrow's work, they should have taken 
 
 41 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 sleep, instead with much delight and in the 
 spirit of their frequent frolicking they said: 
 "we'll read just a little more;'' meanwhile 
 their small son, Lester, begging not to be put 
 to bed, lay with his head cuddled up to 
 mother and his feet in Daddy's lap, while 
 they read on until the daylight came. 
 
 It was to Barber County that Jane and 
 Jerry came when they sold their sorrow- 
 darkened home in northern Kansas. Here 
 Jerry took up a claim and invested in other 
 land and in a herd of cattle. The first three 
 years of cattle raising prospered fairly well. 
 Then the most severe winter ever known 
 in that section of country followed, herds 
 of cattle perished and Jerry lost the accumu- 
 lations of a life time of toil on land and sea. 
 But never in any of the fateful times that 
 took away his earnings and left him naked 
 handed to begin all over again did his broad 
 
 42 
 
JEKEY SIMPSON. 
 
 smile wear off or the note of cheerfulness 
 leave his speech. 
 
 It was from this Barber County home, 
 near Medicine Lodge, that Jerry Simpson 
 was twice chosen bv his fellow citizens, first 
 in 1886, then 1888, to represent them on 
 Greenback and Union Labor issues. Both 
 times he was defeated by Mr. T. A. McNeal, 
 the republican candidate. Both ''Tom'' Mc- 
 iS^eal and Jerry Simpson were past masters 
 of scathing wit and biting sarcasm which 
 they freely used toward each other in their 
 campaigns. Nevertheless a warm friendship 
 sprang up between them, and in the spring 
 of 1890, when Tom McNeal was elected 
 mayor of Medicine Lodge, he appointed 
 Jerry city marshal. The salary was $40 
 per month, but it w^as gladly received, and 
 the modest duties were as faithfully per- 
 formed as if the office had been of national 
 
 43 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 magnitude. 
 
 It was from Medicine Lodge that Jerrj 
 Simpson was called to take part in that won- 
 derful campaign of 1890. 
 
 Wlien he was nominated for Congress 
 he was without money to meet the incidental 
 expenses, but his ardent admirers in all sec- 
 tions of the ''Big 7th" district contributed 
 the necessary funds; many of them gladly 
 giving sums which they could ill afford. 
 These old friends Jerry held in his heart 
 of hearts and always came perilously close 
 to quivering lip and moistened eye when- 
 ever he spoke of their faithfulness and de- 
 votion. 
 
 Jerry Simpson believed as President 
 Roosevelt has said, that: ^'xV man should 
 join a political organization and attend the 
 primaries; that he should not be content to 
 be governed, but should do his part in the 
 
 44 
 
JEEEY SIMPS0:N'. 
 
 work.'' It is true, Jerry did not believe 
 ill remaining with any political organization 
 after it failed to represent liis convictions 
 or to serve in all honesty the interests of the 
 people. He reveled in the opportunity to 
 speak to the people upon the great questions 
 of the times. His years of thought and 
 study, together with his native qualities, 
 made him a logical leader. He translated 
 the theories of politics swiftly into their 
 practical power to readjust social conditions. 
 He made his hearers hear and see how 
 money meant morals, and how all just eco- 
 nomics spelled homes and human happiness. 
 It was in Barber County that a dan- 
 gerous and prolonged illness came upon 
 Mrs. Simpson. The invalidism that fol- 
 lowed was of so trying a nature that it marks 
 the tender care, the marvelous patience, 
 shown her by her husband, such as Only 
 
 45 
 
THE STOKY OE 
 
 mothers, or men of heroic mold are capable. 
 Poor little Jane used to say at times dur- 
 ing her years of weakness: '^Oh, Jerry, 
 how can you be so patient and so good to 
 me?" And, in his beaming fashion, he 
 would say, ^'Why, Jane, how else should I 
 be with you ?" 
 
 After little Hallie's death, the father 
 lavished on his baby boy a twofold affection. 
 There was no display of weak indulgence, 
 but ever a great gentleness. From Lester's 
 infancy, on to his years of manhood, he 
 never had from his father one harsh word 
 or any reprimand. The mother, less calm 
 of temper, and less a believer in non-coer- 
 cion, administered the customary parental 
 punishings, whereupon Jerry would say: 
 ''Don't scold the child, Jane, he'll come out 
 all right." Then to Lester, ''Come now, 
 little son, let's talk over this whole matter." 
 
 46 
 
JERKY SIMPSON. 
 
 It often took long argument and mncli pa- 
 tience but never once did the father assume 
 dictatorship. 
 
 These intimate domestic facts are here- 
 in told, because they show the self-poise, the 
 ingrained democracy, of the man whose 
 hiter fame caused such widespread wonder. 
 
 He had reflected much upon the springs 
 of human action, and so discriminated be- 
 tween the evil doer and his evil deeds. His 
 serene, unswervable belief in the essential 
 goodness of mankind was a saving grace with 
 him; he cherished no resentments. This 
 Vv^ell-spring of good fellowship never ran 
 
 dry, and that was the great reason wdiy he 
 drew men to him in public life and made 
 them so strangely forgiving and fond of him 
 even when he lashed them mercilessly. 
 
 47 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 There was no miracle or mistake about 
 the fame that came to Jerry Simpson; it y 
 was merely that the man was ready when 
 the time arrived. 
 
 48 
 
POLITICAL EVOLUTIO]^. 
 
VII. 
 
 Political Evolution. 
 
 The voice of the waters called Jerry 
 Simpson throiighoiit all of his days. The 
 freedom, the joy, the strength of his life 
 had been inbreathed as he sailed. Away 
 from the distracting Babel — away from the 
 fret and blur of elbow- jostling life ashore, 
 he had found the basic principles by which 
 he was destined to test the varying phrases 
 of social and political events. He had cast 
 fast anchor upon the bed-rock of Justice and 
 1^'air Play. 
 
 Whatever barred the way to full, SAveet 
 life to ^ny human kind, he squared himself 
 to fight against. Whatever conditions, so- 
 
 51 
 
THE STOEY OF 
 
 cial or political, failed to secure to each and 
 all fair chance for their best endeavor, fell 
 short of license to continue. When the war 
 between the I^orth and South menaced the 
 Union, Jerry said: 'The people need a big 
 ship to sail the stormy sea of life. Our 
 good Ship of State flies the Declaration of 
 Independence; she must not be scuttled. 
 Furthermore, hand-cuffs and auction blocks 
 for fellows who work, don't heave-to alone-- 
 side of justice.'' 
 
 These were the reasons Young Simp- 
 son gave when he left the Lake service and 
 ■enlisted in Company A, Twelfth Illinois In- 
 fantry. 
 
 A few months of army service was ter- 
 minated by the first severe sickness of his 
 life. 
 
 Jerry Simpson was so inately and un- 
 swervingly democratic that he could not be 
 
 62 
 
JEEKY SIMPSON^. 
 
 other than Eepublican in politics — in those 
 days. He cast his first vote in 1864 for 
 Abraham Lincoln. 
 
 Jerry's early passion for books was suc- 
 ceeded by devotion to newspapers and such 
 current literature as bore upon social and 
 political problems. Among his treasures 
 that went down with the "J. H. Kutter" 
 were some bound volumes of the Congres- 
 sional Eecord which he had read in quest 
 of information as to what the great Ameri- 
 can statesmen, in whom he religiously be- 
 lieved, proposed to do in the w\^.y of safe- 
 guarding the rights and fortunes of the 
 whole people. 
 
 With a view to the comfort of his 
 family, Captain Simpson re^ig-ned his com- 
 naand and bade final goodby to life on the 
 Lakes. He located temporarily in northern 
 Lidiana, at the time when the Grange was 
 
 63 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 ii! the liigh noon of its nseful days. The 
 story of the solid service rendered to Ameri- 
 can progress by that farmer organization is 
 not half well enough known. Wherever 
 rural life was touched by the wisdom and the 
 poetry of the Grange, there homes were em- 
 bellished, individual life ennobled and social 
 ccmsciousness aroused. The graces and the 
 prosaic practicalities were alike cultivated 
 by the Grange. It was through the Grange 
 that the American farmers as a class made 
 their first incursion into the economics of co- 
 operation and railway transportation. In 
 all these Grange studies, Jerry Simpson was 
 an eager and thorough student. His clear 
 swift logic took him unbewildered, straight 
 through the mazes of discussion on the 
 money question. The sophistry and technics 
 of the money craft left him undazed. 
 Straightway he put the broad test of fair 
 
 54 
 
JEEEY SIMPSON. 
 
 play to money manipulation. He found the 
 system lacking justice in its usage and ap- 
 plication; it fostered special privileges — 
 hence his vote for Peter Cooper, Green- 
 lacker. 
 
 Jerry Simpson did not ^'drift" to Kan- 
 sas. He never drifted anywhere. He con- 
 sulted a purposeful chart. The great story 
 of Kansas — the birthmarks of the young 
 state, baptized in freedom's blood, appealed 
 to him. In 1878 he came to Jackson County, 
 its superb country, its rich possibilities, won 
 him. Here, said he, will I cast my lot and 
 build a home for my loved ones. The 
 crushing sorrow of a swift coming day cast 
 no shadow over that laughing landscape. 
 Jane, little Hallie and baby Lester were 
 there and Jerry was in love with life on 
 land or sea. Years afterward, when Vic- . 
 tor Murdock asked him why he came to Kan- 
 
 55 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 sas, Jerry replied: ''The magic of a Jcer- 
 nel, the untclicraft in a seed; the desire to 
 put something into the ground and see it 
 grow and reproduce its hind. That's why I 
 came to Kansas/' 
 
 Presently the Knights of Labor came 
 to bring to the toilers in the American shops 
 and factories something of the unification 
 and enlightment which the Grange had 
 brought to the farmers. The noble motto of 
 the organization: ^^An injury to one is the 
 concern of all," found swift response in 
 Jerry's justice-loving soul. Hence, his 
 affiliation with the Union Labor party fol- 
 lowed as inevitably as night follows the day. 
 About this period in the political evolu- 
 tion of Jerry Simpson, he came upon Henry 
 George's Progress and Poverty. Then, in- 
 deed, he knew he had found, in all its re- 
 ligious heights and depths, his own abiding, 
 
 66 
 
JEEEY SIMPSOK 
 
 political gospel. When lie finished reading 
 the book he declared his convictions as fol- 
 lows : Systems of finance, methods of trans- 
 portation, however important to human pro- 
 gress, are but conveniences of the passing 
 time; governments may deal with them in 
 accordance with the shifting conditions of 
 a growing civilization. But the great neces- 
 saries of human existence grow in the 
 ground, hence the first and greatest obliga- 
 tion of government is to secure freedom of 
 land to all the people. With this solid base 
 upon which to operate, all that is essential 
 to the orderly development of society will 
 follow. This bounteous, beautiful, bread- 
 giving earth is mother to all God^s family; 
 Avhom God hath joined let no man put as- 
 under. 
 
 He had early observed the retrogres- 
 sion of political parties after the first clean 
 
 57 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 years of organization for their specific pur- 
 poses; and so he read them all his declara- 
 tion of independence. ^'Parties/' said he, 
 ^'are born for principles, not principles for 
 parties, they are merely ladders upon which 
 truth and wisdom may climb for a season." 
 So, is it not clear, that the political march 
 of Jerry Simpson, first Republican, then 
 Greenbacker, then Union Labor, finally Sin- 
 gle Taxer, was a steady and orderly proces- 
 sion in the onward struggle for justice and 
 fair play ? It was, moreover, a thorough, 
 though unconscious schooling for a part 
 that he was later on to play in a great na- 
 tional drama. 
 
 58 
 
THE FARMEKS ALLIAIN^CE. 
 
VIII. 
 
 The Farmers* Alliance. 
 
 The Grange had been in about ten 
 j'ears of decline when the Farmers' Alliance 
 came into existence. Those ten intervening 
 years of toil, early and late, in the cotton 
 fields of the sunny South, and in the wheat 
 and corn fields of the boundless West, h:id 
 made life a little grayer, a little less buoy- 
 ant for the farmer folk. They were brought 
 to face the fact that they were not getting 
 ahead in the great world of prosperity in 
 proportion to tlie labor they performed or 
 the service they rendered. So they went 
 into the Alliance to figure out what to d.-> 
 about it.' The Grange was full of poetry; 
 the Alliance was full of politics. 
 
 61 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 Looking back upon the stirring national 
 drama which the American farmers placed 
 upon the boards at that time, one sees that the 
 comedy was furnished by the spectators — ^the 
 outsiders upon whom blank consternation fell 
 as they saw the farmers I^orth and South 
 flouting old sectionalism, invading politics, 
 shouting their demands, singing their gospel 
 songs, and disporting themselves like conquer- 
 ing hosts. The hitherto docile farmer was in 
 rebellion. He said that he came into town 
 asking how much he might have for the things 
 he had to sell, and how much he must give 
 
 for the things he had to buy. He said he was 
 an anomaly in all the world of trade and 
 
 commercialism; he was a questioner at both 
 
 » 
 
 ends of the bargain. He must say by your 
 leave, sirs, to speculators in cotton and grain, 
 and, by your leave, sirs, to protected manu- 
 facturers who held what other goods his daily 
 needs required. 
 
 62 
 
JEREY SIMPSO:^. 
 
 There were many smaller, localized, un- 
 related farmer organizations preceeding tlie 
 x\lliance. The "Farmers Mutual Benefit As- 
 sociation, the Agricultural "WTieel, and, Farm- 
 ers Unions, in nearly every state in the 
 Union. There were men of ability and of 
 broad intelligence in each of the organiza- 
 tions who saw the futility and the folly of 
 their isolation and its consequent impotency 
 to correct the injustice of which they com- 
 plained. 
 
 A call was sent to all the farmers organ- 
 izations in the country to meet at St. Louis, 
 in 1889, to effect consolidation. 
 
 The Farmers Alliance of the South was 
 the best organized, so the strength and num- 
 bers of the other organizations went to that 
 one. It was then that speculators, politi- 
 cians, and manipulators in general sat up 
 and took notice. 
 
 63 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 ' The new Alliance had a ritual, pass words, 
 grips, signs, dnes, and other unknown quan- 
 tities with which the unhorny-handed wore 
 not on speaking terms. The Alliance had a 
 religious tone. The official list of each lodge 
 included a chaplain. The meetings were 
 prayer opened and benediction closed. There 
 was a burial service; an oj^ligation to care 
 for the sick and to aid the needy. Moreover, 
 there was a national organ, able and astute, 
 published at the national capital. There 
 were state and county newspapers, exponents 
 of Alliance principles, in nearly every state, 
 South and West. The consolidated organiz- 
 ation formulated specific demands related to 
 national legislation. There Avas a national 
 Alliance Lecturer whose business it was to 
 systematize and unify instruction relative to 
 their legislative demands. Each state, each 
 county, and each lodge had its own especial 
 
 64 
 
JEEEY SIMPSOK. 
 
 lecturer who must pass along the instructions 
 concerning the farmers demands. Thus the 
 Alliance became a school of economics. It 
 was a masterly method, and its momentum 
 was stupenduous. 
 
 Besides the farmer and his Avife and sons 
 and daughters, there were eligible to mem- 
 bership, the country doctor, country parson, 
 the country school teacher, and editors of 
 newspapers devoted to the demands of the 
 Alliance. 
 
 In 1890, at Ocala, Florida, the Farm- 
 er's Alliance added, ^'Industrial Union," to 
 its name, and received to membership the 
 workers from the shops, the factories and 
 mines. This list very nearly calls the roll 
 of essential service to any community or 
 country. It would seem that in all reason 
 these useful and desirable citizens might de- 
 mand financial legislation which would place 
 
 65 
 
THE STOEY OF 
 
 the money of tlie nation as easily at their 
 convenience as it was at the convenience of 
 the legislation-favored classes. It would 
 seem within reason that they might demand 
 of their representatives in Congress such 
 legislation as would restrain the transporta- 
 tion companies from taking all the toll the 
 traffic would bear. It would seem to be 
 within the realm of reason that all these use- 
 ful citizens might demand that the land, 
 with all its treasures of forests, mines and 
 fertile fields, should be safe-guarded against 
 the rapacious speculator and the greedy grab- 
 ber so that there might be a heritage within 
 the reach of their children and their child- 
 ren's children. 
 
 "Money, Land and Transportation ;" these 
 were the vital themes which engaged the 
 thought and employed the speech of Alliance 
 members for two solid years. And they were 
 
 66 
 
JEERY SIMPSOK 
 
 years of systematic, simultaneous study such 
 as had never before engrossed that class of 
 citizens in any nation in all the civilized 
 world. 
 
 Jerry Simpson was at that time living 
 on his ranch in Barber County, near Medi- 
 cine Lodge. The Alliance claimed him. He 
 was prepared by years of thought, reading 
 and experience. He was by nature and by 
 most genial personality deserving of the ex- 
 traordinary fealty and affectionate regard 
 of his neighbors. 
 
 And thus the curtain rose upon the pro- 
 logue of a greater part for Jerry Simpson 
 than any prophet had foretold. 
 
 67 
 
AN ALLIANCE NEMESIS. 
 
IX. 
 
 An Alliance Nemesis. 
 
 Out in western Kansas, one day in 1890, 
 a great crowd was gathered in a grove where 
 a two days political picnic was in progress. 
 Out of the Farmers Alliance there had grown 
 a new political party. 
 
 Kansas had been bom, christened and 
 baptized Republican, and would stay so 
 world without end, so thought all men and 
 women outside of the Alliance. 
 
 This particular meeting had been gotten 
 up by the new ^'Peoples Party." An invita- 
 tion had been sent to Colonel Phillips, the 
 Republican candidate for Congress from the 
 Fifth District, to meet John Davis, the 
 Peoples Party candidate, in joint debate. 
 
 Colonel Phillips was at that time holding 
 
 71 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 a seat in Congress. He had tlie prestige of 
 official position. Moreover he was personally 
 popular. He was erudite, suave, and elo- 
 quent. 
 
 John Davis, the Peoples Party candi- 
 date, was able, dignified, and greatly es- 
 teemed, but he lacked platform experience 
 and the personal polish of his opponent. 
 
 A large percentage of the new party 
 men present at this gathering had voted times 
 before for Colonel Phillips. Party ties are 
 strong. The situation was tense. Both 
 candidates had spoken. Colonel Phillips 
 had surpassed himself in fervid presentation 
 of the claims of the dear old Republican 
 Partv that Abraham Lincoln loved so well. 
 The dense crowd had listened spell bound. 
 It seemed to the Republican orator, as he 
 closed with a matchless peroration, and sat 
 down flushed and glowing, that he had re- 
 
 72 
 
JEEKY SIMPSO:Nr. 
 
 captured the voters and won the victory. It 
 did not seem to count that there was no 
 noisy demonstration. The solemn silence 
 gave even better promise than applause. 
 
 Hardly was Colonel Phillips seated, 
 when way at the back of the crowd, a high- 
 pitched voice sent out a shrill, long-drawn, 
 quavering cry, which shivered through the 
 crowd as if freighted with anguish and alarm: 
 '^Say you I Say you ! Say you !" 
 Turning to whence the strange challenge 
 came, there towered the tall, guant figure of 
 an old woman. With calico sunbonnet 
 pushed back from her grizzled head, with 
 piteously poor apparel, she stood a very sym- 
 bol of ill-requited labor. With face aflame, 
 with long, bony arm stretched at length, with 
 toil-distorted hand, and fearsome forefinger 
 pointed at the perspiring orator, as if sum- 
 moning him before the bar of eternal justice, 
 
 73 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 she continued her weird chant : 
 
 "Say you ! It aint no use you a-talkin', 
 an' a-talkin', an' a-talkin'. It aint no use 
 you a-talkin', you aint never Done nothin' 
 for Us, an' you never v^ill." 
 
 If any Alliance man in all that crowd 
 had wavered under the spell of Colonel Phil- 
 lips' eloquence ; if there had been any tugging 
 of heart strings toward old and cherished 
 party affiliations, they were called ofF by that 
 weird arraignment. 
 
 The crowd was silent no longer. Cheer 
 upon cheer, shout upon shout, a perfect whirl 
 of ecstatic acclaim told Colonel Phillips that 
 he had lost the day — even as on a later day, 
 he lost the election to Congress. 
 
