INK SLINGS. —The man who pledges himself to support legislation, the real nature of which he has no knowledge, is cer- tainly not a safe person to represent Centre or any other county in the Leg- islature. —The foot ball season is on, but it’s lost its old time setting. We still have the chrysanthemum, but the long haired warriors are gone from the field and their long haired admirers will be few in the stands. —The Rev. Dr. Lever, of the Epis- copal church of the Advocate, in Phil- adelphia, said it to Mayor Kendrick last Sunday night. If the Mayor reads or hears of that sermon he’ll be face to face with a lot of truths that most politicians know, but try to hide from. —Betting in New York is already seven to five that Al. Smith will beat young Roosevelt for Governor. The >dds on Smith will lengthen before November because Smith has a record :0 stand on and all Roosevelt claims s an illustrious Pap and a narrow es- ape from the oblivion that Fall and Daugherty and Denby were urged to setake themselves to. —Due entirely to our rooting Wash- ngton has won the American League yennant and Walter Johnston, one of he greatest moundsmen of all time, vill have his first chance to pitch in v world’s series. Henceforth the vorld will be told that the Washing- on monument was really erected in inticipation of the glory that the Sen- tors have brought to the Capital of he Nation. —No one need have missed meals ind stood day after day in a swelter- ng court room to hear the Musser nurder trial. The “Watchman,” to- lay, publishes every detail of it, far nore accurately than most of those vho were in the court room can tell if it, for they couldn’t hear more than alf of what was said either by the ourt, the attorneys, the witnesses or he prisoners at the bar. —Missouri being safe as Alabama or Davis, Indiana looking better very day and New York conceded as . fifty-fifty proposition, even before smith begins his campaign, it is not o awfully premature to begin think- ng about who will be the next post- raster in Bellefonte. Mr. Knisely is raking a very good one, of course, ut he wouldn’t consider, for a minute, ontinuing in office under such a fel- >w as John W. Davis. —Eight years as Commissioner of ‘entre county gave William H. Noll n opportunity to observe and study ur needs. He knows the diversity of 1terests in the county. He knows ae valuations, the tax problems, the ibor and racial conditions of every istrict, because he has personally ome in contact with them in an offi- ial capacity. And if he is sent to larrisburg to represent Centre in the egislature this knowledge will be reatly to our advantage. It will en- ble him to vote intelligently on bills 1at may be presented. —As we walked down street Sun- ay morning we noticed the twelve ien on whose verdict the life of Har- ;y Musser was hanging. They were at for a bit of exercise under the ob- srvation of two court officials. To 35, all of the jurors had the appear- 1ce of solemnity. Well might they, vr a human life was in their hands. hen we noticed the unusual number * automobiles moving on the streets 1d wondered whether one of the any drivers would, before night-fall, ke the life of some innocent pedes- ian. The responsibility of a life sts heavily on men in a jury box. "it rested as heavily on men at a eering wheel the grim reaper would bt be perched on the bumpers of so any automobiles. —There will be nine National par- as with candidates to be voted for xt month. This means that the lot will be at least eleven columns ide: One for the party squares, ne for the thirty-eight electors of ch party and one blank for other sctors whom the voters may write This will necessitate a ballot at ast thirty-two inches wide and long ough to accommodate the names of e electors of each party, the candi- tes for Superior Court Judge, State easurer, Auditor General, Congress- an, Member of the Legislature, Jury ymmissioner and space for the pro- sal to hold a constitutional conven- mn in 1926. A blanket ballot seems certainty, whether it’s to be warm cold on election day. —-Settlement of the Boston police ike made Coolidge a vice-Presiden- 1 candidate. Death made him esident and gave him the chance to n for the office on his own. Some mths ago we told you that Coolidge is away from Boston when the po- e strike was settled and had little do with the achievement that was :dited to him and used to accom- sh his nomination at Chicago four ars ago. Now, no less an authority in Clinton W. Gilbert, author of he Mirrors of Washington” con- ns the “Watchman’s” statement in new book, “You Takes Your oice.” He says Coolidge did not tle the Boston police strike and he ther credits him with great mental wer, nor much political courage. If : Republican convention at Chicago 1 known that Mr. Harding would ; survive his term Calvin Coolidge uld have stood no chance, what- ir, of being its nominee for Vice :sident. — STATE RIGHTS AND FEDERAL UNION. VOL. 69. BELLE FONTE, PA.. OCTOBER 3. 