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Show Published Every Saturday BY GOODWINS WEEKLY PUBLISHING CO., INC. F. P. GALLAGHER, Editor. JAMES P. CASEYBusiness Manager 8UB8CRIPTION PRICE: Including postage in the United 8tates, Canada and Mexico $2.50 per year, $1.50 for six months. Subscriptions to all foreign countries, within the Postal - Union, $4.50 per-year- . 8lngle copies, 10 cents. Paymsnt should be made by Check, Money Order or Registered Letter, pay able to The Citizen. Addrees all communications to The Citizen. Entered as secondclass matter, June 21, 1919, at the Postoffice at Salt Lake City, Utah, under the Act of March 3, 1879. Ness Bldg. Salt Lake City, Utah. Phone Wasatch 5409. 311-12-- 13 HOW REPUBLICANS CAN MAKE GOOD I WM. Our Democratic friends are solicitous lest the Republicans make a fizzle of their victory. They have a right to be solicitous not merely because they found the problems of these new times overpowering but because the problems that are with us and those that impend just beyond the present horizon of politics are sufficiently complex to tax all tlie skill and wisdom of the greatest and sanest minds in the Republican party. All of us have reason to share the solicitude of our late opponents, though we may not be as pessimistic .as they. . What is it that gives our Democratic crtics so much anxiety? We can detect it in the criticisms they uttered immediately after the election.. They accused us of being reactionary and predicted that we would surrender the government to the corporations. That is a customary Democratic accusation. It has been the stock in trade uf the party for many years. Big business grew up after the civil war and because- the Republican party was in power it grew up under Republican administration of national affairs. Hard times the worst in the history 'f the country Oppressed the land in the days of the second Cleve-Hlan- d administration. Prosperity revived under McKinley and has continued with a few setbacks down to the present day. It is notable, however, that in the closing years of the Wilson administration profiteering by the big interests especially the new interests created by the war became a scandal as, shameful as any that ever disgraced our land. In shipping, in airplane construction, in the purchase and sale f war sunplics, the scandal rested directly upon the servants of the administration. . We feel, therefore, the Democratic critics should be in a rather fhastened mood when they talk of surrender to the corporations. The corporations, we believe, ask only a square deal from the government. They thrive best when both government and business are honest. But no doubt there are corporations whose directors are hoping that the Republican administration, legislative and executive, will display a partiality toward those who seek to cnccutrate wealth in the hands of a few by means of governmental with the problems confronting us the radicals must slow down a bit and the reactionaries must speed up. It was admirably expressed. It was a platform in itself a sort of golden rule for the new times. We do not doubt that Senator Harding, when he becomes presi-- . dent, will abide by that rule in making his appointments. Perhaps the most conspicuous failure of the Democratic adminbasis. It clung istration was its inability to return to a peace-tim- e to war laws in dealing with both capital and labor. It could not apply the constitution to the period of reconstruction and abandoned the constitution for autocracy. Only the other day a labor leader stated that a great srike was called off last year because the administration threatened to deny his organization the use of the mails and telegraphs. That was hardly the act of a free administration in a free country. It will be the purpose of the new president to reassert the adequacy of the constitution to deal with both capital and labor. A government by law, not a government by threat and coercion on the one hand or weak capitulation on the other, will be the policy of the administration. But in the nation and in the states Republican executives must realize that it is up to them to make good. Everywhere that statement is on the lips of Democrats and Republicans alike. The Republicans have full sway. Not only the executive but the legislative departments of government are theirs in all the northern states. They can blunder at the beginning by naming only politicians to office or by selecting their officials, not for ability, but for reasons of friendship or favoritism. Never before did a party have such an opportunity to succeed brilliantly or fail dismally. By selecting able men and women for the executive positions they can make the best possible start. They should not be considered able simply because of technical skill. There is another quality that is perhaps a supreme consideration. Appointees should have the vision of true Americanism. They should understand the spirit of our institutions and our people. If they have that quality they will be neither reactionary nor radical. They will be able to make progress in the light of the past the only way, in fact, favor. that progress can be made. They will trust the constitution and The Republicans 'must not fail to sec that the gravest errors can the laws and the American system of government ; and they will not l'c nu.de at the very outset. And among them will be mistakes in resort to autocracy when confronted by a trying problem. Ppoii tments. Unless forward-lookin- g If Republican executives all over the country keep these prinmen are selected for the in our national administration: unless, at the very be- - ciples in mind we shall solve our problems without too much disninii,! the administration begins to be progressive, there is danger turbance or dislocation and a few years hence we will realize that f neither the reactionaries nor the radicals have triumphed, but that wrecking the Republican car before it is fairly started, b' thcclosing days of the campaign Senator Harding suggested we have progressed gradually by following the rule of the golden correct policy. Tie said that if wc were to deal competently mean. - long-establish- ed high-portio- ns |