 74 
 
THE PEOPLE'S PAETY. 
 
X. 
 
 The People's Party. 
 
 Eemembering the great beginnings of 
 Kansas — how there had foregathered on her 
 freedom-consecrated soil, men sublimely pur- 
 posed to live or die for justice, it was surely 
 befitting that the 'Teople's Party" should 
 have its genesis in that state. 
 
 Victor Hugo said of the Battle of Water- 
 loo, ^'It was not a battle, it was a great change 
 of front of the universe." 
 
 Likewise, this People's Party was not, 
 viewed as to its significant portent and its ul- 
 timate destiny, a mere political party. It 
 was a movement vrhich projected a new prin- 
 ciple into the policies of the nation. 
 
 77 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 The People's Party declared for govern- 
 ment o^vnersliip of railways and telegraphs. 
 This brought forward the fundamental doc- 
 trine of public 0T\Tiership of public utilities. 
 
 The widespread discussion on this line 
 brought out the ethics as w^ell as the econo- 
 mics of collective ownership. 
 
 The elimination of private profit from 
 public service was urged as a corrective of 
 legislation corruption and of personal demor- 
 alization. 
 
 Temptation to unwholesome accumula- 
 tion lurks in the strong box of profits. 
 
 With profits deflected from the private 
 purse to the public use, the tricks of the 
 tempter and the tempted would pass into ob- 
 solescence and private and public morals 
 would rise from the dust of the old regime. 
 
 Public OAvnership was further urged as 
 a means whereby the manual laborer, en- 
 
 78 
 
JERRY SIMPSON. 
 
 gaged in the operation of enterprises of great 
 magnitude, might secure the national guaran- 
 tee of shortened toil and adequate remuner- 
 ation. 
 
 For the first time in the life of the 
 great Republic there was a political organiza- 
 tion which grappled directly and fundamen- 
 tally with the gross injustice which marked 
 the dealings between Exploiters and the Ex- 
 ploited in the realm of industrialism. It 
 marked the beginning of an entire change of 
 front of things Governmental in relation to 
 to the Server and the Served. 
 
 All this is true to history, despite the 
 fact, that the written platforms of the Peoples 
 Party made but partial statement of the 
 basic theory. Nor does it change the great 
 fact because a multitude of men inside the 
 party ranks were unillumined as to the scope 
 of its mission. Nor yet does it count against 
 
 79 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 the truth, to note that the mere party died; 
 that it accomplished little directly in legis- 
 lation, and that the ^vhole stirring drama has 
 passed into reminisence. 
 
 It is withal true, that in 1890, in Kan- 
 sas, there was articulated, in political party 
 vernacular, the cry of the human, seeking 
 relief from ages-old burdens. Dumb drudg- 
 ery was climbing painfully from its abyss. 
 
 To the low browed artizan of stuntc3d 
 life, to 
 
 "The motherless girl, whose fingers thin, 
 Push from her faintly, want and sin" 
 — to such as these, the new party called out : 
 '^I am coming to the rescue : the great relief 
 march is begun. Someday, somehow, such 
 as ye are shall no more make moan, in this 
 fair, sweet world, so overfull of God's rich, 
 bounteous stores. 
 
 Jerry Simpson, gifted by nature with 
 
 80 
 
JEKEY SIMPSON. 
 
 sympatliy and imegination, mentally enriched 
 by a wide range of reading, spiritually il- 
 lumined by the religious fervor of Henrx 
 George's gospel, and made thrice tenderwiso 
 toward all sorrow — toward all suffering — by 
 the great grief that had crushed into his life, 
 was to the front among those who knew the 
 full freighted meaning and the inexorable 
 purpose of the new party. He knew that 
 despite its stammerings, its half uttered 
 truths, its timid baitings in the face of ven- 
 ture and its blemishes of personnel, it was 
 still the progenitor of a new order and a new 
 time when equity and righteousness among 
 all people would prevail. In his speech at 
 the inauguration of Governor Lewelling, he 
 snid: ''Today we are witnessing the install- 
 ation of the first People's Governor on earth." 
 The first defiant move of the political 
 revolution of 1890, was made at Hill City, 
 
 81 
 
THE STOEY OF 
 
 Kansas. There the Alliance took the bit in 
 its teeth, locked the lodge doors against nn- 
 sanctified outsiders, took up the pass word 
 from the brethren and proceeded to nominate 
 William Baker, one of their very own, a 
 tiller of the soil, a non politician, for their 
 representative to Congress. 
 
 Oh, what a howl was there, my country- 
 men! The constitution and all other things 
 patriotic and polite had been flouted. Poli- 
 ticians and other unthinking folk were scan- 
 dalized — even livid with rage. But you see, 
 the Alliance men were in battle array for 
 fair play in legislation, they were intent up- 
 on safe-guarding themselves against the se- 
 ductive eloquence, the parliamentary tactics 
 and the oiled maneuvers of the wily politi- 
 cians who had theretofore dominated, flatter- 
 ed and — betrayed them. Moreover, there 
 were the Alliance women, also in holy 
 
 82 
 
JEEEY SIMPSON. 
 
 earnest. They saw straight through the 
 ■economic issues to their effects upon their 
 hearthsides and their younglings. The white 
 hot zeal of those electric days was fed to ful- 
 ness by the wives, mothers and daughters of 
 the voters. It was the women who cooked 
 the picnic good things, who sang the Alliance 
 songs, marched in the parades and never 
 once played Lot's wife on the party question. 
 
 The constitution was not again assaulted 
 by an Alliance nomination. The state was 
 rapidly organized with due regard to party 
 law and order. County, congressional and 
 state tickets, were named and the fight was 
 on. And what a fight it was. ISTo time, 
 away from armed and bloody conflict, had 
 ever seen its like. 
 
 Throughout that historic summer and 
 fall of 1890, the great mass meetings of the 
 party were held in ''God's first temples." 
 
 83 
 
THE STOEY OF 
 
 The solemn prayers, the fervid exhortations 
 full of stories of the distressed, the homeless 
 and the helpless every^vhere, made the major- 
 ity of the meetings more like religious re- 
 vivals than like unto any ever before known 
 in the realm of politics. 
 
 Emerson was being verified : "Every 
 reform is at heart religious." 
 
 The opponents of the Peoples Party 
 strove to brand it as unpatriotic — yea, even 
 aw an abettor and hatchery of treason. A 
 pretext was found in the official roster of the 
 National Farmers Alliance, whose president 
 was Colonel L. L. Polk, of I^orth Carolina. 
 
 Colonel Polk came to Kansas at the 
 behest of the State Alliance. He was gentle, 
 humane and full of love toward his fellow 
 men, but, being Southern born and bred, he 
 had been an officer in the Confederate Army. 
 Well, the spasms of rage that distorted cer- 
 
 84 
 
JEEEY SIMPSO]^. 
 
 tain patriots, were painful to look upon. 
 You really would not have thought that patri- 
 otism could act that way upon the human 
 system. Still, when you stop to think, some 
 answer to the arguments of the new party 
 had to he made, so, in lieu of relevancy, the 
 cry, '^rebellion redivivus,'' was perhaps about 
 the best that could be done. 
 
 Jerry Simpson talked back at this treas- 
 on charge, after this fashion. ^'You Repub- 
 lican fellows are mightily afraid of the ghosts 
 of Eebel Brigadiers, you ought to get over it. 
 Brace up, the war is over. The flag's a-wav- 
 ing do^vn South. My gentle sirs, put on your 
 goggles and watch the buccaneers of Wall 
 Street; the brigands of the tariff; and the 
 whole shootin' match of grain gamblers, land 
 grabbers, and Government sneak thieves, be- 
 fore they steal you blind. Fire away at 
 them and don't get nightmares over Rebel 
 
 85 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 Brigadiers." 
 
 The first platform of the Peoples Party 
 had a declaration favoring the pensioning of 
 all honorably discharged soldiers. One time, 
 a debate was arranged, with two Republican 
 lawyers on one side, and a Peoples Party 
 woman, on the other. Courtesy prevailed; 
 but one of the legal gentlemen ])lended with 
 his personal compliments, a note of sorrow- 
 that the most estimable lady, his opponent, 
 herself, no doubt, a patriot, should be so woe- 
 fully misled — so dangerously hypnotize'! 
 into rank treason by ''Brigadier General'' 
 Polk. In ponderous proof, thereof, he read 
 from the Peoples Party platform, the declara- 
 tion anent the pensioning of all honorably 
 discharged soldiers. With waring forefinger 
 and all but trickling tears, he besought the 
 lady to notice the absence of the word 
 "union" which should have been prefixed to 
 
 86 
 
JEEKY SIMPSOIT. 
 
 ^'soldier." So, there it stood, in all its 
 naked treason — the black design of Eebel- 
 dom, whose dupes and tools, we Kansans 
 were. The Southern purpose, plainly being, 
 to pension their confederate soldiers. And 
 then, the speaker sat him down, as if o'er- 
 come by the deadly peril to his country. 
 
 The hall was densely packed, a crowd 
 stood outside the open windows, and from 
 thence a ''hayseed" voice piped out: "Oh, 
 come off! Don't you know them there John- 
 ny Rebs aint honorably discharged soldiers, 
 they're prisoners on parole. Any fool might 
 'a kno^^Ti that." 
 
 When the cheers subsided, the lady 
 speaker laughingly recited a list, well nigh a 
 dozen long, of truly Rebel Brigadiers who 
 long had been perched high in national Re- 
 publican office and tow^ard whom her alarmed 
 and tearful monitor had doubtless never cast 
 
 87 
 
THE STOEY OF 
 
 one glance of terror in all the years of their 
 
 most honored incumbency. 
 
 A little book, ^'Seven Financial Conspir- 
 acies," figured as a favorite reference in the 
 
 Peoples Party. It was the target of much 
 scornful. Republican speech — '^all silly 
 tales,' ' they said. \Vhereat, the Peoples 
 Party man would strike an attitude and 
 orate lustily, quoting Republican Senator 
 Plumb : "Wall Street and the United States 
 Treasury are in partnership and these con- 
 spiracies will breed revolution." 
 
 Republicans frequently taunted the new 
 party men with base ingratitude in leaving 
 the grand old party of ''Protection." Where- 
 at the taunted ones would jauntily toss back 
 a quotation from Republican Senator Ingalls : 
 ''The. tariff is of no more consequence than 
 a fly on a cart wheel ; it is an instrument for 
 tomfoolery and juggling." 
 
 88 
 
JEKEY SIMPSON. 
 
 Oh, they were posted, those hayseeds 
 and clodhoppers of 1890, and when Repuhli- 
 cans attacked them 
 
 "They mocked 'em and they shocked 'em 
 An' they said they didn't care." 
 
 But in their heart of hearts, they did 
 care. It was no light thing to break the 
 party ties of a lifetime. There were old 
 Republicans whose faces sometimes took on 
 the pallor of the coffin time as they sang, 
 '-'Good-by Old Party, Good-by." And by that 
 token you may know how strong was their 
 belief in the principles and purposes of the 
 new party. 
 
 The strangest thing of all, was the mis- 
 understanding of hosts of good men and 
 women who, had their hour of awakening 
 but arrived, would have been with the move- 
 ment, heart and hand. Ten years or so later, 
 when many, very many, of these same people 
 
 89 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 became alarmed by the devastations of com- 
 mercial combinations, incensed by corrupt 
 officialdom, and outraged by flagrant favorit- 
 ism in legislation, they courageously took up 
 the task of working out the problems and 
 carrying on the work so startlingly begun in 
 1890. 
 
 It was the quickened fraternalism, the 
 perfervid fellowship with all the hosts of 
 back-bent men whose lives were filled from 
 birth to death with ill requited toil; it was 
 the tender sympathy with overburdened 
 womanhood, with defrauded childhood; in 
 short, it was the keen, biting sense of the 
 injustice of it all, that made the new party 
 invincible and prolonged its career until it 
 had innoculated the older parties, and the 
 whole nation had risen to a higher level of 
 understanding of wrongs which press upon 
 humanity and of evil ways which menace 
 
JEEKY SIMPSON. 
 
 national integrity. 
 
 Greatly blessed were the men and 
 women of that epoch in American history, 
 who, through propinquity or prescience, were 
 privileged to be in and of the Peoples Party. 
 
 91 
 
THE PERSOlS^Is^EL OF THE PEO- 
 PLE'S PARTY. 
 
XI. 
 
 The Personnel of the People's Party. 
 
 The personnel of the Peoples Party 
 typified the entire social state. 
 
 It ranged all the way from the un- 
 lettered toilers, whose lives of deprivation 
 had stranded them in illiteracy, poverty of 
 speech and uncouth manors, on to the very 
 flower of American culture, intellectual 
 greatness, refinement and social standing. 
 
 Henry D. Lloyd, Hamlin Garland, B. 
 O. Flower, Eev. D. P. Bliss, Professor 
 Frank Parsons and Ignatius Donnelly were 
 among the pioneer propagandists. 
 
 95 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 In Kansas, among lawyers who were 
 with the party from the first, were Judge 
 Frank Doster Rnd G. C. Clemens, whom bnt 
 to name is to announce superiority. 
 
 Among the scores of newspaper men, 
 whose writings served to mold and unify the 
 new party sentiment. There were the Vincent 
 Brothers — reformers, blood and bone. There 
 was John Davis, with many years of solid 
 service. There was Dr. McLallin, clear 
 brained and dependable as the polar-star. 
 
 Dr. McLallin's paper, the Advocate, was 
 first the official organ of the Alliance and 
 later the official paper of the Peoples Party. 
 In those turbulent, uncertain days, when the 
 daily press purveyed the wildest rumors, the 
 bitterest personalities and reports afar from 
 facts; the new party folk would read, shake 
 their heads in doubt or derision, and remark : 
 '^ We'll wait until the Advocate comes, then 
 
 96 
 
JERRY SIMPSOIT. 
 
 we'll know the straight truth about it all." 
 
 Very many of the early speakers rose 
 through fervor, sincerity and clear statement 
 to great speech — at times, to eloquence; but 
 transcending all in oratorical power there 
 was Mary Elizabeth Lease. 
 
 Ah, how the fingers of the writer of this 
 stor^^, throb with desire, which must be 
 denied, to write herein honored names, num- 
 bering into thousands, of great souled Kan- 
 sas men and women, personally esteemed and 
 affectionately remembered, who were enlisted 
 in the great Crusade of 1890. 
 
 Upon the farms and in the ranks of 
 labor, were mcii and ^vomen of fine education 
 and choice culture. And among those less 
 fortunate, it must not be inferred, that the 
 superficial thing which is named, illiteracy, 
 necessarily betokens ignorance or coarseness 
 of character. Incorrect speech, even small 
 
 97 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 acquaintance with books, tells no sure storv, 
 save one of lack of schooling or untoward 
 circumstance. 
 
 Nothing short of taking a club and beat- 
 ing Jerry Simpson into insensibility and 
 ii:to a change of individuality conld ever have 
 taught him how to spell or to refrnin from 
 wholly unprecedented pronunciation of cer- 
 tain words. Read in' and 'rithmetic were 
 his, but spellin' and writin' were alien and 
 hostile. And yet he reveled in the choicest 
 literature. Stevenson enthralled him, Kip- 
 ling delighted him Tenuvr^on enraptured him 
 Emerson inspired him, Dickens was his very 
 own. History, Philosophy, and Social Sci- 
 ence were included in his wide range of 
 reading. And still, it is doubtless true, as 
 was charged by a political foe, that he some- 
 times misspelled the name of the town in 
 which he lived. Jerry smilingly drawled 
 
 98 
 
JEKEY SIMPSON. 
 
 out in reply to this taunt : "Well, maybe I 
 don't always spell the name of that town just 
 right, but I wouldn't give a cent for a man 
 who couldn't spell a word more than one 
 way." 
 
 The common sense, the good judgment, 
 the first hand knowledge, born of observation 
 or experience, diffused among the rank and 
 file of this phalanx of the nation's useful 
 citizens challenge comparison with any pro- 
 ceeding political party. 
 
 The party issues were no mere hear-say 
 stories, no matters of indirect concern. The 
 things complained of, wefe things they had 
 experienced. The remedies they asked for 
 had been considered day by day, and year by 
 year. 
 
 All of this is to the good. ISTow, what 
 should history say as to the personal unworth, 
 
 99 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 self-seeking, or base design in the new party ? 
 Merely this ; that it was of small percentage, 
 existent as a negligible quantity at the out- 
 set, but perchance, as has ever been the way 
 of parties, augmented as victory and success 
 attracted and tempted the vanity or cupidity 
 of human nature. 
 
 100 
 
SOGKLESS SOCKATES x\ND PRmCE 
 
 HAL. 
 
XII. 
 
 SocTcless Socrates and Prince Hoi. 
 
 Here he stands, the Sockless Socrates of 
 1890, before a vast crowd of fellow citizens. 
 Many of them are applauding wildly; some 
 are silent, sullen and hostile. The faces of 
 the approving ones are luminous — alive with 
 joy. Most of the applauders have been pas- 
 sion-swept by worship of political idols in 
 former days, but this time it is different; 
 their other great men were a trifle aloof — 
 just enough aloof to make it very blissful to 
 be numbered among their marching torch 
 bearers and to be spoken to by the great one 
 '^just as common-like as if he were one of 
 us." But this time, as to Jerry — well he 
 is their very o\\ti, they are thrilled 
 
 103 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 by a sense of kinship, they feel it in 
 the marrow of their bones. The kin- 
 ship is closer than that of craft or 
 vocation; it is born of sincerest champion- 
 ship. Jerry Simpson is the voice of their 
 needs, their burdens, their longings, their 
 hopes, their aspirations, and on him they rest 
 in perfect fullness of belief: He bespeaks 
 a better dav : He heralds a new era of an all 
 embracing fraternity. There is no quiver 
 of doubt in his tone for he too believes 
 through all the innermost reaches of his be- 
 ing. 
 
 Notice as he comes to the platform front 
 his slightly lurching gait, reminescent of 
 sailor days, his muscular build, his broad 
 shoulders, his lithe, supple frame. He is an 
 athlete. His face is a blend of rugged 
 strength and keen intelligence. His clear, 
 bro^Ti eyes look men and measures squarely 
 
 104 
 
.TERKY SIMPSO:Nr. 
 
 in the face. There is no flutter of self- 
 consciousness nor any self-assertion in his 
 manner. jSTo man ever faced crowds of his 
 fellow men with more serene, unshakable 
 confidence in the eternal verity of the mes- 
 sage he bore. 
 
 But there is something besides sym- 
 pathy, something other than exhaltation of 
 spirit that Jerry's audiences expect: they 
 expect to be entertained — to be wrenched by 
 aching laughter. And so the applause is 
 prolonged, it rises to a roar, it breaks into a 
 laugh before a word is said. And then the 
 earnest, half -sad face that Jerry brought to 
 the front begins to glow as if from some 
 warm light back of the features, the brown 
 eyes twinkle mischievously, he responds to 
 the call — he is himself amused. His firm 
 mouth widens into a straight line across his 
 face and, well, it must be said, he is grinning. 
 
 105 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 Truly "grin" is not a dignified word but 
 there is none other nearer to veracions des- 
 cription. If ever there was another man 
 who could grin and not look weak or silly the 
 writer of this story never heard of him. 
 'i'his grin was purely a Jerryesqne achieve- 
 ment. It was the most mirth provoking 
 facial expression ever presented to a helpless 
 audience. It did not suggest buffoonery nor 
 hint of the harlequin. You saw before you 
 just a big, good natured boy and you laughed, 
 not at, but with him. And right then was 
 the moment for the sullen ones to reinforce 
 their disapproval, to rebarricade their hostile 
 grounds lest they be drawn within the in- 
 fluence of this strange, irresistable man. Lest 
 they listen with minds too open to the swiftly 
 flashing changes of the Sockless Socrates as 
 he passes from comedy to argument; to con- 
 cise statement of facts; to pathetic story of 
 
 106 
 
JEEEY SIMPSOI^. 
 
 huirian misery; to appeal to love of country; 
 to prophecy of better days when God's 
 abounding stores shall be justly apportioned 
 to all gladsome workers. 
 
