The nonpartisan leader. [volume], June 30, 1919, Image 6

About The nonpartisan leader. [volume] (Fargo, N.D.) 1915-1921

Image provided by: State Historical Society of North Dakota

                
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Official Magazine of the National Nonpartisan League—Every Week
Entered as second-class matter September 8, 1915, at the poatofflce at St. Paul,
Minnesota, under the Act of March 8, 1879.
OLIVER S. MORRIS. Editor
E. B. Fussell, A. B. Gilbert and C. W. Vonier,'Associate Editors. B. O. Foss, Art Editor
Advertising rates on application. Subscription, one" year, in advance, $2.50 six
months, $1.50. Please do not make checks, drafts nor money orders payable t® indi
viduals. Address all letters and make all remittances to The Nonpartisan Leader,
Box 575, St. Paul, Minn.
MEMBER OF AUDIT BUREAU OF CIRCULATIONS
THE S. C. BECKWITH SPECIAL AGENCY, Advertising' Representatives, New
York, Chicago, St. Louis, Detroit, Kansas City.
Quack, fraudulent and irresponsible firms are not knowingly advertised, and we will
take it as a favor if any readers will advise us promptly should they have occasion to
doubt or question the reliability of any firm which patronizes our advertising columns.
THE WAY THEY FIGHT
has been more cowardly than the way the oppo
sition to the League has .attempted to misrepresent the
progress of affairs in North Dakota. Typical of the mis
representation has been that in connection with the workmen's
compensation bureau.
One of the first things the workmen's compensation bureau
did was to employ a secretary. John B. Brown was selected for
this purpose at a salary of $2,500, St. Paul papers announced, in
their headlines, that a secretary had been selected at a salary of
$25,000 and other anti-farmer sheets copied the statement. A typo
graphical error? One might think so, but wait to learn what
followed.
The commission was charged with the duty of fixing rates to
be charged employers to insure their workmen. This is a most dif
ficult task, of a highly technical nature. Probably there are not
100 men in the United States with sufficient technical training and
experience to calculate these rates correctly. The North Dakota
commissioh found a man able to do it. This man was Emil El Wat
son of Columbus, Ohio. He is an actuary in chargie of a large sta
tistical laboratory, equipped with the latest and most expensive
computing machinery, and has call on the services of 25 trained
clerks.
Mr. Watson contracted to do the work of computing the rates
for $3,600. He had previously done the same work for the state
of Idaho for $5,000. The fact that the North Dakota commission
got a reduction of $1,400 shows their interest in economy.. When
the first half of Mr. Watson's payment came due State Auditor
Kositzky refused payment. He went to the anti-League news
papers with a cock-and-bull story that the state of North Dakota
had hired Mr. Watson for $1,800 a month and the anti-League news
papers, enlarging upon this, said that he was to have a salary of
$21,000 a year.
The facts are that the $3,600 promised Mr. Watson is not
salary for two months' work, but the fee of his bureau or laboratory'
for the highly technical task of rate-fixing, involving the assistance
of 25 clerks besides Mr. Watson.
It is a fact, however, that Mr. Watson is to be employed per
manently by the commission, after the rate-making work covered
by the $3,600 fee is completed. For this work he is to get, not
$21,000 a year, but $1,800 a year.
Of course any decent newspaper, which had the slightest re
gard for the truth, would correct its statements about Secretary
Brown getting $25,000 a year and Actuary Watson getting $21,000
a year. But it is too much to expect from such papers as the St.
Paul Pioneer Press and Dispatch, the Bismarck Tribune, Fargo
Forum, Grand Forks Herald, Lincoln Star and a half-dozen other
sheets we might name which have printed the untrue statements.
THE LEAGUE IS GROWING
from every state in which the League is organized
indicate that the past week showed the most tremendous
advance in membership of any similar period in the history
of the organization. Facing the crisis in North Dakota, where the
strength of the farmers is being tested for a second time within
-a year, the heretofore unorganized farmers of North Dakota and
other states are showing eagerness to align themselves with their
brother Leaguers in the fight for economic and industrial democ
racy. North Dakota has shown what has been made possible by
^political co-operation of the farmers. Farmers in other states are
anxious to enjoy some of the advantages that the farmers of North
Dakota are now enjoying, and they are joining the League to get