1924. NO. 39. Seeking Votes Under False Pretense. New York Insures the Election of No one is greatly surprised when demagogues of the George Wharton Pepper type juggle figures to fool the public. But when the President of the United States resorts to such ex- pedients to support his claim to con- tinued popular favor thoughtful peo- ple are justly amazed. In his accept- ance speech on August 14th, Presi- dent Coolidge said: “A great revival of industry during the Republican ad- ministraton took place, which is now spreading to agriculture. C-=z:plaint of unemployment has ceased; wages have increased.” In his Labor day speech Mr. Coolidge said: “Not only are the American wage earners re- ceiving more money and more of the things money will buy for their work than any other wage earners in the world, but more than was ever be- fore received by any community of wage earners.” Mr. William B. Wilson, who was un- til his election to Congress in the Six- teenth district of Pennsylvania, secre- tary-treasurer of the United Mine Workers, is probably better informed on labor statistics than any other man in the country. When the office of Secretary of Labor was created Pres- ident Woodrow Wilson appointed Wil- liam B. Wilson to occupy that seat in his cabinet. Since his retirement from that office he has kept in inti- mate touch with organized labor and has been its capable and efficient champion. He has analyzed the state- ments of President Cooilage above quoted, and taking the statistics of the Department of Labor during the pres- ent administration shows that em- ployment has fallen off since 1920 from 108.4 in that year to 94.8 at present, and that from July, 1923, to July, 1924, there has been a decrease of 14.3 per cent. in employment, 19.3 per cent. in pay roll totals and 5.9 per cent. in per capita earnings. The scheme of the Republican man- agers is to deceive the voters into the belief that industrial life is running at high tide of prosperity. Of course, people in Bellefonte know that such is not the case here but being assur- ed on so high an authority as the statement of -the President - of the United States they may be fooled as to conditions in Pittsburgh, Chicago or other points at which they have no contact. The people of Pittsburgh and Chicago may accept his state- ment that business is prosperous in Boston or Buffalo, because American voters are in the habit of accepting for truth any statement of the Presi- dent of the United States. But the statistics of the Department of Labor for the period of the administration of President Coolidge show that he has misrepresented facts. When a business man goes to the bank and gets accommodations by false representations he commits a misdemeanor. If a man goes to the store and procures goods or credit by misrepresentation of facts he is pros- ecuted and punished. In his state- ments on the occasion of his notifica- tion and on Labor day when he as- sembled in the White House a select group of former labor leaders, now employees of the government, Calvin Coolidge forgot his caution and plung- ed into a misrepresentation of facts in order to get votes under false pre- tense. It is not customary to make such charges against the President of the United States but it is not usual to see one-third of the members of the President’s cabinet dismissed for cor- rupt practices or for the President to falsify. ——Herbert Hoover is greatly wor- ried for fear the government of the United States will spend forty or fif- ty billions of dollars to buy all the railroads of the country. Herbert is too emotional. ——It seems that the Coolidge managers have been unable to get Senator Brookhart into line and thus the electoral vote of Iowa is almost certain to be for Davis. ——Harry Daugherty has butted into the campaign in behalf of Coo:- idge but thus far they have been able to keep former Secretary Fall outside the breastworks. mg ——Now if Governor Pinchot would add a line or two to his recent letter to the Public Service board dismissing all the members it would be worth while. ee Es ——1In order to avert a conniption fit in the White House we hasten to assure President Coolidge that the constitution is perfectly safe. —Coolidge will not reduce the sugar tariff as long as the sugar growers continue to “sweeten” the slush fund. ————— ——Don’t put off al! political work until election day. This is harvest time in that line. Davis. If there were at any time since the adjournment of the New York conven- tion any doubts of the election of John W. Davis to the office of President they were removed on Friday last when Governor Smith accepted the nomination of his party for re-elec- tion. Governor Smith has been elect- ed three times and administered the office with great ability and fidelity but at immense personal sacrifice. He wanted to retire in order to give at- tention to business