 The Sockless Socrates kncAv that tlie 
 first part of the great task set for those whose 
 political creeds were like his own was to clear 
 the way; to expose misdeeds and to arraign 
 misdoers. So he accuses, assails, batters 
 and ridicules without stint and apparently 
 without mercy. Yet ever there is back of his 
 stinging sarcasm, back of his flashing furj 
 a personal note of gentleness as if above all 
 he felt the great pity of it and as if he held 
 an abiding conviction that there was more of 
 good than of evil even among those whom he 
 arraigned. 
 
 In his first campaign for Congress Jer- 
 ry had for his opponent Colonel James R. 
 Hallo well, one time United States Attorney 
 
 107 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 and a distingiiislied corporation lawyer. Col. 
 Hallowell was college bred, a polished orator, 
 a high social favorite and a most fastidious 
 dresser. His extreme personal aloofness and 
 iinlikeness to the great majority of the rural 
 constituents he sought to represent in Con- 
 gress gave Jerry much leverage among the 
 voters he addressed. The Republican press 
 teemed with reckless characterization of 
 Jerry as a cIo^^ti, an ignoramus, a boor and a 
 rag-a-muffin. Jerry retorted by nicknaming 
 his opponent 'Trince HalL'' ^'This prince 
 of royal blood," said Jerry, ''travels in his 
 special car, his dainty person is gorgeously 
 bedizened, his soft white hands are pretty 
 things to look at, his tender feet are encased 
 in fine silk hosiery, what does he know of 
 the life and the toil of such plow-handlers 
 as we are ? I can't represent you in Con- 
 gress with silk stockings — I can't afford to 
 
 108 
 
JEEEY SIMPSOK 
 
 wear 'em.'' 
 
 Straightway from the fertile pen of 
 Victor Murdock, then a youthful reporter, 
 now Jerry Simpson's successor in Congress, 
 the story flew and the title ^'Sockless Jerry" 
 grew. Later, William Allen White elimin- 
 ated "Jerry" and substituted "Socrates." 
 Jerry joined in the fun and jollity which 
 the campaign croAvds got out of it, although 
 in later days the "sockless" story became irk- 
 some because of the many coarse and un- 
 warranted variations it underwent. 
 
 Those were days of parades, miles upon 
 miles long. Those on Jerry's side far out- 
 sized and out-classed the attempts of Prince 
 Hal's friends. The fierv zeal of the friends 
 of Sockless Socrates knew no bounds. Their 
 banners, their bands, their tableaux sur- 
 passed in number and originality anything 
 before exhibited in spectacular campaigning. 
 
 109 
 
THE STOEY OF 
 
 Every political demand was emblazoned on 
 their banners: ^'Down with Wall Street," 
 ^'^Give Us Eifty Dollars Per Capita/' '^Give 
 the farmers as fair a chance as you give the 
 bankers." Floats laden with girls knitting 
 socks for Jerry were in the parades. During 
 the campaign the ^^sockless" candidate was 
 presented with more than three hundred pairs 
 of socks. 
 
 It appeared incredible to the entrenched 
 Eepublicans of the Big 7th District that 
 Jerry Simpson could win over their trained 
 and resourceful candidate. 
 
 Here is the story of Colonel HallowelFs 
 experience with Jerry as told by Col- 
 onel "Marsh" Murdock, one of the most 
 influential Republican editors of that con- 
 gressional district. : ''Our candidate was a 
 crack stump speaker. He was "known all 
 over Kansas as a crack orator. We thought 
 
 110 
 
JEREY SIMPSO^^. 
 
 that Jerry would not dare to face him on the 
 platform, and we knew that if toe could get 
 them together our man would luipe the floor 
 witJi Jerry. . .So we challenged Jerry to joint 
 debate. If he refused we ivere to have the 
 laugh on him. If he accepted he was to he 
 used up. He accepted and arrangements 
 were made for a series of joint meetings. 
 One meeting came off — only one. Our man 
 never appeared at another. V\^hy luith the 
 audiences that turned out ah those meetings 
 our candidate ivasiit any match for Jerry at 
 all.'' 
 
 The ''Big Ttli" had been ''safely'' Ee- 
 iDublican by 14,000 majority, but when the 
 ISTovember votes were counted Prince Hal 
 had lost by nearly 8,000 votes and the Sock- 
 less Socrates had won his seat in Congress. 
 
 Ill 
 
JEEEY ARRIVES AT WASHmGTOlSr. 
 
XIII. 
 
 Jerry Arrives at Washiiigton. 
 
 Enroute to Washington, December 1890, 
 Jerrj Simpson, Congressman-elect, attended 
 that great meeting of the i^ational Farmer's 
 xA-lliance at Ocala, Florida. Unstinted and 
 m.ost lavish entertainment was given by Flori- 
 dians to the convention delegates. No 
 beauty spot in all that land of flowers and 
 orange groves was left imvisited. During 
 all those gala days th;^t counted into w^eeks, 
 at every festal board, ^Jt barbecue, in orange 
 grove, a-sailing do^\T:i St. John's, at morning, 
 noon or night time halting of the special 
 trains, the waiting, welcoming people would 
 call, ^'A speech, a speech from Jerry Simp- 
 ■^on." And every time our Jerry flashed a 
 
 115 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 new, quaint, humorous, little gem of speech. 
 
 Out on the waters of Pensecola Bay as 
 guests of Senator Mallory, Jane and Jerry 
 visited the Life Saving Station and there 
 were greeted by the self same crew who res- 
 cued Captain Simpson and his men from 
 the sinking J. H. Rutter. How strangely 
 human crafts do drift apart, then meet again 
 upon the sea of life. 
 
 At old St. Augustine Jerry was one of 
 the guests entertained at the luxurious Ponce 
 de Leon. With what perfect ease he 
 ada2:)ted himself to those exquisite and ele- 
 gant surroundings. As usual the call came 
 from the citizens assembled in the parlors of 
 the hotel for "a speech from Jerry." His 
 response was a little model of tact and good 
 taste, combining therewith a few serious, il- 
 luminating sentences, anent the mission of 
 the Peoples Party, which meant not to level 
 
 116 
 
JERKY SIMPSON^. 
 
 dovra but to upbuild and to create more and 
 more of art and beauty in the world; and 
 furthermore to give the artisan a chance to 
 become an artist. Why said he, there's none 
 of all this too good or fine for all of us. 
 Then with a quick turn to whimsy he said, 
 "I'm going back to Kansas to sell my last 
 year's crop so I can come back and put up 
 at this hotel for a day." 
 
 As it was through Florida, so it was in 
 'New York when Jerry went to speak to the 
 Single Taxers at Cooper Union — everywhere 
 he won his way to the approval and affection 
 of those w^ho learned to know him. 
 
 At the ISTational Capitol he had been 
 pre-announced as a freak and a boor; yet at 
 the first great public meeting where he spoke 
 the not over friendly reporters were captiv- 
 ated. Said one, "Jerry Simpson is a dia- 
 mond in the rough, he will rival the more 
 
 117 
 
THE STOKY OF 
 
 polished Ingalls as a credit to Kansas." 
 
 Upon the assembling of Congress Jerry 
 was chosen by the little band of Peoples 
 Party and Alliance men, hailing from Min- 
 nesota, Nebraska, Kansas, Georgia, and other 
 Sonthern states, as leader and spokesman for 
 the reform party. Certain old party mem- 
 bers started in to make sport of him and of 
 the new party declarations. In each and 
 every instance the would be tormentors re- 
 tired from the fray with pain and surprise. 
 Jerry's retorts were nearly always good 
 natnred, uttered in quaint, drawling tones 
 and embellished by his choicest grin. Upon 
 rare occasions, however, he would administer 
 a serious rebuke to levity aimed at Peoples 
 Party principles. 
 
 Shortly after Jerry took his seat in Con- 
 gress, an unwitting Pepublican Member 
 sneeringly said: ''Xow give us something 
 
 118 
 
JERRY SIMPS0:NT. 
 
 about your people burning corn." ''Yes," 
 replied Jerry, "tbey did burn corn, and by 
 tlie light of tliat burning corn they read the 
 history of the Republican Party. That is 
 why the Peoples Party carried the state." 
 "No Member of the House ever committed 
 the error of twice attacking Jerry expecting 
 him to fall an easy prey. 
 
 One day a rash young correspondent of 
 an eastern newspaper approaclied Jerry with 
 an air of now-see-me-poke-fun at this Sock- 
 less fellow, and said, ''What do you think of 
 the McKinley bill?" Jerry drew the grin 
 across his face, his eyes shot mischief through 
 his spectacles as he answered, "I am going 
 to look that little m.atter up, and if I find the 
 bill correct I shall vote that it be paid." 
 
 During this his first term in Congress 
 Jerry Simpson was a tireless student and a 
 matchless champion of his political prin- 
 
 119 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 ciples. From the floor of the national House 
 of Representatives he spoke to the whole 
 nation. Thus was the high destiny for 
 which all his years had fitted him heing ful- 
 filled. 
 
 120 
 
SEKATOK LO^^G XNT> JERRY 
 SIMPSOK. 
 
XIV. 
 
 Senator Long and Jerry Simpson. 
 
 Throngh four deeply significant and 
 hotly contested congressional campaigns 
 Chester I. Long of Medicine Lodge, and 
 Jerry Simpson were pitted against each 
 other. Jerry was twic« victorious and twice 
 the victory went to Mr. Long who later be- 
 came United States Senator. 
 
 The early fervor and zeal of Jerry's 
 constituents continued and their admiration 
 and pride in him increased. The full story 
 of those four campaigns given in all their 
 picturesque details would make a volume. 
 
 123 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 No event of its kind in Kansas ever sur- 
 passed in intensity of interest and superheat- 
 ed feelings the series of debates between these 
 tvo Kansans. 
 
 Mr, David Leahey reporting these con- 
 tests said: '^Jerry's fight in those debates 
 was unorganized : Chester's fight was organ- 
 ized. When Mr. Long would leave the 
 hall he v^ould go to his room and lie down 
 and with loyal, intelligent friends would 
 pick flaws in Jerry's arg-uments in hopes of 
 being able to riddle them at the next meet- 
 ing. Jerry, on the contrary, after leaving 
 the hall, would sit do^Mi on a curb stone and 
 talk to the crowd of Populist admirers as 
 unconcernedly as if he had nothing to do 
 with the debates that had everybody's blood 
 at boiling point. He depended altogether 
 upon the knowledge he had been picking up 
 during a life time — knowledge he had stored 
 
 124 
 
JERRY SIMPSON. 
 
 away in his remarkable memory — and upon 
 his sharp wit and barbed and pointed sar- 
 casm. He was a master in the art of illus- 
 trating his points with a story, an art in 
 which Mr. Long was deficient." 
 
 On one never to be forgotten occasion 
 the crowd had assembled ahead of time for 
 the debate in such vast numbers that not only 
 was the auditorium densely packed but all 
 the avenues of approach to the building were 
 blocked l^eyond the possibility of effecting 
 an entrance. Mr. Long had earlier made his 
 way inside, but Jerry with all the aid of the 
 authorities found the path to the front en- 
 trance impenetrable. High up in the rear 
 of the building was a small window, a ladder 
 was brought, Jerry mounted and quickly ap- 
 peared at the small aperture facing the 
 amazed and waiting inside crowd. His face 
 framed as if in a picture on the wall took an 
 
 125 
 
THE STOEY OF 
 
 his classic grin — the effect was indescribable. 
 Delirium swept the crowd as Jerry bodily 
 effected his entrance in the only possible way. 
 Friend and foe alike enjoyed the spectacle, 
 and to this day men tell and laugh with gusto 
 of the great meeting where Jerry got there 
 in that novel fashion. 
 
 About this time it came to be widely 
 noticed that Jerry had a gift so unique that 
 men often pondered on its source and qual- 
 ity. He could without apparent effort or 
 purpose of effect put into his utterance of a 
 single word a fulness of characterization that 
 carried a whole vocabulary of description — a 
 whole gamut of subtle accusation. Psychol- 
 ogy, perchance, could penetrate the mystery 
 of this power, but plain observation left it 
 as unexplained as it was extraordinary. 
 
 'Now Chester I. Long possessed unusual 
 symmetry of feature as well as a fine bearing 
 
 126 
 
THE STOEY OF 
 
 and physique. In one hilarious outburst 
 Jerry was making free with his o^ti lack of 
 personal graces. Pausing a moment he said, 
 ''jSTow, there is — Chester." Well, he put 
 into that one word ''Chester" at least a dozen 
 insinuations — ranging all the way from re- 
 prehensible to criminal. You felt that of 
 all arraignments that ever curdled your emo- 
 tions that contained in the word ''Chester" 
 was surely one you would best like to dodge. 
 And the more it penetrated the more ludi- 
 crous it became. It was intangible. There 
 was nothing to deny — there could be no de- 
 fense. But there lingered an uncanny feel- 
 ing that the lamentable sin and shame of 
 "Chester" was his good looks. 
 
 It was the persuasive personality of Jer- 
 ry Simpson, aside from the subject matter 
 of his speeches, that produced the powerful 
 effect upon his audiences. It is impossible 
 
 127 
 
THE STOKY OF 
 
 to reproduce in story or to retell by quotation 
 of his very words, the humor, the pathos or 
 the prophecy that inhered in the utterance of 
 this remarkable man. 
 
 Governor Hoch said of him, ^'On the 
 stump he was almost irresistible, he could 
 come nearer to making Avhat many of us be- 
 lieved to be error appear to be truth than any 
 one in recent history.'' 
 
 It is not improbable that the Scottish 
 strain in Jerry Simpson's blood gave him his 
 occult power. Certain it is that there was 
 much of the mystic in his makeup. 
 
 There was somewhat in his life known 
 only to his wife, his brother James, and one 
 or two most intimate earlv friends. Poor 
 little "Jane" in the early years of her life 
 with Jerry could not understand why there 
 came upon her husband, hours and 
 sometimes days of Silence — of far- 
 
 128 
 
 J 
 
JERKY SIMPSON. 
 
 awayness — when tliere was for him 
 no reading, few words, not even the 
 c-ornigated brow of thouglit, but only 
 the rapt air of one enthralled by a great 
 stillness. These seasons of silence came less 
 frequently in his later years bnt there grew 
 within him more and more of the Emerson- 
 ian calmness and perfect trust in the benefi- 
 cent universe. The desire to discuss re- 
 ligious creeds, a one time passion with him, 
 ceased. The peace which passeth power, or 
 wish to be put into words came to him in 
 rich plentitude. 
 
 And yet this story to be rounded out 
 must tell of the militant, the virile side of this 
 very human, very modern '^Sockless So- 
 crates." He Avas no plaster saint. He 
 could, on occasion, fight — with his fists. The 
 hearty work he could do in that line would 
 have delighted the boxer-loving Conan Doyte. 
 
 129 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 Mr. Tom Mcl^eal tells this story: "Jer- 
 ry was possessed of a great deal of physical 
 as well as moral courage and during his ex- 
 periences on the Great Lakes he had learned 
 to handle himself well. On one occasion 
 a somewhat heated street corner discussion 
 took place between him and a Medicine 
 Lodge blacksmith by the name of Corson, 
 Corson claimed that Simpson had insulted 
 him and that he intended to whip him. He 
 found Jerry standing in the corner livery 
 stable with his overcoat on and with a pre- 
 liminary word or so struck the future Con- 
 gressman in the face. In a minute Corson 
 was down and out, a badly whipped man. 
 The next year Corson was one of Jerry's 
 most devoted and enthusiastic followers,"' 
 
 In evidence of the non pious language 
 that Jerry sometimes used, Mr. McE'eal tells 
 of at one time expressing his surprise at some 
 
 130 
 
JERKY SIMPSOK. 
 
 of Jerry's views: ''Well/' said Jerry, dry- 
 ly, "I presume I believe a damned sight of 
 things that wonld surprise yon." 
 
 iin 
 
JERRY IX C0:N^GRESS. 
 
XY. 
 
 Jerry in Congress, 
 
 You are a visitor at Washington. You 
 enter the visitors gallery of the House of 
 Representatives. The guide exclaims, ''You 
 are in luck, Jerry Simpson, of Kansas, has 
 the floor.'' You cannot have come from so 
 remote a spot in all the land that you have 
 not heard of Jerry. You may not know, 
 though the guide does, that the House is 
 usually a babel. You can count on the 
 fingers of one hand the Members who can 
 command attention. 
 
 You see a modeishly clad man, just 
 slightly stooped since the rollicking days 
 of the last tournament with Prince Hal. 
 The black hair shows here and there a line 
 of gray. He is not gesticulating, his voice 
 
 136 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 is clear. At rare intervals there is a mis- 
 pronounciation that is more an oddity than 
 an error; more rarely still there is a lapse 
 in grammar — you ]:)arely notice these. The 
 qniet sincerity, the entire genuineness of the 
 man, hold your thought above trivalties. If 
 you were directly facing him you would see 
 that the strong, thoughtful face is sad a? if 
 the sorrows of helpless humanity called to 
 him for relief. And if you knew him well 
 you would know^ that, just as the great sor 
 rows of his times pressed sorely upon tlie 
 tender heart of Abraham Lincoln even 
 when his jests and jokes were readiest, so 
 too is Jerry Simpson ever sore of heart be- 
 cause of his great pity for the cruel buffet- 
 ing of his fellow men. True, he does not 
 make his abiding sympathy the subject of 
 frequent talk, but it is seldom absent from 
 his waking hours. And if you knew him 
 
 136 
 
JEKRY SIMPSON. 
 
 ^^ell you would also know that he is as fine 
 of fibre as he is fearless of speech. He re- 
 sponds to poetry as flowers respond to sun- 
 light. Just now he is speaking to the ques- 
 tion of the admission of New Mexico to the 
 Union. He has tersely stated the facts, he 
 has made a fine appeal to the Democrats 
 and to the Republicans of the House to put 
 aside party considerations, and now he is 
 passing to a not infrequent mood of raph- 
 sody and swift torrential speech. He is not 
 magnetic — he is .electric. He is saying: 
 
 "Ages and ages ago there was a tropical 
 climate in the northern regions and man, 
 along with animals that only live and 
 thrive in the temperature and tropical cli- 
 mate, lived and inhabited that part of the 
 earth. But there came a change. Suddenly 
 down from the northern regions came the 
 biting bLasts of xYrctic winter, and the very 
 air was frozen into ice. Glaciers formed 
 
 137 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 and moved over the earth to the south. Be- 
 fore this irresistible force man was driven 
 to leave his home and haunts, to find new 
 opportunities to supply his wants. From 
 central and western Europe, Scotland, 
 Scandanavia, Switzerland and France men 
 w^ere driven forth to seek new habitations. 
 But though the heat of the sun has long 
 since melted the ice, and the grass is green 
 and the harvests ripened where once was 
 nothing but eternal winter, there is yet a 
 powerful force that is ever pushing the hu- 
 man race onward to find new and unoccu- 
 pied countries, not, however, on the same 
 lines, but along the temperate zone from 
 east to west, they are being driven by an- 
 other resistless power. 
 
 Since prehistoric times populations 
 have moved steadily westward, as De- 
 Tocqueville said, ^^as if driven by the hand 
 of God.'' It was customary in times gone 
 by to lay all the blame on God for the mis- 
 
 138 
 
JEREY SIMPSON. 
 
 fortune of man; but a higher civilization 
 has taught us that nearly all the ills man 
 suffers are attributable to his own ignor- 
 ance of the laws of God. 
 
 This force, that makes him, like the 
 ^'Wandering Jew," ever to be condemned 
 to move onward, is generated by himself. It 
 ifc the outgrowth of a bad system of land 
 tenure, which allows one human being to 
 hold portions of the earth out of use and 
 deny his fellow-man access to the great 
 storehouses of wealth. 
 
 Land monopoly, that has resulted in the 
 depriving of man of the right to live upon 
 land, has had the effect to push him from 
 one end of the globe to the other, and in his 
 flight he has been pushed forward with a 
 steady and resistless force, even as the gla- 
 ciers pushed him from north to south, and 
 his course has been marked by changes upon 
 the earth's surface almost as great as that 
 marked by the course of the mountains of 
 
 139 
 
TPIE STORY OF 
 
 ice. 
 