them.. It looks as though 1920 .might be a mighty bad year for the
^.reactionary politicians in the -"original 13" states.
Wi&JSkr
SIX
A LETTER AND ANSWER
HE Nonpartisan Leader has no desire to dictate W aiiy of
its readers what they should think in regard to current af
fairs. On the matters contained in the League platform we
are all united. On such other matters as are discussed'from time
to time in these columns the editor of the Leader Welcomes helpful
.criticism, such as that contained in a letter recently received from
F. A. Jenne of Sunnyside, Wash. Mr. Jenne took exception to an
editorial in the Nonpartisan Leader of June 2, in which the peace
treaty was criticized because it failed to follow the 14 points pre
viously enunciated by President Wilson. Mr. Jenne said, in part:
You seem to take it that because the peace treaty did not follow
the exact text of President Wilson's 14 points that an injustice has
been done Germany. Perhaps it has, but if so I would like for you
to explain more fully in just what way. Why should these 14 points
be followed to the letter in making this treaty? 4*.'
To my way of thinking, the treaty that has been put up to Ger
many to sign lets her off entirely too easy. I say the above being
fully convinced that German^ alone was entirely responsible for the
.war and should be forced to pay for the same in full if such a thing
were possible. This should be done not only as a punishment but as
a lesson to herself and others who contemplate a similar course.
Did you ever stop to think what the peace terms would have beep
had Germany been the undisputed victor? I think it well to look at r?
the matter from this point of view also. In a spirit of right and
.- justice to all I feel that Germany should be forced to pay the limit
for the calamity she brought upon the world. 4 --,
The editor of the Leader has answered Mr. Jenne as follows:
We hold no brief for Germany. The imperial German govern
ment undoubtedly was chiefly responsible for starting the world war.
Some people take the ground that because the German people were
not truly represented by the imperial German government, they
should not be punished now that they have changed their govern
ment. With this view, we can not wholly agree. The people of a.
nation are always responsible for the government under which they
live, even when that government very flagrantly misrepresents them..
The German people should have reformed their government before
the war instead of waiting until it was over.
Our objection to the peace treaty does not run so much to the
^question of the severity of the terms offered Germany. The real ob
jections are two in number:
First, our own good faith and that of our allies was pledged
to negotiate a treaty of peace based upon the 14 points enunciated
by President Wilson January 8, 1918. Insofar as we depart from
those points, to which we are pledged in honor, we harm not Ger^
many bat ourselves.
^Second, as a practical matter, we fear that the distribution of
territory made at the peace conference, in many instances on the
old theory that "to the victors belong the spoils," holds the germ
of future wars. Just as the forced annexation of Alsace and Lor
raine, with their French population, by Germany in 1879,' made a
war at some period between France and Germany inevitable, so are
forced annexations "such as the Saar valley, the Shantung peninsula
and, possibly, the Dalmatian coast, likely to lead the world Into fu
ture wars.
Undoubtedly Germany, had she been successful, would have 'put^
into effect a treaty of peace fully as severe as that now offered her
—probably more severe. But there is a vital difference between Ger
many and. ourselves. The ruling class in Germany, which was re-i
sponsible for the world war, Relieved in the necessity of an occasional
war as a permanent national policy. They were perfectly willing to
put into effect arrangements that would lead to future wars so long
as they were wars in which Germany probably would be victorious,
But we do not believe in a policy of war. The people of the United
States backed the government's entry into the war on the theory that -3
it was a war that would end war. We doubt very much whether the
treaty of peace is calculated to do this, but, as we said editorially
June 2, we are still hoping for the best.
What do other readers of the Leader think about our stand?
A power has risen up in the
government greater than the
people themselves, consisting
of many and various and pow
erful interests, combined into
one mass, and held together
by the cohesive power of the
vast surplus in the banks.
--John C. Calhoun, in
speech May 21, 1836
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