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Show PARKER CONSTITUTION CLUB? U (Prom a Letter to the N. Y. Evening Post.) N jH What are the specific acts of Mr. Roosevelt K hicu the members of the Parker Constitution K; CJub, as lawyers, believe to be unconstitutional? !S In your issue of August 1G you announced the H organization of the club and printed a statoment, H purporting to emanate from its executive commit- H tee, setting forth in most general terms Uat un- Hi constitutional acts of President Roosevelt were , H the ralson d'etre of the club, and closing as fol- , JH lows: 9 "The club will make no hasty assertions and H take no hasty action. It will investigate the full jfl records of some of President Roosevelt's acts, jH such as his adding twelve million dollars to the ' H pension roll by his executive order; his real con- ( fl nection with the Panama affair, and other mat- ' fl ters in which he has overridden the constitution. S The club will be perfectly just to him. It will H accuse him of what he ought to be accused of, jfl and give him credit for the things that he de- ,19 serves credit for." i JH In other words, these gentlemen in general and jfl very consistent language announce their conclu- . H sion that Mr. Roosevelt has been guilty of every H possible infraction of the Constituion, and then fl wish the public to believe that as lawyers they i jfl will proceed to make an impartial investigation. fl This would not be serious if it were not that fl the pre-emption of the name Constitution Club ffl by eminent lawyers must inevitably produce the t fl false impression that not as Democrats, but as jfl lawyers, they have reached a conclusion that the jfl Constitution has been violated not that in their JH political view of the purposes of our governmental system the spirit of the Constitution has been set ffl at naught,, but that as a matter of law Mr. Roose- jfl volt has been guilty of acts which are in a lQgal jfl sense unconstitutional and therefore null and void. jfl The eminent gentlemen at the head of this club ' fl have thus assumed a responsibility proportioned jH to the high honor in which their names are hold jH in this community, which they may only fairly H discharge by sotting forth with clearness what H acts they deem unconstitutional and for what jfl reason, and what judicial or even executive prece- i jfl dents exist to suport their conclusion. i 1H Or, failing this, let them change their name ' H to the Parker Democratic Club,, which will accur- jfl atoly describe both the personnel of their member- H ship and the real purpose of their organization; JH and I for one will rejoice at such a hopeful sign , flj of the development of a sane and virile opposition . flj party. j H But if the managers of the club persist in ask- 9 ing for the confidence of the public as expounders ' -,H of the Constitution I cannot refrain from asking S them if they will not, while they are in the bui- H noss of Impartial research, examine and report h upon the situation existing in many of the South- 9 orn States, without whose electoral votes their J H rrlnc'ples c-jnnot prevail, whereby Democratic ' H members of Congress are elected by the votes of fl less than one per cent of the population. jfl HBJNRY W TAPT J fl 1 |