 From India, Persia, Greece, Italy, Ger- 
 many, France, Spain, Great Britain, and 
 then to the great West, on from Plymouth 
 Rock and Jamestown to the Golden Gate, 
 like the star in the east which guided the 
 three kings with their treasures westward 
 until at length it stood still over the cradle 
 of the young Christ so the star of empire, 
 rising in the East, has ever moved onward, 
 until it has at last rested over what, to my 
 mind, is the treasure-house of the world. 
 
 Men have built cities, railroads, canals, 
 magnificient palaces, yet they find themselves 
 homeless and in a condition to perish, amidst 
 plenty and abundance. They starve within 
 the shadow of the storehouses bursting w^th 
 plenty. 
 
 The opeu road to safety, lies through 
 immigration to those new Territories where 
 men can find unoccupied land, and let lis 
 hope that thereon will be built the happy 
 
 140 
 
JERKY SIMPSO:^. 
 
 homes of millions of people; and let us also 
 hope that, like the heat of the light of the 
 snn that melted the frozen ice in the glaciers, 
 the sunlight of reason and brotherly love 
 will so soften and civilize man that he will 
 not then deprive his fellow-man of the right 
 to live upon the land. The earth belongs to 
 the children of men and should be held for 
 their use.'^ 
 
 William el. Bryan, who was cotcmpor- 
 ary in Congress with Jerry Simpson said, 
 ''Mr. Simpson clarified every subject he dis- 
 cussed. His speeches contained a delight- 
 ful commingling of logic and humor." 
 
 Champ Clark, also a colleague, said, 
 "He was one of the best rough and tumble 
 debaters with whom I have served in my 
 thirteen years in Congress. His wit, humor, 
 sarcasm and wide knowledge of men rend- 
 ered him a master in that difficult field of 
 
 endeavor." 
 
 141 
 
THE STOKY OF 
 
 The Chicago Tribune editorially said, 
 '^ Jerry Simpson was perfectly fearless, he 
 had a ready, pungent wit and a gift for 
 repartee which made him one of the most 
 popular speakers and one of the most feared 
 debaters in the House. He boldly crossed 
 swords with Tom Keed himself who did not 
 always come off from the contests with a 
 whole skin." 
 
 The House greatly enjoyed the bits of 
 comment which Jerry could no more resist 
 interjecting into the turgid speeches of most 
 of the Members, than a frolicsome boy could 
 resist flipping a pebble into a stagnant pool 
 to make it ripple. 
 
 Jerry was a free trader, and never let 
 a chance slip by to puncture the tariff. 
 
 A Member, arguing ponderously for the 
 deepening of harbors, was solemnly asked by 
 Jerry, "why money should be spent on bar- 
 
 142 
 
JEEKY SIMPSON. 
 
 bors to promote foreign trade, and a tariff 
 wall be bnilt to obstruct tbe foreign trade? 
 Why not let the foreigner flounder in the 
 harbor V 
 
 On one memorable occasion, Mr. Ding- 
 lej was making an exhaustive and sentiment- 
 al talk on the tariff as a protector of Ameri- 
 can labor. Acting on the hint of a Eepubli- 
 can Member who enjoyed a joke, Jerry 
 strolled up the aisle and glanced into Mr. 
 Dingley's silk hat that was deposited upon 
 one of the House desks, it bore a London 
 Trade Mark. Jerry with boyish candor 
 asked leave to question Mr. Dingley. He 
 consented and Jerry asked: '^Why, if it be 
 a matter of morals to encourage the home 
 manufacturer, do you buy your fine silk 
 hats from England?" Mr. Dingley floun- 
 dered and the Members roared while he ex- 
 plained that his hat was really made in the 
 
 143 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 United States, but that the London Trade 
 Mark had been used to make it sell. AVhere- 
 at Jerry said, ^^Oh, sir, is it moral to encour- 
 age such deceitful men by buying our hats 
 of them." The House was con^^llsed with 
 laughter, and it was a long time before Mr. 
 Dingley forgave Jerry — but he did — later. 
 No one could hold out against the Kansan's 
 good nature. 
 
 On another uproarously funny occasion, 
 Jerry was making merry with the tariff. 
 'No black and white telling of the story can 
 give the faintest hint of the drollery of man- 
 ner and the bits of talk accompanying the 
 performance : Jerry had bought a coat from 
 a market gardener which he proceeded to tear 
 to pieces with such lack of effort that 'twould 
 seem as if the cloth just fell appart dis- 
 heartened and shamed by the exposure of its 
 
 shoddy quality : This was done to show that 
 
 144 
 
JEKRY SIMPSON. 
 
 shoddy had taken the place of wool in the 
 manufacture of clothes fov the poor, protect- 
 ed laborer. 
 
 One day, Mr. Payne of New York, who 
 had been driven close by one of Jerry's 
 pointed questions said, ^'If I were inclined 
 to be rude, Mr. Speaker, I would answer the 
 foolish query of the gentleman from Kansas, 
 by asking him if his ancestors were mon- 
 keys." 
 
 "In which event," said Jerry, calmly 
 looking at Mr. Payne, "I should reply as did 
 the elder I3umas, when a I^'rench fool asked 
 him the same question. I should say to the 
 gentleman. Yes, your family ends where 
 mine began." 
 
 Jerry once went to the Speaker, Mr. 
 
 Reed, and urged the passage of a private 
 
 pension bill which had come in from the 
 
 Committee vrith an unfavorable report. "The 
 
 145 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 bill affects the fortunes of a poor old widow 
 down in Kansas/' said Jerry. "But, why,'' 
 said Speaker Reed, "do you press this bill 
 when you've been opposing pension bills un- 
 favorably reported." "There are thirty reas- 
 ons why I support this bill," said Jerry, "the 
 first one is that the woman needs the money, 
 — the other twenty-nine I have forgotten."" 
 Speaker Reed recognized Jerry and the bill 
 passed. 
 
 W. D. Vincent, a populist Representa- 
 tive from Kansas, tells this story of his col- 
 league : 
 
 "Jerry was attempting to make a speech 
 on the Dingley tariff bill. The Chairman 
 had tried to rap him down with his gavel, 
 but Jerry would not yield the floor. The 
 chairman ordered the sargeant at-arms to ar- 
 rest him. The arrest of a Member of Con- 
 gress is a very novel procedure. There are 
 
 146 
 
JEREY SIMPSOISr. 
 
 no papers served and no words uttered. The 
 sargeant-at-arms simply marches up in front 
 of the Member holding the mace in front of 
 him. The mace is a symbol of authority. 
 The one used by the House of Representa- 
 tives is a large bronze in the form of a brass 
 eagle, mounted on a staif. When this is 
 held in front of a Member by the proper 
 officer he is under arrest. Following the in- 
 structions of the chairman, the sergeant-at- 
 arms walked up to Jerry with his eagle. By 
 this time the excitement was intense, but 
 Jerry continued his speech, only stopping 
 long enough to say to the officer, with a care- 
 less wave of the hand: ^'Oh, take that buz- 
 zard away from here." 
 
 ^ There was a deathlike stillness over the 
 House. The chairman looked dumfounded, 
 while the face of the sergeant-at-arms turned 
 
 fourteen different colors as he gazed about 
 
 147 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 the hall with a sort of vacant stare as if try- 
 ing to decide whether it was a dream or the 
 real thing. For a moment everybody seemed 
 embarrassed but Simpson, who alone seemed 
 to appreciate the ludricous situation, and, 
 standing there with a smile on his face said 
 to the officer : ''Well, what are you going to 
 do about it ?" All at once the suspense was 
 broken by a peal of laughter from the Mem- 
 ber? that almost shook the capitol building. 
 It had suddenly dawned on them that w« 
 Avere in a committee of the whole and there 
 was no rule under which a Member could be 
 arrested in the committee. The sergeant-at- 
 arms marched meekly and submissively back 
 to his room and Jerry continued his speech 
 until the Speaker rushed into the hall and 
 with a rap of his gavel declared the House 
 in session. In the meantime Jerry had said 
 all he wanted to say and was ready to sub 
 
 148 
 
JERRY SIMPSOiNT. 
 
 side." 
 
 No subject of importance came before 
 Congress while Jerry was a Member upon 
 which he failed to speak. The principles 
 and purposes of the Peoples Party were ex- 
 poimded over and over again. His experi- 
 ence and practical knowledge as well as his 
 reading and reflection equipped him for most 
 efl^ective presentation and solid argument. 
 
 Tom L. Johnson and Jerry were warm 
 friends as well as co-disciples of Henry 
 George. They connived to spread the gospel 
 of Single Tax upon the pages of the Congres- 
 sional Record. They portioned out the en- 
 tire contents of ''Progress and Poverty" 
 iunong the Single Tax Members to be used 
 in quotation in their several speeches. The 
 scheme was entirely legitimate and thus un- 
 numbered readers were presented with that 
 great work, and the archives of the nation 
 
 149 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 carry it as a public document. 
 
 One of the keenest writers on the staff 
 of a great eastern daily said, ''There was not 
 a question of Congressional action during 
 Jerry Simpson's stay in Congress on which 
 he did not think, and his speeches threw new 
 light on every subject under discussion. The 
 legislative accomplishments of Simpson con- 
 sisted, during the six years in the House, in 
 turning eastern sentiment regarding Popul- 
 ism from scornful ridicule to respectful con- 
 sideration." 
 
 So, if it be asked in skepticism, why 
 write up the "Sockless Socrates" as a states- 
 man when no large legislation stands to his 
 credit, let the answer be this : Laws are the 
 creation of majorities in legislative bodies. 
 ^o one man, nor yet a little band of such as 
 were Jerry's political compatriots may do the 
 impossible. Politicians follow public senti- 
 
 150 
 
JEERY SIMPSON. 
 
 ment; statesmen create it. Far greater — 
 far more enduring than mere acts of legisla- 
 tion is the work of creating public sentiment, 
 of informing and enlightening the popular 
 mind. The shedding of light on unfamiliar 
 and higher paths than those hard trodden by 
 dull conservatism and tragic ignorance — 
 these great things Jerry did, and when the 
 years of fine fruition come, as come they will, 
 let men who can grasp fine meanings, high 
 purpose and real achievment say, Jerry 
 Simpson's name belongs not with the poli- 
 ticians' but with the statesman's class. 
 
 151 
 
POPULISM ENROUTE. 
 A. D. 1908. 
 
XVI. 
 
 "^Populism Enroute. 
 A. D. 1908. 
 
 The full storj of civilization is not to 
 be told by the mere data and description of 
 events. Analysis of the quickening, throb- 
 bing, pulsing ideas of the day or age must 
 go into the rounded history. 
 
 Great sentient waves of thought flow 
 through humanity and gradually make vast 
 changes in the manners, the morals, the art, 
 the science, the trade, the vocations and the 
 structural habitations of mankind. 
 
 ISTo on-sweeping march of armored hosts, 
 
 with all their hoarse shoutings, their blare 
 
 and blazonry and their thundrous tread, ever 
 
 *The official name of the Peoples Party was never 
 changed, but through popular usage it came to be 
 called the Populist Party. 
 
 155 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 wrouglit upon God's footstool, changes that 
 could compare with those wrought by the 
 subtle, percolating, permeating power of 
 ideas. 
 
 Against the objective existence of the 
 Peoples Party, the machinations of adroit, 
 expert, and long entrenched old-partyism pre- 
 vailed. But not all the cunning ways of 
 high-handed and commercial politics playing 
 upon the unawakened, the uninformed and 
 the unalarmed hosts of American voters could 
 barricade against the on-sweep of Populist 
 ideas. So here are we today in the early 
 years of the good twentieth century witness- 
 ing the vindication, and enroute to the full 
 fruition, of the Populism of 1890. 
 
 The fundamental doctrine of Populism, 
 was public o^vnership and public conduct of 
 public utilities. Behold now the vast extent 
 of popular acceptance of that theory. Be- 
 
 166 
 
JEEKY SIMPSOK 
 
 hold the tortuous clutchings of private owner- 
 ship seeking to avert its certain doom. 
 
 Decades hence some museum of things 
 archaic will hold a street car, with aisles and 
 platforms densely packed with w^eary men 
 and w^omen. Then some student lad v.'ill 
 say, ''Daddy, why did they crowd so ?" And 
 daddy will reply, ''Well, son, once upon a 
 time, private parties owned the street cars 
 and furnished straps, instead of seats, for 
 passengers." 
 
 In 1890, Henry D. Lloyd, gave in 
 "Wealth Against the Commonwealth" the 
 story of Standard Oil rapacity. Populism 
 called that huge trust an "Octopus." Turn • 
 on the phonograph of memory and listen to 
 the shouts of derision over Populist use of 
 that word "octopus." Listen also to the elo- 
 quent defense of "Standard Oil," — rebates 
 and all. 
 
 157 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 A few years later and public sentiment 
 honeycombed by Populist ideas was ripened 
 to tbe point of safe venture for a popular 
 periodical to publish Ida TarbelPs story of 
 Standard Oil and its black deeds. 
 
 Read, years later, in the Kansas City 
 Star, arraignment of Standard Oil under the 
 bold caption : ^THE REAL OCTOPUS." • 
 
 So short a time within a nation's life 
 and such fine progress toward fuller light ! 
 
 Jerry Simpson, in a speech at Wichita 
 in 1890, discussing the transportation ques- 
 tion, urged the apointment of a national com- 
 mission to ascertain the actual value of rail- 
 roads in order to obtain a basis upon which 
 to determine just and reasonable rates of 
 transportation. Republicans bubbled with 
 glee: ^^What! that ignoramus, that whittler 
 of dry goods boxes, that spouting demagogue, 
 tendering his advice anent the great railways 
 
 158 
 
JEKKY SIMPSON. 
 
 that have upbuilt the great West !" 
 
 But years later along came President 
 Koosevelt and Senator La Follette, echoing 
 that same piece of sound advice. 
 
 Standing on the steps of the State 
 House, at Topeka, Kansas, and pointing to 
 the Santa Fe railway offices opposite, Jerry 
 Simpson said: ^'Over there is now the seat 
 of government; the mission of the People's 
 Party is to move it over here." That was 
 '^demagoguery, pure and simple" when Jerry 
 Simpson said it. But a few years later, the 
 Kansas City Star, the most influential* daily 
 in the great West, said as much, and more, 
 time and time again, and had great popular 
 acclaim. 
 
 Again the Kansas City Star: ''There is 
 no more corrupting influence in the nation 
 than the corporation campaign contributions 
 and the organized corporation lobby. The 
 
 159 
 
THE STOKY OF 
 
 peoiile are in no mood to hear longer with 
 tlie railroad politician and the railroad 
 lobbyist/' 
 
 As a matter of history, Populism was 
 ready to dispense with these corrupting in- 
 fhiences a decade and a half ago. 
 
 ISTot reproduced from a Populist paper 
 of the early Nineties, but from a recent issue 
 of the Kansas City Star is this : 
 
 ""an amazing style of robbery. 
 
 ''If any man of your acquaintance were 
 to cau^e his hands i,o be tied behind his bach 
 and then invite theives and robbers to go 
 through his pochets you would have no hesi- 
 tancy in consigning him, in your mind at 
 least, to a hospital for the insane. And there 
 is little douht but that his case would speedily 
 engage the attention of a commission to taJce 
 action on his mental condition. 
 
 160 
 
JEEEY SIMPSON. 
 
 ''This illustration exemplifies the differ- 
 ence hetiveen individuals and the great cor- 
 poratio7i which we call the government. 
 Time and again through the action of Con- 
 gress are the hands of Uncle Sam tied behind 
 him and his person exposed to open plunder. 
 This is exactly what happened yesterday 
 when Congressman Murdoch's plan to save 
 five million dollars by an honest method of 
 weighing the mails was defeated. The rail- 
 roads were literally invited by the law-mah- 
 ing power, to step in and rob the nation of 
 that amount of money. They were not even 
 put to the trouble of way -laying the victim. 
 Tie was bound and turned over to them by his 
 so-called Representatives and guardians. 
 
 ''The very same things happen every 
 time the government makes a contact for 
 building material, for munitions for defense^ 
 
 161 
 
THE STOllY OF 
 
 for food and other supplies for its soldiers, 
 or for whatever it buys. 
 
 ^'Was there ever before such an amazing 
 system of robbery in a country calling itself 
 free, and can the equal of it be found any- 
 where else in the world today, even among 
 the despotisms?" 
 
 Twenty years ago Jerry Simpson advo- 
 cated Federal control of Insurance. In 
 Kansas, Webb Mcl^all, Populist Superinten- 
 dent of Insurance, took liberties with "The 
 System/' that well nigh called for the lamp 
 post and boiling oil. Ten years later, 
 Charles Barnes, Eepublican Superintendent 
 of Insurance, is applauded for bravely fol- 
 lowing in the pathway of his Populist prede- 
 cessor. 
 
 So merrily runs the world away. 
 
 The "crack-brained Populists," plead 
 for the holding of rich coal lands away from 
 
 162 
 
JEERY SIMPSON. 
 
 the railways ; Republican Senator LaFollette 
 will help to carry out this crack-brained will 
 and testament. 
 
 The Popnlists talked day and night 
 about a ''national system of Irrigation," pub- 
 lic enlightenment along this line carried the 
 day in legislation. 
 
 Likewise, the safe-guarding of public 
 lands; the preservations of forests and the 
 limitations of land holdings, were frequently 
 the subject of Populist speech. 
 
 Mr. Garfield, Secretary of the Interior, 
 has recently announced his intention of en- 
 forcing the limitation to holdings of oil 
 
 lands. 
 
 True, the fulfilment along these lines 
 lags as yet : " 'Tis not so deep as a well, nor 
 so wide as a church door; but 'tis enough, 
 'twill serve," pending the time when the vot- 
 ers cast their ballots for their beliefs instead 
 
 163 
 
THE STOEY OF 
 
 of for their party programs. 
 
 A demand for Postal Savings Banks 
 went into Populists platforms and Populist 
 argument. 
 
 The Initiative and Referendum, now 
 the organic law of four western common- 
 wealths, stands to the credit of Populist 
 literature and Populist iteration on the ros- 
 trum. 
 
 Por answer to Populist arguments on 
 the money question there came these sneers 
 from press and platform: ^''What do you 
 know about 'feenance/ ^per capiter' or other 
 sacred mysteries of the best financial system 
 the world has ever seen V 
 
 ^^Get between plow handles," said Gov- ^ 
 ernor Anthony, "you old hayseeds, and send 
 your plow shires deeper — there's your reme- 
 
 dv." 
 
 t/ 
 
 "You can't legislate properity into ex- 
 164 
 
JEEEY SIMPSOK 
 
 istence/' said Senator Ingalls, ^'smj more 
 than you can make rain fall by legislation. '^ 
 
 Populism argued that the producers of 
 the bread of the whole nation ought to have, 
 in time of stress, as fair a chance in a money 
 way as the Wall street bankers. 
 
 Whereat arose a shrieking chorus : "Ask- 
 ing for a Sub-Treasury, are you ? w^ant to get 
 negotiable certificates based on no better se- 
 curity than wheat and corn and cotton ? Ha ! 
 Ha ! ! Ha ! ! ! 
 
 The old time merry-makers at Populist 
 expense were boisterously funny over the 
 *'per capiter idiots." Populism said there 
 was not enough money in circulation to trans- 
 act business, hence hard times and business 
 stagnation. 
 
 Fifteen years later. Governor Hoch, 
 speaking at Washington, said, ''Kansas is 
 doing famously. A state that has a hundred 
 
 165 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 dollars per capita has a little right to boast, 
 for I thinh, that is more than any of its sis- 
 ter commonwealths can boast. In the Popu- 
 list days of Jerry Simpson his followers did 
 not demand more than half that much" 
 
 As to corn and wheat and cotton merit- 
 ing subtreasury conveniences, is it not the 
 proud boast of today that these great sub- 
 stantial sources of real wealth are the best 
 assets of the nation ? 
 
 Wall Street borrows of the West, and 
 begs of Secretary Cortelyou — a little sixty 
 millions or so, whenever a breath or a rumor 
 disturbs its delicate constitution. Wall 
 Street gets the cash, of course, — Populism is 
 only enroute. 
 
 The scandalous insecurity of a privately 
 owned monetary system and its utter inabil- 
 ity to serve the business and the industry of 
 the country are being daily demonstrated. 
 
