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Show MORMON REFUGEE DENOUNCES TAFT. "Writing to the Standard from Panguitch, Utah, F. E. Eldredge, who has just returned from Mexico, places the responsibility for the loss of American lives in the republic to the south of us, on President Taft. lie says: "Editor Standard: Ton innocent unoffending Mormons have been murdered in Mexico and over 4,000 Mormon colonists havo been driven from their homes, with a loss of over a million dollars. In other parts of Mexico, outside the Mormon colonies, over three hundred Americans have been driven out of Mexico with a destruction of American owned property amounting to more than fifty millions of dollars. Why is this? "There is but one answer tjO the question, and that is, because the United States does not protect American citizens, and their property prop-erty in Mexico. "The man who is to be blamed for this is Prosident Taft. On his "head lies the blood of those who have died. He is responsible, because the stale department reports to him, and they state department depart-ment has an American consul in every city in Mexico of importance. It is the duty of every consul to report fully and frequently to the State department, So Taft is not ignorant of the situation and conditions, con-ditions, unless blindly, criminally so. Continued on Page Eight.) V, l-''''- ""'.VOV ; , V - - -. --. , , .-----.. . C2Bi,fcri .-- -f? JNgg-',-Tr---- H MORMON REFUGEE DENOUNCES TAFT. H (Continued From Page Four. H ' "The vrrongs done to the Mormon colonists of Mexico arc hardly H mentioned in eastern newspapers and the great magazines. Nor is H the wrong of other Americans given to the public. B ""Why? Simply Taft's policy is behind this and the news is H .suppressed. It can not be hushed up in Utah and Idaho, however. H Remember, official figures, give the amount of American capital in- H vested in Mexico as over nine hundred million dollars. The Ameri- H can superintendent, of one railroad, the Mexican National, reports H that there wore 42,000 Americans living in the country along the H line of his railroad, when the trouble began and that only 3,000 of Hj them are there now. Hl "This statement alone is sufficient to give an idea of the extent H of the losses. Mexico is a seething mass of revolution, anarchy and H crime, with several different revolutionary factions in the field. H "It is a fact, beyond denial, that captive women are ravished, H children's hands cut off and the tongues of men cut out. Men have been burned alive by their captors. Rebels and government troops have done these things in the southern part of Mexico, and now the H I Mexican government has taken off the restriction in the Mexican H I ' law to prevent the killing and tortuning of captives taken by Ma- H j dero's government troops. The meaning is plain. Is this .yar? H v "Not one case in twenty, (probably not one in a lnmdred), of H i the Americans murdered has been reported in the newspapers, ex- H ' cept those forced upon the attention of Utah people by having oc- H I curred in the Mormon colonies. H "I know whereof I speak, as 1 have resided long in Mexico. B "It would have been a blessing to all parties to have had this H "war" stopped long ago. H j "If Roosevelt had been president it would have been stopped at m the start; and as people realize tliis, the sentiment in favor of Roose- . velfc is growing wonderfully, all over Utah, a strong, rapid, rising ; tide, that, if properly directed, will sweep everything in his favor. "The best friend, as president of the United States, that Utah R ( ever had is Roosevelt; and, had he been president, not one Mormon R colonist would have been molested. There is no doubtof this. K , "If Utah people want the Mormon colonists to return to their H homes in Mexico and be protected they should vote solidly for f '; Roosevelt, as he will be elected anyhow. One shake of Roosevelt's RL 'big stick' at Mexico, when he becomes president, and things will be Ht-' quiet there, and all Americans will be protected. (Signed) F. E.' Y ELDREDGE." j: . Taft's treatment of the Mexican problem has been so vacillating V that the Mexicans have interpreted the American indecision as a Bi ' weakness which invites all kinds of abuses without, danger of bring- H? r ing down on the Mexican people the heavy hand of retributive jus-B jus-B B': Taft, at the beginning of the Madero revolution, rushed nearly r' the entire army of the United States to the boundary line, and then, Ki following the example of the French general who marched his army Hf up the hill and down again, he withdrew the American forces with- H out offering any plausible excuse for either action. H., The rebels and the federals have learned to look with contempt H j on American rights. This could have been prevented, if there had H been a Roosevelt in the White House whose promise to defend the;. H unprotected Americans in Mexico would have been a warning that H J' neither rebel nor federal would dare disregard. H This uncertain inactive, vacillating policy has brought sorrow H( and death to hundreds of our fellow countrymen in Mexico. :- ' " : |