that he might ac- cumulate a campetency for his fami- ly. But he was persuaded to relin- quish that laudable purpose in order to promote the interests of his party and rescue the government at Wash- ington from the thieves who have been looting during four years. It is freely admitted even by the chairman of the Republican National committee that Mr. Coolidge cannot be elected without the electoral vote of New York. It is equally certain that with Governor Smith as the can- didate of the Democratic party the electoral vote of New York is made as secure for Davis as that of Ala- bama or Georgia. The Republicans have nominated for Governor the man who contributed most to the fraudu- lent lease of the Teapot Dome oil re- serves to Sinclair in the belief that his name, Theodore Roosevelt, will en- list public sentiment in his favor. But no name is as potent as that of Al Smith in New York and even if Roose- velt were not smeared with Teapot oil he would be defeated. With the electoral vote of all the southern States and such border States as Delaware, Kentucky, Mary- land and Missouri absolutely secure the addition of the vote of New York literally guarantees the election of John W. Davis by the Electoral Col- leges. Mr. Coolidge may get a few more votes than were given to Taft in 1912 for the reason that LaFollette is likely to get a few less than were cast for Roosevelt. But the result will be the same. Davis will be elect- ed this year as Woodrow Wilson was then and it is gratifying that his elec- The Constitution is All Right. We hasten to assure our distressed Republican friends that the constitu- tion of the United States is in no dan- ger from bolshevists, anarchists, so- cialists or other persons who look at things through red lenses or imagine that some other form of government is preferable to that we are now liv- ing under. John W. Davis, the su- perb candidate of the Democratic par- ty for President, told the truth and the whole truth the other day when he said the real enemies of the consti- tution are not the Reds and Bolshe- vists, but the corrupt and impotent public officials and their associates.” They constitute the only serious pres- ent menace to the government of the United States and its fundamental law. Albert B. Fall, who was Secretary the United States and impair the con- stitution when he leased the oil re- serves to Doheny and Sinclair in one day than Mr. LaFollette could do in a thousand years, even if he were elect- i ed President, which he never will be. | Harry Daugherty, Attorney General under Harding and under Coolidge un- til public opinion fored him out, did more harm in one week in the Little Green house on K street, Washington, than the entire LaFollette party could do in four years of unrestrained con- trol. It is the official thieves who con- trol the Republican party that mean harm, The tariff law which steals from the pockets of the people five billion dol- lars a year to bestow unearned lar- gesses on political favorites creates more discontent in the industrial life -of the country in one month than a million “red” agitators could in a year. The $145,000 a day stolen from the housewives of the country to reim- | burse beet and cane sugar growers {for the money contributed to buy { votes for the Republican candidates is ‘a more potent influence for evil in a ! year than all the bolshevists in the ‘country could be in a generation. The ' constitution is all right and will serve tion will guarantee the same integrity the righteous purpose for which it in office and efficiency in ‘administra- tion and restore to the government the same high ideals which Wilson brought to the service. ——1If the Japs continue to com- plain people are liable to conclude that the Washington conference was a com- plete failure. Well Meaning but Futile Effort. Four thousand well-meaning citi- zens of Philadelphia assembled in the Academy of Music on Monday even- | ing to remonstrate against the im- pending removal of Brigadier Gener- al Butler from the office of Director of Public Safety. The courageous and capable marine officer has disap- pointed the expectations of the May- or of that city and the gang of polit- ical pirates who are behind him. His appointment was to create a sem- blance of obedience to campaign ob- ligations. The city was a hot-bed of vice and crime and the candidate for Mayor promised to “clean up the mess.” It was expected that the ma- rine officer would make a harmless gesture in that direction and in a few months abandon it as a hopeless un- dertaking. General Butler obviously misinter- preted the purposes of the Mayor. He imagined that the expressed intention to drive the crime and vice out of the city was both earnest and sincere and proceeded to accomplish the result. Soon the machine followers of the Mayor protested that the sources of political strength were being sapped. Mayor Kendrick supported his ap- pointee