 166 
 
JEEEY SIMPSON. 
 
 The spectacle afforded by this financial 
 Thing of legislative shreds and patches, with 
 its dark corners, its suicides, its paralysis of 
 business and its widespread distress, holding 
 out its silly hands to clutch the morsel of gold 
 a-sailing over from France and England to 
 be used as a base to steady its doddering old 
 existence is at once a comedy and an insult 
 to American intelligence. 
 
 Private banking is found wanting: 
 government banks, with issue secured by the 
 Patriotism and the boundless wealth of this 
 great Republic will aid in making prosperity 
 a permanence. 
 
 The full contention of Populism as to 
 money is on the highway to fulfillment. 
 
 At the date of this writing there is a 
 wave of "reform" engaged in sweeping dis- 
 honest officials from places of public and 
 semi-public trust. The shallow minded are 
 
 167 
 
THE STOKY OF 
 
 aflame witli zeal, believing tliat to turn out 
 present rascals will inisure against futujre 
 rascality. 'New York City is as sure of 
 future purity, if it can get its ^'Traction 
 thieves" and its ^'Insurance thieves'' ex- 
 patriated or imprisoned as it once was of 
 purity for all time to come when it expatri- 
 ated and imprisoned Boss Tweed and his 
 kind. 
 
 Popular enthusiasm over the conviction 
 of dishonest officials from Atlantic to Pacific 
 coasts is just now quite as jaunty and as 
 trustful of the future, as it was in divers 
 times agone, when Indian Pings, Whisky 
 Pings, Star Pouters, and Credit Mobilers 
 were brought to justice. 
 
 The purblind majority thus far fails to 
 
 grasp the great fact that human nature, in 
 
 essence, is unchangeable: given conditions 
 
 that breed and foster greed and lust of power, 
 
 168 
 
JERRr SIMPSON. 
 
 and sure as night time follows day, so sure 
 will public graft and personal demoralization 
 ioUow on. 
 
 Abraham Lincoln saw that the Repub- 
 lic could not endure half slave and half free : 
 Populism saw that the Republic could not 
 save its honor and its private morals with 
 the great business of public service admin- 
 istered half in the interest of private posses- 
 sion and half in the interest of the public 
 welfare. The inevitable clash of interests 
 begets a contest wherein guile and venality 
 are spawned. 
 
 Hence all this putting honest men in 
 office, this appointing of commissions to in- 
 spect and to supervise, yields but scant and 
 temporary relief. It does not touch the root 
 cf the real remedy. Indeed, the animating 
 spirit of the present rigorous reform is well 
 
 169 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 voiced in President Roosevelt's utterance of 
 August 1899 : 
 
 ^'During the last few months I have 
 been growing exceedingly alarmed at tie 
 growth of popular unrest and popular dis- 
 trust on the Trust question. It is largely 
 aimless and baseless, but there is a very un- 
 pleasant side to this over-run Trust devel- 
 opment and what 1 fear is, if we do not have 
 some consistent policy to advocate, that the 
 multitudes will follow the crank who advo- 
 cates an absurd policy, but who does advocate 
 something.'^ 
 
 There is open confession, spread upon 
 the pages of the daily press, that the only 
 way to head off the public ownership of rail- 
 ways, is for the corporations to acquiesce in 
 the popular demands for strict surveilance 
 and for quasi public management. Thus, 
 political conservatism, failing to comprehend 
 
 170 
 
JERRY SIMPSON. 
 
 Twentieth Century democracy, distrutful of 
 the people, yet pallid with fear of them, will 
 grudgingly dole out legislative makeshifts 
 and half way reforms. 
 
 Meanwhile, Populism, enroute, is placid 
 and patient. Its truths have been uttered. 
 Its ideas are marching on and it is a fore- 
 gone conclusion that the future failure of all 
 the patchwork, cumbersome, jumbled legis- 
 lation now under way, will serve to accelerate 
 the evolution of an expert public service un- 
 hampered by ignorant, impertinent surveil- 
 ance, or untainted by corruption and private 
 profit. 
 
 More than one milliom votes were cast 
 in 1892 for James B. Weaver, the Populist 
 candidate for President. 
 
 In 1896 the Populist Party became the 
 ally of the Democratic Party and more than 
 six and one half, million votes were cast for 
 
 in 
 
THE STOKY OF 
 
 Mr. Bryan. Thus the literature of Popu- 
 lism was carried to an enormous number of 
 friendly readers throughout the nation. 
 Moreover, during all those years, hosts of 
 Eepublicans listened to Populism on the ros- 
 trum and read its literature. They were in- 
 tent upon the refutation of the arguments of 
 their opponents — they came to scoff but re- 
 mained to pray. And the burden of their 
 prayer was to be shoT^Ti how to avert defeat 
 by the assimilation of as much of Populist 
 truth as had grown to acceptance in the 
 popular mind — and to labor for progress and 
 tlie nation's welfare within the Republican 
 Party. 
 
 This amende lioner'able comes from 
 William Allen AMiite: 
 
 ''Ten years ago, this great organ of re- 
 form, wrote a piece entitled 'What^s the Mat- 
 ter With Kansas?' In it great sport was 
 
 172 
 
JEKEY SIMPSON. 
 
 made of a 'perfectly honest gentleman of un- 
 usual legal ability ivJio happened to he run- 
 ning for Chief Justice of the Supreme Court 
 of this State, because he said, in effect, that 
 Hhe rights of the user are paramount to the 
 rights of the owner/ Those were paleozoic 
 Holmes; hoiv far the world has moved since 
 then. If the Gazette had not guyed the 
 Populist candidate for Chief Justice for tell- 
 ing the truth, ijie Gazette would have been 
 '•printed in a little 20:^60 office on Sixth 
 Avenue, about two jumps ahead of the sher- 
 iff. The Gazette was wrong in those days 
 and Judge Doster was right. But he was 
 out too ea7'ly in the season and his views got 
 frost bitten. This is a funny world. About 
 all we can do is to move with it.'' 
 
 Fine ! With but one little error ; Popu- 
 list ideas were not out too early, nor were 
 
 173 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 they frost bitten, they are climbing riotously, 
 like Jack's bean stalk. 
 
 Says Governor Hocb, in the 'New York 
 Tribune : ''I do not believe that there are 
 anywhere on earth sixteen hundred thousand 
 people maintaining a higher standard of 
 morals than the sixteen hundred thousand 
 ivho constitute the population of Kansas/^ 
 
 Well, why not, why not, wasn't the 
 Peoples Party bom in Kansas ? 
 
 174 
 
A SYMPOSIUM. 
 
XVII. 
 A Symposium. 
 
 Tom L. Johnson: '^1 loved Jerry 
 Simpson. In all the time of my acquaint- 
 ance I never saw him fail, either in judg- 
 ment, in courage, or in discretion." 
 
 Tom Feed: ^'1 learned to love him 
 well. I never knew him to lose his head or 
 his feet.'' 
 
 Senator Long: "We were opposing 
 candidates, but personal friends." 
 
 Dennis Flynn: "We were neighbors 
 in Kansas and at Washington. His col- 
 leagues in Congress respected him and ad- 
 mired his ready wit. The benches and the 
 galleries were never empty when it was 
 
 kno^vn that Jerry Simpson would speak." 
 
 177 
 
THE STOKY OF 
 
 Tom McNeal: "I was intimately ac- 
 quainted with Jerry Simpson. We differed 
 in politics, but I respected him for his per- 
 sonal integrity." 
 
 William J. Bryan : "Jerry's speeches in 
 Congress contained a delightful comming- 
 ling of logic and humor, and his hearty good 
 humor made him popular on both sides of the 
 House." 
 
 Governor Hoch : "Jerry Simpson com- 
 manded the respect of friend and foe alike. 
 He often experienced, as well as exemplified, 
 Garfield's beautiful sentiment that, the 
 sweetest flowers that bud and blossom in this 
 world, clamber over the wall of party poli- 
 tics." 
 
 Eon. W, D. Vincent : "I was his close 
 friend and neighbor. Day by day, and all 
 the time, he was the same genial, kindly and 
 
 humorous Jerrv." 
 
 178 
 
JERRY SIMPSON. 
 
 Louis F. Post: "Jerry Simpson was 
 open, strong, unflinching and as tlioughtful, 
 prudent and rational as lie was frank and 
 courageous. He was a democratic nobleman 
 who never forgot a friend or failed to forgive 
 an enemy. I felt it an honor to be able to 
 number him among my closest and most 
 cherished friends.". 
 
 Hon. Champ Clark: "I shall always 
 cherish the memory of Jerry Simpson. He 
 was genial, kind, bright and faithful. I val- 
 ued him highly as my friend." 
 
 Hamlin Garland: "I saw much of him 
 in Washington. I came to like the ^Sock- 
 less Sage' because of the quaint charm of his 
 manner, his kindliness, his humor, his quick 
 wit and the sincerty of his convictions." 
 
 C. W. DeFreest: "I was associated 
 with him in business in ]^ew Mexico. He 
 was one of the most companionable men I 
 
 179 
 
THE STOKY OF 
 
 ever met. I know of no man dearer to tis 
 friends or more beloved, than Jerry Simp- 
 son." 
 
 Henry George, Jr. : ^^I have always 
 believed that Jerry Simpson was the best ex- 
 ample of the Abraham Lincoln type of man 
 I had ever met. Eugged, strong, with a keen 
 perception of fundamental principles, he had 
 an abiding faith in the American standards 
 as expressive of the idea of democratic rule, 
 j^nd he had that largeness of spirit that 
 showed itself so eminently in Lincoln — the 
 power of which was expressed in a humor 
 that carried its will while dulling the edge 
 of opposition. His broadness of mind and 
 greatness of heart represented the best that is 
 in our American life, and when this Ameri- 
 can sailor and farmer took the floor in debate 
 in the House of Representatives at Washing- 
 ton, the old and the young, the wise, the 
 
 180 
 
JEKKY SIMPSO]^. 
 
 supercilious and the cunning all listened ; for 
 in Jerry Simpson spoke sturdy manhood, 
 clear sense, broad, generous feeling, undaunt- 
 able courage, a natural, picturesque oratory, 
 and a healthy humor that could laugh down 
 the most formidable opposition. 
 
 "I respected and loved him as a friend ; 
 and as a press correspondent at Washington 
 when he was a Member of Congress, I re- 
 garded him as among the ablest men in pub- 
 lic life at that time — an estimate which now, 
 years later, I most heartily confirm." 
 
 Judge Frank Doster: ''Jerry Simpson 
 Avas a man whom not only Kansas, but the 
 jSIation, will remember to love." 
 
 181 
 
THE BABES lis^ THE WOODS. 
 
XVIII. 
 
 The Bahes in the Woods. 
 
 Jerry and Jane are at home again in 
 Earber County. 
 
 The last contest between '^Chester" and 
 Jerry has been fought — and won by Mr. 
 Long. Chester I. Long will go to Congress, 
 Jerry Simpson will never more be in official 
 place. A century of new thought has flowed 
 into the last decade. ^^It does not matter 
 so much/' says Emerson, ''how far a man has 
 got, as which way he is facing." As with a 
 man so with the world at large. 
 
 One Sunday morning Jerry is stretched 
 at length on the lounge in their cosy farm 
 house living room. He is holding a news- 
 
 185 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 paper before his face to hide the mischievous 
 twinkle in his eyes from the observation of 
 his son Lester. 
 
 Lester's face is anything but placid. 
 For the first time in his life he finds it hard 
 to broach a matter to his father. 
 
 Lester fidgets, casts anxious glances to- 
 wards the obstructing newspaper. He 
 wants to break the silence, he lacks courage 
 and goes to the kitchen. 
 
 ''Ma, I wish you'd tell him." 
 
 ''Oh, son, I think you ought to tell him 
 yourself." 
 
 "But, Ma — oh, well, I will, hang it all." 
 
 "Son" returns to the sitting room. The 
 newspaper still absorbs his father's attention. 
 
 Another spell of fidgets, another rush to 
 the kitchen. 
 
 "Ma, I think I'll wait until tomorrow, 
 then I'll ask Pa to go hunting, he likes to go 
 
 186 
 
JEKEY SIMPSON. 
 
 with me, then I'll get him in a fence corner 
 and tell him I'll shoot if he says no." 
 
 ^'E^ow, son, just go in and have it over 
 with, Pa wdll be all right." 
 
 Jane goes in and whispers, ''Do make 
 it easy for the boy." 
 
 Jane goes back to the kitchen. Lester, 
 breathlessly, ''Did yon tell him, Ma?" 
 
 "!N^o ,son, it wouldn't be proper, go your- 
 self." 
 
 Lester rushes in, "Pa, I want — Pa, I'd 
 like — well, Pa I'm going to get married." 
 
 "Oh, are you, son ? Well who is the 
 other Babe in the Woods ? There's some 
 lady mixed up in this case, isn't there ?" 
 
 Of course "Pa" has known all the time 
 the cause of Lester's perturbation. Jerry 
 and Jane had talked half the night before 
 about their boy with all the tenderness and 
 all the wonderment that come to parents 
 
 187 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 when tliej awaken with surprise to the fact 
 that their little child — their baby — is a 
 grown np and getting ready to take into the 
 life that has heretofore belonged so closely to 
 them another to whom he will cleave closer 
 than to father or mother. 
 
 'The other Babe in the Woods" was a 
 sweet school girl, Gerlie Kelly by name. 
 Jerry and Jane took her to their Avarm hearts. 
 Little TIcllie's place v, ?i^ not quite vacant af- 
 ter Gerlie came. 
 
 Lester brought his pretty wife to the 
 farm home and the same evening Jerry called 
 Jane aside and whispered, ''Let us go on a 
 bridal tour. We'll take the night train for 
 Kansas City and leave the Babes in the 
 Woods to keep house by themselves, they will 
 be happier alone." 
 
 "But," said Jane, "I'm not ready to go 
 so soon." "Oh, never mind, just go as you 
 
 188 
 
JEKRY SIMPSOIs^. 
 
 are and we'll buy some wedding toggery in 
 Kansas City." 
 
 xind so they went. — these life-long 
 chums — a wiser, sadder, happier pair than 
 sailed so long ago upon the Summer Cloud. 
 
 For one blessed, care-free month they 
 staid in Kansas City. 
 
 Jerry read to Jane, they joked, they 
 laughed, they shopped, they went to the 
 theatres, they ordered good things at the res- 
 taurants, they planned for the future of the 
 dear children in the home nest, whom Jerry 
 always spoke of as their Babes in the AYoods. 
 They talked much and wondered about the 
 mysterious Great Beyond. 
 
 And this their second bridal trip was 
 better, richer than their first. 
 
 189 
 
THE SIMPLE LIFE. 
 
XIX. 
 
 The Simple Life. 
 
 The home life of the Simpson's at Wash- 
 ington was replete with comfort. Mrs. 
 Simpson was a prime home manager. There 
 was no extravagance nor attempt at vain dis- 
 play. The Simpson bank book was for 
 ^'Jane's" nnqnestioned use, as much a matter 
 v'l course as for Jerry's. 
 
 In this well ordered household there 
 vrere no special company ways or manners. 
 The simple routine of everyday life was 
 amply provident for their guests. The home 
 atmosphere was cordial and attractive. 
 
THE STOKY OF 
 
 Jerry was always "company'' in Jane's 
 reckoning. His return from an absence, 
 ever so brief, was proceeded by a refurbish- 
 ing and dainty freshening up such as in many 
 households betoken the coming of some form- 
 al and distinguished visitor. Jane put on 
 her best house-gowns for Jerry and there went 
 into her greeting of her husband an odd little 
 mixture of half bashfulness and pretty cere- 
 mony that was quite without constraint yet 
 with a flavor such as goes with youth-time. 
 The wear and tear of years — the strain of 
 tempermental difference had tugged in vain 
 to bring apathy or commonplaceness of regard 
 between these two who chose each other at the 
 spelling school so many years before. 
 
 Parade or boastfulness werQ quite out 
 of the question for Jerry Simpson but in 
 some subtle, though unspoken way, it was 
 manifest that he appreciated all the capacity 
 
 194 
 
JEREY SIMPSOI^. 
 
 and tlae cookery of his wife. He never ad- 
 dressed lier in endearing words, but there 
 went into the utterance of her name the whole 
 meaning which others squander or dilute in 
 adjectives. When he said ^'Jane" you felt 
 that he had expressed the utmost — that he 
 had told of the anchorage of his life; the one 
 word ^Mane" settled it. It was a strange 
 power that this unique man possessed — that 
 of putting subtle meanings into words. 
 
 It was in the Washington home that 
 many of his choicest friendships were nour- 
 ished. Probably no experience in Jerry 
 Simpson's life was more soul-satisfying than 
 his meeting, and subsequent warm friendship 
 with Henry George. This great propounder 
 of the gospel of human rights had been for 
 many years regarded by Jerry with rever- 
 ence such as religious devotees render to the 
 
 founders of their faith. 
 
 195 
 
THE STOKY OF 
 
 Among the choice guests at the Wash- 
 ington home were Hamlin Garland, Henry 
 George, Jr., and Tom Johnson. This coterie 
 of Single Taxers visited, joked, philoso- 
 phised and planned together as to ways and 
 means to lift the burdens from the toil-bent 
 backs of their fellow men. The commun- 
 nings of these friends were sacramental 
 seasons. 
 
 Tom Johnson taught Jerry to ride the 
 bicycle and these two great souled men took 
 keen delight in their wheel rambles in the 
 country about the beautiful national capital. 
 
 It was in the Washington home that an 
 alarming illness came upon Jerry. During 
 the dread days of suspense when his life was 
 in jeopardy a steady stream of anxious call- 
 ers strove to render service. Members of 
 Congress of all political faiths attested their 
 affection for their sick colleague. And when 
 
 196 
 
JEERY SIMPS0:N^. 
 
 his days of convalescence came and Jerry 
 went over to tlie House tlie Speaker paused 
 in the transaction of business ^vhile the Mem- 
 bers with beaming faces tendered a greeting 
 that was prolonged into an ovation. 
 
 Jerry Simpson's ways with children 
 v\^ere as unusual in manifestation as his other 
 distinctive personal traits. He never talked 
 down to their comprehension, instead he lis- 
 tened with sincere attention to their childish 
 Vvdsdom. Little children turned to him in- 
 stinctively and he received the token of their 
 favor with keen relish — they were friends on 
 equal terms. Ah, Avhat a democrat he was. 
 
 Had it not been for Jerry's generosity 
 with friends there woukl have been a few 
 thousand dollars more to his credit when he 
 left Congress. 
 
 From his six years of service at the ISTa- 
 tion's Capital, Jerry came back to his Barber 
 
 197 
 
THE STOEY OF 
 
 County farm in Kansas, poor of purse. He 
 retired from a public career, which to a man 
 of less integrity, might have afforded un- 
 stinted opportunity for private gain. 
 
 What other should you look for in a 
 man so calmly certain of the essential good- 
 ness of mankind and so supremely trustful 
 of the eventual establishment of justice upon 
 earth than that he would remain unruffled by 
 temporary rebuff of his political principles 
 and undisconcerted by personal defeat in 
 politics. 
 
 What other should you look for in a 
 man whose mind his kingdom was, than that 
 his resourcefulness would carry him cheerily 
 through whatever vicissitudes befell. 
 
 It was part of the popular misconcep- 
 tion malingering from the early days of 
 Populism that Jerry was incapable in busi- 
 ness ways: quite the reverse was true. 
 
 198 
 
JEERY SIMPSOK. 
 
 Fifteen thousand dollars cash and not 
 one dollar of debt stood to Jerry Simpson's 
 account when he went from northern Kansas 
 to Barber County in 1883. A modest sum 
 but every dollar earned by industry and by 
 discreet and careful deals involving even 
 wiser personal oversight than is oftentimes 
 required in the accumulation of huge for- 
 tunes where speculation or legislative man- 
 ipulation enter as factors in the game. 
 
 Abraham Lincoln said, after his election 
 to the presidency; "I hope some time to be 
 worth twenty-five thousand dollars, that is 
 all anyone ought to possess." 
 
