Life — July 11, 1912 — page 9: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

sure? He will give money at election time, of course. What good else is money, and what else has he got that he can swap for power? Has he dreamed any dream? Has he seen any vision? Bryan is right about him and right about Tammany, and right to fight them both off the bridge and down into the hold if the Democratic ship is to sail her true course and make a port. HE papers say that the Taft: men at Chicago offered to nominate Governor Hadley, but that Mr. Roosevelt was not willing. The story scems to be confirmed both by Governor Hadley and Mr. Roosevelt. Or Hughes, if he would, or Cum- mins, might have heen chosen, we read, Here, it would seem, was a chance for Mr. Roosevelt to accomplish his duty to the Progressive cause and pro- vide the Republican party with a Progressive candidate who had a chance to win Why didn’t he? Perhaps he thought an entry so heavily backed as himself could not be scratched without injustice to those who had laid money on him. Perhaps he felt that being himself the Only One, a Progressive victory without him as the head victor would be an egg without salt and not relished by true Progressive patriots. Perhaps he felt that the country wouldn't be entirely safe with Hadley, any more than with La Follette. Perhaps he feared that Heney, Flinn, Dixon, Pinchot, Perkins, Mun- sey and the other Harvesters might not get from Hadley all that should be fairly coming to them. Perhaps he didn’t think quickly enough, and perhaps he just didn’t want to. Who can tell? Somehow, when offered the chance to be the bob on the Progressive line, he elected to be the sinker. He never will be anything else. He is tied now to the Progressive neck like a murdered hen 40 the collar of a naughty dog. E UNCLI HY not an Outcast party now, and a convention and an Out- cast ticket! ily! an and Belmont, Mr. Morgan, John D., Senator Lorimer—who next? The MacNamaras are in jail and can’t vote. Mr. Clarence Darrow might come in. And later in the sea- son it may be possible to include the Colonel and Heney and Dr. Abbott and Flinn, unless the Outcasts decide that the party would no longer be comfortable with the Colonel in it. That, in our view, would be a narrow judgment. The Colonel and John D, would make an ideal Outcast ticket, not more novel than the ticket of Parker and that rich old West Vir- ginia gentleman—what was his name? —that some of us voted only eight years ago. The Colonel ought to have Uncle John D, on his ticket, anyhow. If Uncle John really got interested and felt that he and the Colonel were out for a vindication, he could cough up in a fashion to make the Colonel feel that he had never really ridden in a political automobile before, and that that thing that Perkins and Munsey JUST A FEW MORE Jou took him around in before Chicago was a perambulator. Sta.s above What a running mate Uncle John would make for an Outcast Pro- gressive! And the Outcast platform! Cer- tainly it would put it over any other Progressive platform. The gist of all the other platforms is, “Come, breth- ren, let us give somebody's money to the people.” But the gist of the plat- form that represented Uncle John, and Mr. Morgan, and Ryan, and Belmont would be “Step up, fellers, and have some dough! It’s real money! It’s ours!” If that didn’t appeal to the voters, what would? When Mr. Bryan read that platform he would grieve that he had not more hair to tear. Himself 2 sincere man, he would realize that here at last was a plat- form that meant business, and they'd have to festoon the party portals with barbed wire to keep him out. But why keep him out? Does not he, too, belong with the Outcasts? And Murphy, too. He and Uncle John and Ryan all naturally find their best repose in the same bed, and the Laird of Skibo with them. The Laird should be an Outcast, too, and go in with the rest for direct primaries, di- rect judges, direct Senators and a direct President, all to be underwritten and managed by the Directors. comicbooks.com