for a time. But finally in his zeal to achieve improvements the Di- rector ordered a raid on one of the political clubs. That was “the last straw that broke the camel’s back.” The Mayor gave out the information that he would ask Director Butler to resign. This aroused the clergy and decent citizens to the protest ex- pressed Monday evening. But the protest will be without avail. General Butler will be asked to resign as soon as he recovers from an illness with which he has been af- flicted for several days. The four thousand decent citizens may continue to plead for civic improvement but to no purpose. A few bootleggers and a group of politicians who wax fat on the rake off of protected crime can | accomplish more on election day than all the clergymen and ten times the number of decent citizens who assem- bled in the Academy of Music on Mon- day evening. Vice and crime are es- sential to Republican success in Phil- adelphia and the majority of the vot- ers there being “corrupt and content- ed” will not persist lon gin their op- position. Se rms eens - ——The trouble with Pinchot’s throat may be that the machine man- agers have secured a grip on it. - was created long after the thieves have been driven from Washington. | ——We are glad to learn that Her- ! bert Hoover has found out which par- ty he belongs to. He is now outspok- en for the party that gave him an of- fice. | Pinchot’s Profligate Administration. | It has been the custom of all con- cerned in such matters to treat the ‘administration of Governor William C. Sproul is the high water mark of ad- ministrative profligacy so far as the government of Pennsylvania is con- cerned. It is remembered that tax ' collections were far in excess of pre- | vious administrations, and notwith- i standing that fact the close of the i Sproul term of office found the State : Treasury practically empty and obli- i gations for considerable amounts un- | fulfilled. It was this condition of af- fairs which justified Governor Pinchot tin describing the affairs in Harrisburg as “a mess” which he, with a “flourish i of trumpets” promised to “clean up.” In a speech delivered at Williams- ' port, last Saturday evening, Auditor General Samuel S. Lewis declared that the first year of Gifford Pinchot’s administration cost $25,000,000 more than the last year of the Sproul ad- ministration, admittedly the most ex- pensive year in the history of the State up to that time. To employ the exact language of the Auditor Gen- eral “for the year ending May 31, 1922, expenditures of the State gov- ernment, exclusive of road bond funds, were $67,000,000. That was under the Sproul brand of government. For the year ending May 81, 1924, the ex- penditures, exclusive of road bond funds, were approximately $92,000,- 000. That was under the Pinchot brand of government.” In various papers and at sundry times Governor Pinchot has boasted that he is administering the govern- ment at a saving of $40,000 a day, which in a year would amount to the enormous sum of $14,600,000. That would be a’ splendid achievement and justify. some self congratulation. But the Auditor General declares that his figures are taken from the books of his department which make the official record of the fiscal affairs of the State. They present the reform claims of Governor Pinchot in a rather sorry light, and taken in connection with his shilly-shallying in politics, now make him look like a huge humbug. It looks as if the machine had frightened him away from his speeches. : % rr —— pr —————————— ; ——Bainbridge Colby can’t under- stand Senator Pepper. Senator Pen- rose was in the same predicament for years and kept Pepper out of office. ——It isn’t very hard to get liquor now but it is mighty dangerous to drink it. : J THE BURNING ISSUE—OIL! (A Fall Poem.) (With apologies to E. A. Poe and con- dolence to Messrs. Daugherty, Denby, Fall and T. Roosevelt Jr.—From the National Democratic Magazine). Hear the gushing of the oil— Teapot oil! With a vision of “mazuma’ as it rushes from the soil! How it gushes, gushes, gushes From the caverns underground— Where the ghouls bathe underground— And the speculator rushes To the ticker at the sound, { | i of the Interior during the adminis- Hear the gurgling of the oil— tration of the late President Harding, | did more to injure the government of How the schemers and despoilers seethe | | vis,” but under the head of “Demo- Shouting “Buy, Buy, Buy!” In a frantic frenzied cry, Born of oil; In a craze of speculation without toil Out of oil, oil, oil, oil Oil, oil, oil— From the rushing and the gushing of the oil. to win riches Teapot oil! and broil! How the grafters’ eyes all glisten! See them all sit up and listen To the sordid tales that float— All too true! How the bribers gape and gloat O’er the story of Doheny and his note Torn in two! How the G. O. P. hosts quake! ‘What a spectacle they make! How they shake, With their camouflage of