 During Jerry's second term in Congress, 
 an illness threatening fatality came upon 
 him. Then followed a most exhausting po- 
 litical campaign. He did not regain his 
 former health. Labor on the farm soon 
 PTCW bevond his physical endurance. The 
 
 199 
 
THE STOEY OF 
 
 farm home was sold and the family moved 
 to Wichita where they lived three years. 
 While there, Jerry became the manager of a 
 live stock commission, which for a time did a 
 thriving business. He was a valuable and 
 favorite member of the Western Cattlemen's 
 Association. 
 
 His steadily declining health caused him 
 in 1901 to seek a home at Eos well, l^ew 
 Mexico, where he went into the real estate 
 business with Charles De Freest. He also 
 secured an agency for the sale of Santa Fe 
 railway lands. He chartered a car, loaded 
 it with the luscious products of that fertile 
 countrv and made a tour of the middle states. 
 His interesting lectures and original exposi- 
 tions of that picturesque and fertile country 
 attracted many settlers to jSTew Mexico. 
 Perhaps none of the several breadwinning 
 ventures of his life gave him more genuine 
 
 200 
 
jERKr simpso:n". 
 
 pleasure than this opportunity to persuade 
 people to turn their attention to the develop- 
 ment of nature's storehouses which hold 
 abundant health and wealth and human 
 happiness. 
 
 Jerry Simpson's enthusiasm in this 
 Land and Immigration enterprise was con- 
 tagious. It was a poetic finis to the life work 
 of this ardent lover of [N'ature — this heliever 
 in the soil and in the simple life. 
 
 At Wichita, in 1901, a little son was 
 born to '^Son" Lester and Gerlie — Jerry's 
 ''Babes in the Woods." They named him 
 Jerry, jr., and upon this small boy his grand- 
 father lavished tenderness such as long years 
 before went to his o^vn Little Hallie. The 
 young people, Lester and Gerlie, moved from 
 AVichita to Roswell and made their home 
 uear their parents. Perhaps Jerry Senior 
 had never in all his modest life come nearer 
 
 201 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 to being vain than wTien, his grandson, ar 
 riving at time of speech, made bright and 
 quaint remarks beyond his years. "^Hiat 
 jolly chums these two were. The small man 
 and his grandfather walked the streets of 
 Roswell hand in hand in perfect fulness of 
 mutual admiration. 
 
 The new friends in the village of Ros- 
 well took Jerry Simpson to their hearts, 
 there as elsewhere, he was a beloved and 
 honored citizen. His wit sparkled and his 
 humor glowed for the pleasure of this small 
 circle as unstintedly as for his larger audi- 
 ences on the national stage at Washington. 
 
 202 
 
OLD EKIENDS AIs^D NEW DAYS. 
 
XX. 
 
 Old Friends and New Days. 
 
 It was written in the "book of fate that 
 for Jerry Simpson there would be one more 
 old time political meeting — one more occa- 
 sion of hot enthusiasm, of upturned glowing 
 faces, of hand-clasps, and of greetings laden 
 with such loyalty and love as seldom go from 
 man to man. It was his last public speech. 
 It was at Pond Creek, Oklahoma. An im- 
 mense crowd of old friends awaited his ar- 
 rival. When he left the train men rushed 
 forward, took him on their shoulders and 
 bore him to the place of meeting. I^o time 
 of the old times exceeded this in fervor and 
 in that strange delirium which only a crowd 
 in love with a political idol can beget. 
 
 The master of ceremonies was Charley 
 205 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 Taylor, an official under the administration 
 of Governor Leedy, the second Populist gov- 
 ernor of Kansas. 
 
 ^'I can see now," said Jerry, ''why I 
 failed of election the last time I ran for Con- 
 gress. Here you are, a large part of my old 
 time majority from the good old seventh dis- 
 trict. You moved over here to make new 
 homes in this rich country. Kansas lost 
 what Oklahoma gained." 
 
 For three full hours, Jerry spoke, with all 
 the fire and all the fun, and all the fervid 
 prophecy that vitalized his speeches years be- 
 fore. And when he took his leave he pledged 
 them all to undying loyalty to Populist prin- 
 ciples and to untiring efforts to bring Okla- 
 homa into the Union holding out a fairer, 
 fuller chance for men than any of her sister 
 commonwealths. 
 
 As a goodby word he said : ''Boys, you 
 have given me today, some of the happiest 
 moments of my life." 
 
 206 
 
 I 
 
 life 
 
THE JOUENEY EKDED. 
 
XXI. 
 
 The Journey Ended. 
 
 Like unto a drama on the mimic stage 
 when the closing act is reached there need 
 be but hints and touches — sentences expla- 
 tive here and there, to synthesize the cumula- 
 tive story. So, in this story of real life, 
 there needs be but a flash light here and there 
 to show w^here and how^ the brief time was 
 passed before the closing day and hour, when, 
 for Jerry Simpson, time surrendered to 
 eternity. 
 
 It is September 1905. The closing 
 scenes rush swiftly toward the curtain fall. 
 
 Jerry is at home in Roswell. He has 
 anuerism of the heart. For months he has 
 
 209 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 felt death drawing near. He suffers great 
 bodily pain. He can speak only in whispers. 
 But there is no gloom about the house, in- 
 stead there is an exaltation, as if the on-com- 
 ing Solemnity heralded a sublime and per- 
 fect peace. 
 
 As to the Life Beyond, Jerry has no 
 dogmatism, he sometimes says, ^'I rather 
 think that we shall go on and live and learn ; 
 in this life we get our first lessons and then 
 pass on to other grades." 
 
 Jerry Simpson loves to live upon this 
 earth. He would like to regain health 
 against the time which he so surely believes 
 is coming when the American people will re- 
 alig-n their forces and engage in another 
 mighty contest on issues vital to the nation. 
 But, if it cannot be — if he is never to be 
 well again — why then he will look death in 
 the face as squarely and as imafraid as he has 
 
 210 
 
 .ikii 
 
JEKEY SIMPSON. 
 
 faced all things else in life. He has found 
 men friendly, it has been good to be alive, 
 so, then he 'Svill press death's hand, and 
 having died, feel none the less how beautiful 
 it is to be alive." 
 
 Jane, once the invalid, tenderly cared 
 for by her husband, is now the stronger. It 
 is she who reads aloud the last few months. 
 She reads Trine's In Tune With the Infinite, 
 and, for the very last book of all, she reads 
 The Riddle of the Universe, The time that 
 Jerry long ago foretold has come to little 
 Jane, '"'she imderstands." 
 
 Jerry is beamingly happy, despite his 
 pain and weakness, when ''Son'' Lester and 
 Gerlie come. He fondles Jerry Jr., and 
 takes great delight in whispered chats with 
 him. 
 
 The word has gone abroad that Jerry 
 Simpson is alarmingly ill. Letters of sym- 
 
 211 
 
THE STOKY OE 
 
 patliY, telegrams of inquiry, pour in. 
 Friends make pilgrimages to Roswell. 
 
 The new home and the new friends are 
 very dear to Jerry, yet he yearns for Kansas 
 that so honored him and that he honored in 
 return. ' 'f 
 
 One day, in the late September, Jerry 
 and Jane, start for Wichita. These two have 
 journej^ed many times together, this is the 
 last time. 
 
 The doors of St. Francis Hospital, 
 Wichita, open to a sadly worn, exhausted 
 man. But worn and pain-wracked though 
 he was, he smiled and jested. Gloom and 
 Jerry simply could not live together. 
 
 Judge Stevens, of Medicine Lodge, 
 came to St. Francis Plospital to serve his old 
 friend. 
 
 Dr. Minick, the hospital physician, was 
 the Republican committeeman who officiated 
 
 212 
 
JEKKY SIMPSOI^. 
 
 on the side of Senator Long during the fam- 
 ous Simpson-Long debates. 
 
 Dr. D. H. Galloway, beloved friend and 
 attendant physician at Roswell, assisted in 
 the care of Jerry at St. Francis. 
 
 The good Sisters of St. Francis Hospital 
 marveled at the stream of callers, the tele- 
 grams, the loads of flowers for this new 
 patient. 
 
 Inquiries came to the '^Wichita Eagle" 
 office from all over America, asking to be 
 kept advised as to Jerry Simpson's condition. 
 The days at the hospital run into wrecks. 
 The friends of the brave, cheery patient gath- 
 ei now and then a little hope. The press 
 dispatches are anxiously read ; in many thou- 
 sand homes the first item sought in the daily 
 paper is that which brings word of the sick 
 man at Wichita. 
 
 The physicians can permit but few 
 213 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 friends to enter the sick room; among those 
 who may see Jerry are his loyal friends 
 David Leahy and Victor Mnrdock. Mr. 
 Mnrdock holds the place in Congress which 
 once was Jerry's. He is the ^ ^little red- 
 headed reporter/' named thus hy Jerry in 
 the early Populist days, who started the 
 "sockless" story. Jerry helieves in him and 
 loves him well. With Mr. Leahy, Jerry 
 leaves a special word to the ^^hoys" of the 
 press. 
 
 There is time between paroxysms of 
 pain for much conference with Jane. Jerry 
 wishes her to buy a little home and live in 
 Wichita — which she will do. He also talks 
 much of Jerry Jr. Jane is enjoined to look 
 to it that the little lad is given the best op- 
 portunity for schooling. He thinks there 
 are great things possible for the child. 
 
 In one impassioned hour he said, "Oh, 
 214 
 
JEEEY SIMPSON. 
 
 Jane do not be afraid when I am gone, I will 
 take care of you, I will be with yon, no harm 
 shall come to yon." 
 
 Whether this assurance to the little wife 
 he had so tenderly shielded arose from some 
 vast pity that made the wish father to the 
 thought or whether it was conviction flashed 
 upon him from the luminous Life to which 
 he was very near, no one can surely say. 
 
 Lester, Gerlie and Jerry Jr. came to St. 
 Francis Hospital for the last days. 
 
 "Come and kiss me, son," said Jerry to 
 Lester, and then, half shame-facedly, he said, 
 "Jane do you think I^m a baby ?" 
 
 The nurses, wanting perfect quiet, some- 
 times sent Mrs. Simpson from the sick-room. 
 Jerry then would motion Jane to him and 
 whisper, "Come back as soon as they are 
 gone and snuggle down by me." And she 
 would slip back and they would hold each 
 
 215 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 others hands and talk over early days and 
 laugli, gleefully, like prankish children be- 
 cause they had disobeyed orders and eluded 
 the nurses. 
 
 There are but a few hours left. Some- 
 thing has cleared away and Jerry can speak 
 aloud. Then comes a spasm of pain more 
 dreadful than any before endured and Jerry 
 says: ^'Well now I'm up aginst it; this is 
 the real demon, all the rest has been a joke." 
 
 There are now five minutes left, Jerry 
 smiles, the pain is gone, he breathes easily. 
 Then all is quiet, and Jane and Lester and 
 Gerlie and Jerry Jr. look at his peaceful 
 happy face and know that he is dead. It is 
 the morning of October twenty-third, 1905. 
 
 Flags are at half mast, in other Kansas 
 towns, as well as in Wichita. The body lies 
 in state in the Masonic Temple. Women of 
 the Relief Corps drape the flag about him. 
 
 216 
 
JERKY SIMPSOK 
 
 The solemn service of the Scottish Rite de- 
 gree of Masonry will be held. The ministra- 
 tions which others hnd in churches, Jerry 
 Simpson found in the Masonic Lodge. 
 
 These loving friends, Victor Murdoch, 
 Col. Thomas G. Fitch, Amos McLain, P. M. 
 Anderson, F. A. Amedon, and O. H. Bentley, 
 will bear the body to the grave. 
 
 The hour for the funeral service is 
 come. The large auditorium is crowded, 
 many are unable to gain entrance. There 
 is a blend of sadness and exultation in the 
 feeling of many of those present : sad be- 
 cause there will be no more earthly greeting 
 from Jerry Simpson ; exultant in the mem- 
 ory of the noble life of this tried and true 
 American. 
 
 The w^hole panorama of his life passes 
 in great and glowing pictures before the 
 heart-sore listeners while Victor Murdock 
 
 217 
 
THE STOEY OF 
 
 pays this great tribute to his friend: 
 
 ^'Here halt the quick, and here the dead 
 progress. He has gone out alone, far in the 
 deep darkness, where for each one of us a 
 grave is hidden. Eye nor voice nor hand 
 may follow him. The black barrier is 
 dropped between him and us — the black bar- 
 rier between the quick and the dead. Fac- 
 ing the iron and cruel gate stand the quick, 
 some stark in fear, some benumbed with 
 grief, some wrapped in wonder, but all alikb 
 halted, arrested inexorably. Before the 
 mighty mandate we pause, and then, in all 1 
 
 humility, cry out, as children of sorrow, our # 
 
 little word of comfort to his loved ones, our J 
 
 little word of tribute to a friend. If we 
 hope, refuse us not the privilege. If we 
 reach out a little in the dark refuse us not. 
 If the stars and the wind and the sunshine 
 and the rose whisper to us the evidence of 
 
 218 
 
JERKY SIMPSOK. 
 
 infinity and promise of eternity, let the ma- 
 terial world refuse ns not. I'or standing out 
 against the bald, black wall this afternoon 
 let us cry out again; for our friend we can- 
 not call, our friend we cannot longer see, let 
 US cry out the only challenge that ever met 
 the thrown glove of death — the thundering 
 answer of a mighty faith. The soul is im- 
 mortal, for, as God, the giver, is infinite, so 
 is the spirit He gives eternal. 
 
 ^'When he was dying, Horace Greely 
 murmured: Tame is a vapor; popularity 
 an accident; riches take wings; those who 
 bless today will curse tomorrow. Only one 
 thing endures — character.' Jerry Simpson 
 had character. 
 
 ^'I asked him once why he came to Kan- 
 sas — what called him here. 'The magic of 
 a kernel, the witchcraft in a seed. The de- 
 sire to put something into the ground and 
 
 219 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 see it grow and reproduce its kind came to 
 me, and I did not resist it/ he said. ^That's 
 why I came to Kansas,' 
 
 "The mischievous fates placed him in 
 the only agricultural section of the world 
 capable of spontanietj in novel political ac- 
 tion in Kansas. And when the political 
 storm arose, there sprang, full-armed, to lead 
 it, the son of the Canadian snows, the son of 
 the lashing lake, the son of the Kansas prai- 
 rie — Jerry Simpson. 
 
 "Do you remember him : his entrance to 
 the stage; his attitude before an audience; 
 that smile, that charming, winning, and that 
 warning smile ? Do you remember his eyes, 
 the eyes where lightning played fast and in- 
 cessant from a hot heart and an electric 
 mind ? Do you remember the whole attitude 
 that cried out to you, 'Come on, and beware V 
 In that day, men in Kansas carried him on 
 
 220 
 
JERKY SIMPSO]S[. 
 
 their shoulders. And when success came, 
 Washington yielded its admiration, for, in 
 the sally of debate there, no adversary ever 
 put him do^vn, but many v^ent down before 
 him. It was a great, a picturesque career, 
 and he deserved it all. He won it all, and 
 he won it alone." 
 
 The journey ends at the beautiful Maple 
 Grove Cemetery, where later on they brought 
 the coffined dust of Little Hallie and made 
 a little grave beside that of her father. 
 
 And here his friend, who knew him long 
 and well, the writer of this story, says good- 
 by. A kindlier, more imselfish, more chival- 
 rous man I never knew. 
 
 "Lord keep his memory green.'' 
 221 
 
^3^S^3^i^^SvS^Sv^Xl^S^^!^^l^!X•>^0^.^^ 
 
 \ 
 
 \ ■ 
 
 IP 
 
 m 
 
 ..J I -■ 
 
 MRS. JERRY SIMPSON 
 
LITTLE HALLIE 
 
LESTER SIMPSON 
 
GERLIE SIMPSON 
 
JERRY SIMPSON, Jr 
 
RUSSELL SIMPSON 
 
TEIBUTES FROM FRIEi^DS. 
 
JERRY SIMPSON. 
 
 II0:N'. TOM L. JOHNSOK 
 
 Deae Mes. Diggs — 
 
 I am delighted that you are vvriting the 
 life of Jerry Simpson, a rough diamond of 
 a man whose every impulse was for good. I 
 learned to love him when we were members 
 of Congress together. 
 
 Before he arrived he was heralded as 
 ^^Sockless Jerry," which gave him a false 
 and unpleasant introduction but as he became 
 better known the real greatness of his char- 
 acter developed. When he left Congress 
 there was no man who held the respect of 
 both friends and foes more than Jerry Simp- 
 son. I 
 
 225 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 I have seen him face the hot blooded 
 members of Congress hurling almost insults 
 at him and in his quiet dignified way humili- 
 ate them in the presence of the whole House. 
 One scene especially I remember in which 
 under a vile attack, without any excitement 
 whatever, he first resisted and then con- 
 quered his antagonist who within a few days 
 not only apologized but became one of his 
 strongest admirers. 
 
 Congressman Hatch of Missouri, one of 
 the democratic leaders in endorsement of 
 Jerry Simpson's real democracy once offered 
 on the floor of the House to trade off ten 
 weak-kneed democrats for Jerry Simpson the 
 populist and the sentiment was warmly ap- 
 plauded. He did this to emphasize his be- 
 lief in Jerry Simpson's democracy by com- 
 parison with some men who only thought 
 they were democrats. 
 
 226 
 
 * 
 
JEREY SIMPSOK. 
 
 I taught Jerry to ride a bicycle and we 
 made many a journey in and around Wash- 
 ington. It was on these trips more than at 
 any other time that I learned the big impulse 
 that inspired his life and the tremendous 
 sacrifice he was making and had made in 
 the cause of the plain people. 
 
 There were some men who dressed bet- 
 ter; some men who had a smoother flow of 
 words, but in his rugged way he had the 
 greatest power of happy expression of any 
 man I knew. 
 
 During all my acquaintance with him I 
 never saw him fail either in judgment, cour- 
 age or discretion. 
 
 Trusting that your work will in some 
 
 way give the picture of this great man's life, 
 
 I remain, 
 
 Sincerely yours, 
 
 Tom L. JoHis^soiT. 
 
 Cleveland, Ohio. 
 
 227 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 SENATOR CHESTER I. LOISTG. 
 From 1886 to 1902 in every political 
 campaign Jerry Simpson and I supported 
 different tickets and candidates. In four 
 campaigns we were opposing candidates for 
 congress. During all that time we disagreed 
 on political principles but our personal rela- 
 tions were friendly. He was a most skillful 
 antagonist, a resourceful debater and one of 
 the best political speakers Kansas has pro- 
 duced. 
 
 Medicine Lodge, Kansas. 
 
 TOM McNEAL. 
 I made Mr. Simpson's acquaintance 
 very shortly after he settled in Barber coun- 
 ty, and was intimately acquainted with him 
 during a considerable portion of the time 
 of his residence there. While it chanced that 
 he and I differed politically, I always enter- 
 
 228 
 
JERRY SIMPSON. 
 
 tained a liigli opinion of his ability and re- 
 spect for his personal integrity. I regarded 
 him as a remarkable man. He was pos- 
 sessed of great native wit, shrewdness and 
 courage. He was a bom leader of men and 
 easily commanded both the respect and fidel- 
 ity of his followers. His native wit and 
 shrewdness enabled him to adapt himself 
 easily to all sorts and conditions of men, so 
 that he was at home, either when mingling 
 with the rough bearded farmers of his own 
 district, or with the smooth shaven and well 
 dressed denizens of the metropolis. 
 
 An omnivorous reader and possessed of 
 a marvelous memory, his mind became a 
 veritable store house of information. This 
 fact connected with his natural mental alert' 
 ness made him one of the most formidable 
 antagonists in a rough and tumble debate that 
 
 this country has ever known. 
 
 229 
 
THE STOKY OF 
 
 Long before his death his political ene- 
 mies had ceased to ridicule him and had 
 come to regard him as a man of much more 
 than ordinary power. Few men, indeed, 
 have passed away about whom more was 
 said, spoken and written that was commend- 
 atory, and less that was deprecatory as to 
 either his character or ability. 
 
 My personal relations with him were 
 always of the most pleasant character and I 
 learned of his death with feelings of pro- 
 found regret. 
 
 Topeha, Kansas. ' 
 
 WILLIAM JE:tTls^IIS[GS BEYAN. 
 AVhen Jerry Simpson, as he was famil- 
 iarly called, entered Congress he was dubbed 
 "Sockless Simpson," and "The Sockless 
 Statesman," by some of the eastern papers. 
 But his colleagues were not long in finding 
 
 230 
 
JERKY SIMPSON. 
 
 out that his claim to distinction was in his 
 head rather than in his feet. 
 
 He at once entered the lists as a debater 
 and was the hero of a number of interesting 
 discussions. His speeches contained a de- 
 lightful commingling of logic and humor, and 
 his hearty good nature made him popular on 
 both sides of the House. 
 
 ]^o question under consideration in the 
 National Congress was too large for him to 
 grapple with and he clarified every subject 
 which he discussed. 
 
 My esteem for Jerry Simpson increased 
 as my acquaintance with him grew. 
 Lincoln J NehrasJca. 
 
 WILLIAM GAREISON. 
 
 God gave us prophets of old to warn the 
 people of coming danger. When our flag 
 had brooded over slavery eighty years, pro- 
 
 231 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 tecting not the weak, God gave us a Lincoln 
 to give the nation a new birth of freedom. 
 
 Allien combinations of wealth were fill- 
 ing the halls of Congress with their agents; 
 when the great Mississippi Valley seemed 
 content with a system that taxed the people 
 TO make millionaires; when the wealth of a 
 nation was in the hands of a few, it was then 
 we heard the voice of Jerry Simpson crying 
 in the school houses of Kansas: ^'Equal 
 rights to all, special privileges to none." 
 
 I had the pleasure of nominating Jerry 
 Simpson, at Wichita, for his second term in 
 Congress. He was greatly beloved and was 
 regarded as the Abraham Lincoln cf Kansas. 
 ^^Tien the history of reform is ^vritten; 
 when we have a government administered 
 by and for the people let it be said of Jerry 
 Simpson that he gave the best of his life to 
 free labor from the bondage of capital. 
 Pond Creek, Oklahoma. 
 232 
 
 1 
 J 
 
JEKRY SIMPSON. 
 
 DEJ^NIS rLY:N'K 
 Jerry Simpson and I differed radically 
 in politics, but we have always been the 
 warmest personal friends. I have known 
 him for twenty years. We both lived in 
 Barber county when only a few of us were 
 living there, and when we both went to Con- 
 gress we neighbored at the Capital City and 
 neighbored closely. Mr. Simpson did not 
 prove discreditable to Kansas in Congress. 
 Before his entrance to that body people 
 thought they would see a show, but his col- 
 leagues soon learned to respect him and then 
 learned to admire his ready wit and fine 
 natural talents. He made himself agreeable 
 to the members and took an active part in 
 the proceedings of the lower House. The 
 benches and galleries were never empty when 
 ii: was known that he would have the floor 
 to speak. 
 
 Guthrie, Ohlahoma. 
 
 233 
 
THE STOKY OF 
 
 DAVID LEAHY. 
 
 It was mj privilege to have an intimate 
 personal acquaintance with Mr. Simpson for 
 a period long antedating the appearance of 
 either an ambition or a disposition to enter 
 public life until the hour of his death. In 
 that last hour — that awful hour when the 
 world receded from his conscious vision, 
 when the unknown was but a threshold's 
 width away, when the sable curtain fell for- 
 ever between him and those he loved — ^he was 
 the same Jerry Simpson whom I had known 
 on the farm, in the small, curious combina- 
 tions of village activity, in the superheated 
 politics of the district, in Congress and in 
 his retirement. This last hour was the proof 
 of his whole life — it was the perfected and 
 completed evidence of the sincerity of all his 
 public and private actions and utterances, of 
 the truth of his professions that he was the 
 friend of man. 
 
 234 
 
 -i- 
 
JEKKY SIMPSON. 
 
 Tempermentally Mr. Simpson was what 
 is generally known as a good fellow. It was 
 this quality in him that made so many of his 
 political enemies his personal friends. It 
 was this quality in him that made Kansas 
 weep many honest tears when he passed 
 away. He was a choice companion, never 
 dull, stupid or even commonplace. I never 
 knew a newspaper man who did not secretly 
 admire his personality although the exigen- 
 cies of party politics might have forced them 
 into open and seemingly bitter condemnation 
 of his methods. Interviewers and writers of 
 contemporary activity loved him. He was to 
 them what meat and drink and shade are to 
 the travelers in the desert. In all his utter- 
 ances there was material for a story and a 
 quaintness and originality of expression that 
 never failed to give a professionally desired 
 tout ensemble to an interview. People have 
 
 235 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 erroneously interpreted his tact and readi- 
 ness to accommodate reporters as a fondness 
 for notoriety. It was not. The truth is 
 this, that Mr. Simpson was a sincere believer 
 in certain reform principles and had an apos- 
 tolic zeal in their diffusion among the people. 
 Carried away by this zeal he often was frank 
 and candid to the uttermost and outermost 
 limits of danger in expression, and if news- 
 paper men had loved him less he might have 
 met many embarrassments. Usually sharp, 
 keen and penetrative it is not an unfavorable 
 commentary on the character of Mr. Simpson 
 to say that he was universally admired by 
 newspaper men. It was good to know him 
 intimately as I did, and no one has a greater 
 measure of respect for his memory. He had 
 a genius that would have made him useful 
 and conspicuous in any age of reform and 
 betterment the world has ever experienced. 
 Wichita, Kansas, 
 
 236 
 
JEKKY SIMPSO:^. 
 
 HOIST. CHAMP CLAEK. 
 
 I valued Jerry Simpson very highly as 
 a friend. He was kind, genial, bright and 
 faithful. He possessed a wonderful assort- 
 ment of general information and was much 
 of a philosopher. Pie was one of the best 
 rough and tumble debaters with whom I have 
 served in thirteen years in Congress. His 
 wit, humor, sarcasm and wide knowledge of 
 men and things rendered him a master in 
 that difficult field of human endeavor. 
 
 If I should live a thousand years I shall 
 never forget his skillful handling of Nelson 
 Dingley and his silk hat with the London 
 trade mark. That was a rich and racy inci- 
 dent which enlivened the proceedings amaz- 
 ingly. 
 
 There was one occurence which must 
 haved warmed the cockles of Jerry's heart. 
 When he first appeared in the House subse- 
 
 237 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 quent to a serious illness during which it was 
 generally expected that he would die, the 
 members cheered him till the glass ceiling 
 was in danger of being cracked. The cheer- 
 ing was not confined to Democrats, Populists 
 and Silverites but the Republicans joined in 
 heartily. That was a great day for Jerry 
 and was proof positive that he stood high in 
 the estimation of the House. 
 
 I shall always cherish his memory, both 
 as a personal friend and a public man. 
 Bowling Green, Mo. 
 
 HARRY LANDIS. 
 I was Jerry Simpson's intimate acquain- 
 tance and warm friend in Barber County. 
 It seemed to me that there was no great sub- 
 ject related to human welfare about which he 
 had not read and striven to become informed. 
 He knew not fear, either mental or physical. 
 
 238 
 
THE STOEY OF 
 
 How strong and full of healtli lie was in those 
 days. 'No man in Barber County would have 
 cared to arouse his righteous wrath and risk 
 a physical encounter. He would not quickly 
 resent an insult to himself but he would read- 
 ily punish a man who was imposing upon 
 another. He was the most skillful and pow- 
 erful oarsman I ever saw, it was a delight to 
 see the ease and grace with which he would 
 manage a boat. 
 
 I have often pondered upon the secret 
 of his influence as a personal leader both in 
 private life and in the political field. I think 
 his great personal popularity arose from his 
 abounding good nature and his genuine kind- 
 liness. His power to sway men in politics y" 
 rested chiefly in his own intense convictions. 
 He was in a degree a fanatic. That which 
 seemed to him to be truth he dwelt upon un- 
 til he felt that it must and would prevail and 
 
 239 
 
THE STOEY OF 
 
 bring relief to the needy, suffering sons of 
 men. 
 
 He was a big, strong, fearless man, al- 
 ways espousing the cause of the weak, always 
 for the under dog in the fight. He was gen- 
 tle as a woman, kind, sunny tempered, witty 
 and alert. He was an incomparable "mixer'' 
 and a steadfast friend. 
 Kansas City, Missouri, 
 
 LOUIS F. POST. 
 Jerry Simpson's name first fell upon my 
 ears in the Union Station restaurant at Kan- 
 sas City. It was about two weeks after his 
 first election to Congress, and the sensational 
 victory of the Kansas populists was still fresh 
 in the public mind. Sitting opposite me at 
 the breakfast table — I, a tenderfoot freshly 
 imported from !N^ew York — was a disgusted 
 and garrulous man, who explained what he 
 
 240 
 
JEREY SIMPSOiT. 
 
 evidently regarded as a political episode of 
 unprecedented degradation. ^^Vliy," said he 
 at one point in his tirade and with an out- 
 burst of contempt, 'they've elected a man to 
 Congress over there who doesn't wear socks." 
 The tone and manner were so significant that 
 1 never stopped to reflect that a man's feet 
 might be pretty decently clothed with stock- 
 ings instead of socks; and there rose up in 
 my imagination what was doubtless the 
 counterpart of a picture that filled the imag- 
 ination of my chance acquaintance. It was 
 a picture of a ragged and barefooted tra.up, 
 steeped in ignorance as well as poverty, "beat- 
 ing" his way to Washington to take a seat in 
 Congress. Such a Congressman seemed im- 
 possible. But my informant assured me that 
 what he said was true, and that the man's 
 name was Jerry Simpson. 
 
 241 
 
THE STOKY OF 
 
 Carrying this picture of Jerry Simpson 
 in my mind, I went over to Kansas. At 
 Lawrence my best informant told me tliat 
 Simpson was "a very adaptable man/' who in 
 a couple of weeks would be ^^as much at home 
 with a swallow-tail coat in a Washington 
 drawing room as he was then without socks 
 on a Kansas prairie." By the time I 
 reached Topeka, he had grown larger, and I 
 was told that ^ ^anyone who picked him up for 
 a fool would make a mistake." Determined 
 to see this curious man in his proper person, 
 I started for Medicine Lodge, but stopped at 
 Wichita, for I learned that he had passed me 
 on his way to Topeka. A Wichita informant 
 about him was prolific — all from Eepublican 
 sources — and he fairly towered. Incidental- 
 ly, too, I got a hint that he was a disciple of 
 Henry George. When at last I met him at 
 Topeka, I found this to be true; and a few 
 
 242 
 
JEEKY SIMPSON. 
 
 weeks later lie spoke for us Single Taxers at 
 Cooper Union, New York City, in defense of 
 absolute free trade. From that time until 
 his death I felt it an honor to be able to num- 
 ber his among my closest and most cherished 
 friendships. 
 
 As a man, Jerry Simpson was open, 
 strong, unflinching; and he was as thought- 
 ful, prudent and rational as he was frank and 
 courageous. A politician of public spirit, 
 his democracy was as thorough as Jefferson's. 
 It permitted no distinction of race or creed 
 or class or nationality. Like Henry George, 
 whose intimate friend he became and whose 
 disciple he was proud to be, Jerry Simpson 
 stood for men. It was that that made him a 
 free trader. It was that that made him a 
 single taxer. He believed that the right to 
 trade is a logical corollary of the right to 
 the use of the earth, and that both are natural 
 
 243 
 
THE STOEY OF 
 
 rights of which governments cannot in jus- 
 tice divest anyone. 
 
 In loving his neighbor as himself hy 
 holding aloft the principle of justice, Jerry 
 Simpson made his life a Christian example 
 in a higher than any sectarian sense. A 
 democratic nobleman, who never forgot a 
 friend or failed to forgive an enemy, a re- 
 publican citizen who knew no class distinc- 
 tions, an honest man whose honesty towered 
 so far above policy as to be his guiding prin- 
 ciple of thought and action regardless of per- 
 sonal consequences, he was withal one of 
 those rare patriots to whom, as to William 
 Loyd Garrison, their country is the world 
 and their countrymen all mankind. 
 Chicago, Illinois. 
 
 HON. W. D. VIITCENT. 
 
 It was my privilege to serve as one of 
 
 244 
 
JEKRY SIMPSOX. 
 
 Mr. Simpson's colleagues in the Fifty-fifth 
 Congress. During the five months extra 
 session we lived in the same house and I was 
 with him most of the time, which gave me 
 an opportunity to study and appreciate his 
 simplicity and his greatness. He was one of 
 the most agreeable and entertaining compan- 
 ions I ever met. He was always witty but 
 never tiresome. His witticisms came spon- 
 taneously and yet there was philosophy in 
 what he said. Some men are humorists be- 
 cause they make it a study and try to be fun- 
 ny. Their forced wit soon becomes tiresome. 
 Jerry was humorous because he could not be 
 otherwise, and he was just as brilliant and 
 entertaining at the end of a month's daily 
 conversation as he was in the beginning. In 
 debate he showed the same characteristics. 
 He was always ready. Quick as a spark of / 
 electricity, you could no more knock him off 
 
 245 
 
THE STOEY OF 
 
 liis feet than you could prostrate a solid rub- 
 ber ball, l^othing pleased bim better than 
 to have his opponents fire questions at him — 
 the faster they came the better he liked it. 
 His answers came as quick as a flash, and if 
 he had known a week in advance what the 
 questions were going to be his answers could 
 not have been more complete and to the 
 point. More than once with his sarcasm and 
 irony did he make such old debaters as Ding- 
 ley and Grosvenor regret that they had inter- 
 rupted him. In his controversies with the 
 big men of the house he appeared to be as 
 cool and unconcerned as if he were engaged 
 in the pastime of telling stories to a crowd of 
 schoolboys. 
 
 In the Fifty-fifth congress Simpson was 
 practically the leader, not only of the Popu- 
 lists, but of the Democrats on the floor of the 
 House. The man whom the Democrats had 
 
 246 
 
 :K. ' II 
 
JEKEY SIMPSON. 
 
 selected as their leader was too conservative 
 and lie was almost lost sight of when Jerry 
 made his bold fight on the Keed rules. Simp- 
 son became impatient with the Speaker's rul- 
 ings and he waged a war on the '^czar" that 
 will go down in history as one of the events 
 of the national House of Representatives. 
 Jerry was positively in the right in that con- 
 troversy and he never lost an opportunity to 
 harass the Speaker. At times Reed would be- 
 come so exasperated that he could scarcely 
 control his temper. Jerry dared to say to 
 the Speaker's face what other members were 
 almost afraid to say behind his back. ISTot- 
 withstanding all this Mr. Reed was his per- 
 sonal friend and admired his brilliancy and 
 audacity. 
 
 Let us hope that the life and character 
 of Jerry Simpson will be an inspiration to 
 
 247 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 younger men to take up tlie fight for human- 
 ity where he left off. 
 Clay Center, Kansas. 
 
 HAMLIl^ GAELAND. 
 
 As I look back upon my acquaintance 
 with Jerry Simpson I remember most vivid- 
 ly his humor, his quick wit and his kindli- 
 ness. We were drawn together first by our 
 common interest in Henry George and his 
 land reform but I came to like ^'The Sockless 
 Sage" because of the quaint charm of his 
 manner and the sincerity of his convictions. 
 I saw much of him in Washington and we 
 used to bicycle about the suburbs together. 
 We conspired together in St. Louis to get 
 the land plank into the Peoples Party plat- 
 form and always I found him single-hearted 
 in his desire to make the world better. 
 Handicapped by the lack of education in the 
 
 248 
 
JERKY SIMPSOISr. 
 
 formal sense lie nevertheless was a man of 
 knowledge and I enjoyed his talk qnite as 
 much as his speeches. I saw him on the 
 floor of the House during the time when 
 ^The Alliance" had its "Wedge" in Congress 
 and it was a delight to me to see him measure 
 swords with some of the polished fencers of 
 the floor. He was quite able to take care of 
 himself and Speaker Reed always had a 
 twinkle in his eye when Jerry rose to reply. 
 
 He was a sturdy democrat in the best 
 and broadest sense of the term a "Henry 
 George democrat" as the phrase at that time 
 expressed it. 
 
 He will long remain in the memories of 
 those who knew him as one of the most pic- 
 turesque figures of western politics. 
 Chicago, Illinois. 
 
 249 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 MRS. je:n'ote l. moi^roe. 
 
 The first time I saw Jerry Simpson was 
 at mj home on Capitol Hill. I was enter- 
 taining the Washington Single Tax Club. 
 Mr. Simpson had been in the city but a 
 short time and was a stranger to most of 
 those present. He was a distinct surprise to 
 us all. He looked like a theological student. 
 He talked very little during the evening, but 
 he was in no wise self conscious or ill at ease. 
 The few remarks which were elicited from 
 him evinced a thorough knowledge of Single 
 Tax theories. 
 
 After the meeting, I remarked, "If this 
 Mr. Simpson is a Kansas ignoramus, I would 
 like to meet some of the wise men of that 
 state." 
 
 A short time thereafter I made the ac- 
 quaintance of Mrs. Simpson, and their son, 
 Lester, and it was my great pleasure to be 
 
 250 
 
JEKEY SIMPSOlSr. 
 
 intimate with the family during their entire 
 residence in Washington. 
 
 I greatly admired Speaker Reed, for 
 two reasons, first, because he was an honest 
 statesman, second because he had a genuine, 
 personal liking for Jerry Simpson. 
 
 It is upon Jerry Simpson as a public 
 man of distinction that the memory of most 
 people will linger; I like best to remember 
 him in his simple, everyday, home life, where 
 I ever found him courteous, genial, sincere. 
 He was never effusive in his protestations of 
 desire to benefit his fellow men, but he ever 
 impressed me as one to whom the thought of 
 being of service was never absent. 
 
 During Mr. Simpson's severe illness, I 
 remained at their home for two days ; there 
 was a continual stream of callers — most of 
 them congressmen, and all of them eager to 
 render any possible service. It was during 
 this time of anxiety that I learned of the 
 warm friendship existing between Tom John- 
 son and Jerry Simpson, and also of the warm 
 
 251 
 
THE STOKY OE 
 
 personal regard of very many of his col- 
 leagues who were not at all in sympathy with 
 his political views. 
 
 I esteem it one of the privileges of my 
 life to have known Jerry Simpsoa. 
 
 Washington, D. 0, 
 
 JUDGE W. W. GATEWOOD. 
 
 When Jerry Simpson died God took 
 from among us one of ^Nature's noblemen. 
 He was a diamond, not in the rough, for, by 
 self culture he had made himself a polished 
 gentleman. When Abraham Lincoln was 
 splitting rails in the wilderness of Illinois, 
 he was a prophet undiscovered. The fullness 
 of time revealed the true character of Lin- 
 coln to the world, and the whole earth has 
 united in canonizing him. Simpson was the 
 same sterling character of man as Lincoln. 
 Of and from among the common people, yet 
 in no sense was he provincial or prescribed by 
 the limits or prejudices of any class. As he 
 grew the horizon of his mental vision extend- 
 
 252 
 
JEKEY SIMPSON. 
 
 ed until Jerry Simpson in the meridian of 
 his manhood was one of the broadest minded 
 men and one of the most liberal in his views 
 among all the public men of onr day. With- 
 out early opportunities for education or ad- 
 vancement, by the natural force of character 
 that was in him, by the laudable ambition 
 he always had to do something worthy among 
 his fellows, by his devotion to the right as it 
 was given him to see the right, and by honest, 
 constant, faithful discharge of every duty that 
 fell to him to do, he gradually and steadily 
 arose in the appreciation of those about him 
 until among the first statesmen of his country 
 he became recognized and appreciated as a 
 thinker and a leader worthy of the highest 
 consideration and the most implicit confid- 
 
 ence. 
 
 The writer knew Jerry Simpson as a 
 warm Dersonal friend. His life was much 
 that every father should wish his son to be- 
 come In his business life he was faithful, 
 honest and true. In a word, Jerry Simpson, 
 
 253 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 from first to last, was an honest man — the 
 noblest work of God. 
 Roswell, New Mexico. 
 
 C. W. DeFEEEST. 
 
 Honorable Jerry Simpson was, in my 
 mind, one of the most companionable men 
 with whom I have ever had the pleasure of 
 associating. Generous to a fault, magnani- 
 mous in spirit and action, he was always will- 
 ing to respond to the occasion. 
 