virtue all be- draggled in the moil Of the oil— Of the oil, oil, oil, oil, Oil, oil, oil— In the puddling and the muddling of the oil. Hear the hissing of the oil— Teapot oil! What a record of dishonor in its serpen- tinian coil! How it swells! How it smells To the heavens! How it tells Of the greed-lust that impels To the barter of a soul— Of the greed-lust that bewitches Man to sell his soul for riches To a ghoul! How the reputations fall! See them shrouded in the pall Of the oil Dead and gone beyond recall In the oleaginations that so ominousl RON Bis bai a vm In the oil, oil, oil, oil— Oil, oil oil— In the boiling and the moiling of the oil. G. O. P’s Shift in Tactics. From the Philadelphia Record. “Claim everything possible against LaFollette and pretend that Davis is utterly out of the race.” This is the latest order that has gone out to “the faithful” from the G. O. P. press agency in Washington. The man in the street, who usually has access to only one—or possibly two—newspa-- pers for his daily reading, may not be able to sense this fact, but it is suffi- ciently apparent to the average jour- nalist, whose business it is to skim the pages of a score or more of papers in —Marion and Lucille, 2 daughters of Mr. and Mrs. Lock Haven, were badly sca their bodies, last Friday, when a kettle full of boiling jelly on t 8 in the kitchen of their home in that ‘pla when they ran against the oil stove. —Harry Cummings, of Johnstown was sentenced on September 25, serve a term of not less than set more than ten years in the western peni- tentiary by Judge Thomas J. Baldrige, for complicity in the robbery of the First Na- pardon. ny —One of the most daring burglaries committed in Luzerne county for man years took place Friday night when Night Owl Lunch, at Plymouth, was en- tered and a safe containing $1200 was car= ried away. No trace has been found of the safe, which weighed in the neighborhood of 500 pounds. —John C. Smith, a well known resident of Blair county, who died recently, be- queathed $3000 to the Altoona hospital, $3000 to the Asbury cemetery association, $2000 to the Asbury Methodist church and the remainder of the $20,000 estate in equal parts to the Methodist Home for the Aged at Tyrone, and foreign missionary socie- ties. —Declaring that “petting parties” in the rural sections of Lehigh county not only have become a nuisance, but have a ‘ten- dency to break down the high standards of home life and low ideals,” Schencksville Grange has adopted resolutions protesting against improper usage of public high- ways and calling upon the officers of the law to break up the practice. —Edward Free, son of Dr. Spencer M. Free, of DuBois, has been appointed chief editor of The Scientific American. Mr. Free is a graduate of the DuBois High school, 1911, later graduating from Cornell and receiving the degree of Doctor of Philosophy from Johns Hopkins. He was with the United States government for several years doing research work. —George W. Rockwell, has been formal- ly awarded a contract to build a bridge across the Susquehanna’s west branch be- twen Northumberland and Blue Hill. His bid was $405,112.08, for a cement and steel structure of eleven spans. It will replace a century-old structure of wood that was burned on June 3 of last year. Work will be started at once, according to Mr. Rock- well. . —The first of a series of criminal pros- ecutions by the State Department of For- estry against the railroads of the State, was entered at Allentown at a hearing be- fore Alderman Rickets. The Central Rail road of New Jersey and William Sweeney, division superinendent, were co-defendants to a charge of starting a forest fire at Sugar Notch in March with sparks from a defective locomotive. —Mrs. Sadie Erb, 24 years of age, of Le- high county, the mother of five small chil- dren, was so badly burned last Thursday morning at her home that she died three hours later at the Allentown hospital. How ithe accident occurred is not known as she was alone at the time. Her husband was attracted by her screams, finding her clothing a mass of flames. She died with- out regaining consciousness. --Pleading guilty to smuggling twelve steel saws into the western penitentiary, Harry Holtgraver, a former guard at the prison, was sentenced to serve from two to four years in the Allegheny county work- house, in criminal court at Pittsburgh last Thursday. Holtgraver testified that he was in urgent need of money at the time and was unable to resist the temptation when convicts made him offers to obtain saws for them. —Dr. L. F. Arensberg, the new com- mander-in-chief of the Grand Army of the Republic, was a member of the Legisla- ture in the sessions of 1901, 1903 and 1905 from Fayette county. He is a doctor and a farmer. He served under all the big generals of the army from Bull Run to Appomattox, marching over 8000 miles, and was under fire 60 times with his bat- tery. The Pennsylvania Department of the the course of the day’s work. Sturdy defenders of the policy of keeping frigidly “cool with Coolidge” gave much prominent space recently | to the dispatch from Washington an- nouncing that “the concentration of all the Republican fire against Sena- tor Robert M. LaFollette, independent. candidate for President, and the vir- tual abandonment of any campaign against John W. Davis, the Democrat- ic nominee, is explained by reports from all over the country which have been reaching here, information as to which became available today.” The fact that this “information” of such momentous importance only “be- came available today” for the first time is due entirely to the inability of the G. O. P. press agency forces to make up their collective mind as to what sort of “information” should be sent out. Earlier in the campaign it was confidently announced by this same agency that LaFollette would draw his strength mainly from the Democrats. But now all that has been changed. It “is explained (to quote the language of the Washington dispatch itself) by reports from all over the country that have been reach- ing here.” But the G. O. P. press agents have not profited by those re- ports in preparing their prophecies of what is likely to happen in November. Their statistics are feverish and laughable. “Republican strategy, in attacking LaFollette.and not Davis,” they say, “is based on the following table of electoral votes,” etc. Then follows the most humorous part of the whole story. The 249 votes—count ’em, 249!— “practically certain for Coolidge” in- clude, of course, Utah’s and Vermont's (four each) won by Taft in 1912; but we find there, also, California (where ‘““Hi” Johnson is silent), Illinois, Mich- igan (where Couzens will prove the most distant of relatives), New Jer- sey, New York and Ohio. Nothing. whatever is given as “certain for Da- cratic claims” we find the 166 votes representing the Solid South. As a matter of fact, the only absolutely sure. votes are those 166—or let us: say, to be conservative, 150—which will unquestionably: go to. Davis. Of the rest, practically nothing is certain for any ‘of the. three candidates ex- cept Wisconsin for LaFollette and a few New England States and Penn- sylvania for Coolidge. . So Davis is to be ignored entirely. | Well, well, what a wonderful cam- | paign it ist G. A. R. elected him department command- er in 1916. —The Reading Iron company, succes- sor to the Thomas Iron company, of Allen- town, is offering virtually the whole of | Hokendouqua for sale. The town for many years figured prominently in the steel and iron industry, but several months ago the furnaces were shut down and indications are they will never be reopened. The Reading company is also disposing of its farm lands there. There are 238 dwellings, the majority erected sixty years ago for furnace employees, offered for sale. —With a view to establishing a training camp for young people, an option has been taken on the camp grounds at Newton Hamilton by a commission named by the board of Sunday schools and Epworth Leagues of Central Pennsylvania Metho- dist conference. The commission hopes to move the Epworth League Institute from Eagles Mere to Newton Hamilton and to establish a boys’ and girls’ camp. The project has the approval of Bishop Mec- Dowell and the four district superintend- ents. i —Pennsylvania express train No. 95, west bound, ran from Bellwood to East Al- toona last Friday without a directing hand in the locomotive cab. The engineer and the firemen were driven from the cab by flames, steam and smoke when the lift pipe in the stack collapsed. Engineer J. I. Arndt took refuge on the lower step of the engine and, as the train sped through Bell- wood, he was knocked off by a fence. Fire- man V. C. Ayres, who sought a place of safety on the coal tender, was burned about the face. When the fire under the boiler died down, Ayres crawled back into the cab and brought the train to a stop. —Raymond Steinmetz, who leaped into national prominence on the front pages of many papers last Tuseday, when he saved a 5 year old girl from death by a locomo- tive at Emporia, Kan., may be a hero to most of the world, but to his home-town folks in Monessen, Pa., he is a fugitive from justice. Steinmetz is wanted in West- moreland county for deserting his wife and on charges of fraud. Other Pennsyl- vania: ‘towns want him on other charges, William Horne, chief of police of Mones- sén, gays. Reading of the exploit of Stein- metz, Chief Horne wired to Emporia po- lice to arest him. Steinmetz was captur- ed in Council Grove, Kan, and is today awaiting extradition to Pennsylvania. The man went to Monessen last year and mar- ried Miss Schilling, sister of the Rev. A. | F. Schilling, pastor ‘of the German Luth- eran church of that place. He left and Mrs. Steinmetz brought desertion charges against him. tional bank, of Claysburg, is asking for a =