 My association with him in the Land 
 and Immigration business, extending over a 
 considerable period of time, was a great edu- 
 cation for me. I shall always look back and 
 remember with pleasure, the period in which 
 we strove together, in directing and bringing 
 people to the Pecos Valley. \Ye never had 
 an unpleasant word, and I know of no one 
 held dearer in the hearts of his friends and 
 constituents than Jerry Simpson. 
 Roswell, Neiv Mexico. 
 254 
 
JERKY SIMPSOISr. 
 
 ROSWELL, K M., RECORD. 
 'Not for the honors he had won in the 
 past nor for high office he once held, but for 
 his everyday personality as a neighbor and 
 private citizen, his leadership and earnest ef- 
 forts in presenting to the world the advant- 
 ages of the valley which he chose for spend- 
 ing his declining years in peaceful simplicity 
 of living, the city of Roswell and the Pecos 
 valley sincerely mourns the death of Jerry 
 Simpson, a good and useful man. Unspoiled 
 by success, dignified and determined enough 
 on occasion, he was childlike in his frank en- 
 joyment of the simplest relations. Every- 
 body called him by his first name, and yet 
 he was none the less respected. It w^as not 
 a vulgar familiarity that caused his friends 
 to refer to him as "Our Jerry." It was 
 
 rather, like the parental pride whose heart 
 with love in contemplating the achieve- 
 ments of ''our boy" — cherished by the humble 
 fireside, and looked upon with wonder and 
 admiration as his voice was raised in the halls 
 of the great. 
 
 255 
 
THE STOEY OF 
 
 HEIsTRY W. Y0U:N"G. 
 
 Jerry Simpson was one of tlie most orig- 
 inal and unique personalities the present 
 generation has seen and at the same time 
 wholesomely human and genuinely lovable. 
 Although so illiterate that he couldn't write ^ 
 a dozen words without misspelling several of 
 them, he was none the less a great man. In 
 the halls of Congress he weilded an influence 
 greater than any other member of the minor- 
 ity, and in the thrust and parry of debate he 
 had no peer. He was as quick-witted as an 
 Irishman and his repartee came like a flash 
 of lightning out of a clear sky. Politically, 
 he was, like Mayor Tom Johnson, a single 
 taxer, a disciple of Henry George. 
 
 Knowing him intimately, as one knows 
 a man with whom and against whom he has 
 battled in conventions and committee rooms, 
 and with whom he has talked familiarly by 
 the hour, I feel impelled to say that while 
 Jerry was human and fallible, like the rest 
 of us, he was a clean, honest, straightforward 
 
 256 
 
JEEE7 SIMPSON. 
 
 self-respecting American who had at heart 
 the interests of all the people and worked for 
 them as he saw the light. 
 
 Jerry contributed in no small degree 
 to the gaiety of the nation and he made the 
 most prosy political subjects bright and di- 
 verting by his original w^ay of looking at 
 things and by his homely anecdotes and il- 
 lustrations. It would be well for the people 
 of the United States if there were lots more 
 like Jerry in public life. But he stood alone 
 and singular, the only one of his kind and by 
 far the more interesing on that account. 
 
 It seems well and fitting that he should 
 have come back to Kansas to die. Although 
 he was born over the border in Canada, it was 
 here that he made the long step from city 
 marshal of Medicine Lodge to member of the 
 United States Congress. His story is part 
 of the heritage of our state, and we are glad 
 that the last scenes upon which his mortal 
 eyes gazed were those of one of our greatest 
 valleys and the last skies whose mornings 
 
 25Y 
 
THE STOKY OF 
 
 brightened and whose sunsets flamed over 
 him were those of the commonwealth he 
 loved and honored, and which had honored 
 him. 
 
 Independence, Kansas. 
 
 MES. COKxi G. LEWIS. 
 
 Many people who admired Jerry Simp- 
 son as a public man, knew little of his de- 
 lightful personality. He had the reserve of 
 the genuinely refined, and was most loveable 
 as a friend. He was a guest in our home 
 many times, coming the first time with Mrs. 
 Simpson. He had been very ill and was 
 really not able to speak, and to meet and to 
 shake hands with the crowds of people that 
 always swarmed into town to hear him. I 
 shall ahvays remember the exquisite care his 
 ^vife gave him when she brought him to the 
 house in a state of exhaustion after the hand- 
 shaking ordeal. 
 
 We always had enchanting hours with 
 books, when he was vv^ith us, and long looks 
 
 268 
 
JEREY SIMPSOl^. 
 
 backvrarf] over the pathway of the race to its 
 present place, and made many plans to help 
 hurry the coming of the day of brotherhood. 
 The books we loved best are more precious 
 because he has read iiloud from them. He 
 had a way of stopping in the midst of a 
 thought and drawling, "Say do you remem- 
 ber what Hugo, or perhaps Emerson or Mat- 
 zini, said about that — ^haven't you got it 
 somewhere ?" Mostly we had it, and some of 
 the books have turned down corners yet, as 
 he left them. Sometimes there were friends 
 in, to share the beautiful hours. Xo matter 
 how much we tried to keep avv'ay from it, 
 every talk on the problems of humanity, 
 came untimately to Henry George's solution 
 in "Progress and Poverty." We have a 
 copy of this book that he gave us. It was in 
 paper covers and he had been reading it on 
 the train during a campaign. It has a few 
 penciled comments on the margins, and is 
 hallov/ed by memories of the times three of 
 us read that wonderful last chapter together. 
 
 259 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 Warden Haskell had this book bound for ns 
 by a convict at the penitentiary. It seemed 
 to me that was what it needed ; to have been 
 written by Henry George ; to have been 
 loved and read by Jerry Simpson ; and to 
 be bound by one who had suffered; for the 
 lives of both writer and lover were beaten 
 out against the bars of life, trying to ease 
 the burdens of mankind. I remember once 
 when Mr. Simpson came to Kinsley, Mr. 
 Lewis was in Topeka taking care of the 
 speaker's bureau during a hard fought po- 
 litical campaign. Jerry came in Friday 
 evening, and went to bed with the usual 
 good night, and "rest until you want to 
 get up." We were in the midst of an excit- 
 ing local political fight and I was running 
 the Graphic. I went to the office early Sat- 
 urday, leaving the household in charge of 
 my mother, and a faithful maid. The town 
 was full of people, for Jerry was to speak 
 at the opera house in the afternoon, and at 
 eleven a. m. there was to be a procession 
 
 260 
 
JERKY SIMPSOIsr. 
 
 headed by the speaker. Jerry had been in- 
 formed by the chairman of the arrange- 
 ments. I refreshed his memory as to the 
 pkn Friday evening. Along about 10:30 
 Saturday the chairman of the congressional 
 committee, came to the office after the 
 speaker and said the procession was form- 
 ing. I said ''he was very tired yesterday 
 and I am afraid he is still asleep at our 
 house. Won't you go down and ask mother 
 to have him called at once?" The chair- 
 man went. He came back surrounded by a 
 chilly official atmosphere, and said icily, 
 "Jerry isn't there." ''He has taken your 
 three children and gone for a walk on the 
 prairies, and your mother says he has been 
 ffcne an hour and he knew all about this pa- 
 rade." I was aghast. I went home at once, 
 and reproached mother for having let the 
 hero of the day escape. Eleven o'clock 
 came and no Jerry. The procession had 
 formed, the horses were prancing and the 
 wind blowing, and again the chairman ap- 
 
 261 
 
THE STOEY OF 
 
 peared, about as mad as a man can be. He 
 said bitingly to me: '^Is he out with those 
 children yet ?'' I felt most deeply my guilt 
 in being the mother of the three who had so 
 endeared themselves to Jerry. Eleven 
 thirty came, and I was desperately trying 
 to smooth the ruffled plumage of the chair- 
 man, while mother and the maid kept a 
 sharp lookout for the run-a-ways. Finally 
 the chairman took his departure, icicles 
 crackling from his outraged person at each 
 step. Mother and I felt most decidedly, at 
 this point, that politics was not woman's 
 sphere. The procession, without a person- 
 age, wended its way about the little 
 town, a sense of resentment against Jerry 
 and me pervading its entire presence. About 
 one o'clock the wanderers came home. They 
 were so happy, so dirty, and so tired, I had 
 not the heart to say a word. Their arms 
 were full of long sweet grasses, lacy brown 
 ^veeds and late autumn flowers. Two of 
 the children had thrust a branch from a 
 
 262 
 
JERRY SIMPSOK 
 
 Cottonwood, througli a big tumble weed, and 
 were towing it home in triumph, to show 
 their grandmother. They unloaded their 
 trophies on the veranda and besides the 
 things visible there were hidden treasures — 
 stones, a small lizard, a few late frogs, some 
 curious seed pods and a weather-beaten 
 bird's nest. As gently as I could I broke 
 the news of the heroless parade to Jerry. 
 He said, '^Oh, I don't care; I hate proces- 
 sions anyway. I was so tired and I had 
 a walk that's rested me enough to last a 
 week," and he turned to arbitrate the ques- 
 tion, as to whether the lizard belonged to 
 the six-year-old boy, who saw it first, the 
 seven-year-old boy, who caught it, or their 
 sister of ten, who carried it home in her 
 apron pocket. I was not to be trifled with 
 further. I insisted upon a proper toilet, a 
 hurried luncheon and telephoned to the com- 
 mittee that their candidate would be at 
 the Graphic office ready for a conference 
 with the party leaders at one thirty. When 
 
 263 
 
THE STOEY OF 
 
 we got there tlie atmospliere would have chill- 
 ed an Esquimo. Jerry felt bady for he loved 
 people, and hated to grieve them, much as 
 he abhorred anything in the shape of display. 
 That night at dinner we all felt depressed. 
 Finally Jerry said, "Well Jim ought to have 
 stayed home and tended to this thing. AAHiat 
 did he go away for anyhow?" "Yes," I 
 said, "he is the cause of all the trouble. He 
 should have been here instead of leaving 
 this meeting to me." Mother straightened 
 up and began a defense of her son-in-law, 
 w^hom she would not have blamed for Jerry's 
 forgetfulness. We laughed and soon forgot 
 the annoyances. Friends came In for the 
 evening, and Jerry charmed and delighted 
 us until midnight with his conversation. His 
 keen mind always dominated a company. 
 A great reader, a profound thinker, a lover 
 of men, a man to whom shams were abhor- 
 rent, a gentle kindly spirit, whose wit was 
 keen as a flame, as a guest he left in our 
 home a trail of sweet scented memories. 
 Kinsley, Kansas. 
 
 264 
 
JEEEY SIMPSOIsr. 
 
 JUDGE FKAOT^ DOSTER 
 
 There is a species of justice akin to tli3 
 retributive whicli compels us finally to ac- 
 cept the creed of those who because of it wo 
 first persecuted and reviled; but rarely in- 
 deed is the grace given us to admit to the 
 victim of our hate and scorn that we have 
 been converted to the saving reason and-pow- 
 er of his superior virtue. Paul, it is true, 
 confessed to the face of those he had scoffed 
 at and scourged ; we rather than make avow- 
 al to those whom we have wronged because 
 of their faith, meanly conceal our conver- 
 sion, or more often, and meaner still, usurp 
 the place of the prophet who had told us of 
 the better way, and pretend to have been, 
 instead of he, the first apostle of the right- 
 eousness he had preached. We seem never 
 to be able frankly to admit that we were in 
 the wrong and another in the right. If we 
 loake the admission at all it is always so 
 compromised and qualified with ^'buts" and 
 ^'ifs" that the virtue of that ''honest confes- 
 
 265 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 sion wliicli is good for the soul" becomes de- 
 prived of all efficacy by the lies which ac- 
 company its telling. 
 
 Jerry Simpson in what he preached il- 
 lustrated more than anyone of this genera- 
 tion the strange anomalies of human nature 
 just mentioned. In his public career he 
 was calumniated and reviled more than any 
 man of his time. What obloquy and re- 
 proach did not fall to his lot had either not 
 been conceived in thought or else failed of 
 expression because of the limitations of 
 speech. The superlatives of contempt, ridi- 
 cule, epithet, and anathema were inadequate 
 to voice the disapproval and contempt of him 
 and his doctrines. They sound strange now, 
 those indictments under which he was ar- 
 raigned at the bar of partisan malignity and 
 hate. It will be profitable to glance at some 
 of them so as to know how radically in so 
 brief a space of time the law of political high 
 crimes and misdemeanors has changed. He 
 said that party politics was corrupt and that 
 
 266 
 
JERKY SIMPSOX. 
 
 party organizations existed chiefly for the 
 purpose of public plunder. The sickening 
 revelations of boodle, graft and fraud in the 
 courts and other investigating tribunals seem 
 to justify the suspicion of everyone in offic- 
 ial life. He said that avaricious trusts and 
 combines were possessing themselves of the 
 substance of the industrial toiler and should 
 be compelled to let go. The universal judg- 
 ment of the country, voiced in particular by 
 its president, now approves what Jerry 
 Simpson said, and demands that the trusts 
 let go. He said the people as a whole should 
 own and operate what the individual could 
 not own and manage for himself. The 
 socialization of the public utilities of light, 
 v/ater, communication and transportation is 
 now the accepted philosophy of the vast ma- 
 jority — is practiced in numerous instances, 
 while in all other instances we only await 
 decision as to the available time and methods 
 of realization. Not to further call over the 
 list, he said a dozen other truths of large mo- 
 
 267 
 
THE STOEY OF 
 
 ment and of like kind to tliose mentioned, 
 which like them fell upon dull ears or were 
 ridiculed bj scoffing tongues, but every one 
 of which in less than a score of years has 
 been accepted by populace and politician, 
 and on which those who crucified him for 
 uttering them are now riding into office. 
 With the exception of what Jerry Simpson 
 thought on the financial topic, viz., the kind 
 of material out of which money should be 
 made, absolutely everyone of his views has 
 passed into the accepted creed of the two 
 controlling political parties of the nation, 
 and it only needs a financial panic or a re- 
 currence of hard times to turn men's thoughts 
 to a serious consideration whether, after all, 
 he was not right as to that. Less than twen- 
 ty years ago, for preaching what everybody 
 now believes, he was the most illy thought of 
 and worst abused man of his time. Only 
 his nimble wit and contagious good humor 
 saved him from actual physical violence; 
 now his erstwhile enemies speak of him with 
 
 268 
 
JERRY SIMPSOK 
 
 respect, some of tliein even with affection. 
 He was a man whom not only Kansas but 
 the nation will presently remember to love. 
 Topeka, Kansas, 
 
 MRS. LESTER SIMPSOK 
 
 I think few girls feel toward their 
 father-in-law as I did toward Mr. Simpson. 
 I conld never see him in any light except as 
 a most perfect husband and father. He was 
 always kind and generous in his home and 
 always had a kind word and pleasant smile 
 with which to greet us all. I never met him 
 that he did not greet me with a smile and a 
 ^^Hello Gerlie.'' 
 
 He never told his family of an^'thing 
 that might worry them, but he would tell us 
 of the better things that were in store for us. 
 
 I was with him a great deal in his last 
 illness and while we all knew he was suffer- 
 ing untold pain I never heard him speak ond 
 word of complaint. 
 
 269 
 
THE STOKY OF 
 
 Oh, there is so much to be said about 
 Daddie. 
 
 Lipscomb, Texas. 
 
 MRS. JEERY SIMPSO:Nr. 
 
 I want to say a few words directly to 
 the personal friends of my husband. I 
 want them to know how truly he valued their 
 friendship. Especially do I want to tell 
 the 7th District friends how grateful he was 
 for their kindness, their warm support and 
 for their contributions which made it pos- 
 sible for him to go through his first cam- 
 paign for Congress without financial embar- 
 rassment. Dear old friends, he spoke of 
 you so often. 
 
 Oh, how many precious memories I 
 have of my good husband. How wonderful 
 were his patience and his tender care of me 
 during the years of my invalidism. His 
 was the gentler nature, mine the more im- 
 petuous. ]^ever once in all his life did he 
 speak in any but gentle, loving tones to our 
 
 2Y0 
 
JERKY SIMPSON. 
 
 little son. And oh, what delight he took in 
 our little grandson, Jerry Simpson, Jr. 
 
 My husband did not leave us wealth 
 but he left a far more priceless legacy, in 
 the record of his public career and his un- 
 tarnished name. And it is my hope that 
 our son Lester, his wife Gerlie, of whom he 
 was so fond, and their two sons, Jerry and 
 Russell, may ever find inspiration and in- 
 centive to noble living in this book. 
 
 The world is better I am sure because 
 of the life and work of my Jerry. 
 Faithfully yours, 
 
 Jane Simpson. 
 
 Wichita, Kansas. 
 
 271 
 
THE STOKY OF 
 
 Speeches of 
 HOI^. JERRY SIMPS0:N' 
 
 52nd, 53d and 55th Congresses. 
 
 ^^nd Congress, First Session. 
 Eree Cotton Ties. Appendix to Congression- 
 al Record pp. 132—140. (Chapters 
 XXV — XXX of Henry George's Protec- 
 tion and Eree Trade.) 
 
 Meat Inspection 1773 
 
 Indians 1514 
 
 Wealth of Country 3728 
 
 E'aval appropriation 3230 
 
 Tariff 3107—3114 
 
 Irrigation 4396 
 
 Post Office 4820—4831 
 
 Personal explanation 7084 
 
 52??^ Congress, Second Session. 
 
 Pensions x\ppendix 49 — 50 
 
 6Srd Congress, First Session. 
 
 Silver 486—493. Appendix 50—51 
 
 Earm Mortgages 927—928 
 
 Railroad-road stations in Territories 
 
 2717, 2735 
 
 6Sd Congress, Second Session. 
 
 Silver Bullion Coinage 2517 
 
 Appendix 517 — 522 
 272 
 
JEERY SIMPSOK. 
 
 Western Brancli of Soldiers Home 
 
 Appendix 645 — 647 
 
 Admission of :N'ew Mexico 270—272 
 
 Tariff 772-777-905 
 
 Admission of Utah 210—211 
 
 Central Labor Union, Worcester, Mass. 1274 
 
 Oklahoma town sites 2261 
 
 6dd Congress, Third Session. 
 Currency Legislation . . .Appendix 194, 383 
 
 Tariff and Income Tax Appendix 382 
 
 Debate on Pension bill 
 
 (Elizabeth Brewer) 1 • 127—1130 
 
 Pacific R. R. Indebtedness l'S'04 
 
 Printing U. S. l^-otes 1383—1384 
 
 Sugar Duty ; • • • • ^^^^ 
 
 Debate on ITaval appropriation bill 
 
 2240—2244, 2460—61 . 
 
 International Money Conference 3215, 3246 
 Fifty fifth Congress, First Session. 
 
 India Famine sufferers 568 — 569 
 
 Personal Privilege ^^^9 ^^^ 
 
 Tariff 273—275, 399, 491—492 
 
 Pearl Harbor 1025, 1026 
 
 Monetary Commission 2966 
 
 55^7i Congress, Second Session. 
 
 Payment of bonds of U. S. 
 
 Appendix 111 — 116 
 
 273 
 
THE STORY OF 
 
 War Revenue bill 
 
 xippendix 549 — 550, 4395 — 4406 
 
 Civil-service Law 546 — 548 
 
 Cotton Industry 810 
 
 Cuba 803—804 
 
 Governmest expenditures 947 — 948 
 
 Kansas Affairs 949, 950, 951 
 
 Transportation of Bullion 565 — 566 
 
 Rivers and Harbors 2196 — 2197 
 
 Paris exposition 2058 — 2059 
 
 Second class mail matter 2375 — 2377 
 
 Naval Appropriation bill 3465 — 3467 
 
 Election of Senators by the people 
 
 4816—4817 
 
 Pacific R. R. Indebtedness 6723—6724 
 
 66tJi Congress, Third Session. 
 
 Xavy personnel bill 668—669 
 
 Relief of William Cramp &; Sons Ship and 
 Engine Building Company. , . .860 — 862 
 
 Army reorganization 1001 — 1006 
 
 Indemnity to Spain 1958 
 
 Army appropriation bill 2329 
 
 Speech of Thomas Corwin 2743 
 
 Philippine Islands 2408 
 
 274