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THE ATLANTA GEORGIAN
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George W. Perkins and the
Roosevelt Progressive
Partv
R * r
He Has Set an Example That Other Prosperous Men Might Fol
low. The Country Needs Able Men to Take an Interest in
Politics and Government.
The Republican party spent SOO,OOO on Its Chicago convention.
The Progressive party, managed by Perkins, spent $17,000 for exactly the
same kind of a convention—and came back from Chicago $2,000 Io the good.
Think about that!
While Roosevelt was speaking to 30,000 men and women in Bos
ton. some one in the crowd yelled, “Tell us about Perkins!’’
Roosevelt replied, “I'm glad you asked that question,’’ and
then answered it.
He said that Perkins, although a rich man, had joined the Pro
pressive party and interested himself in politics BECAUSE HE
HAS CHILDREN AND FELT THAT IT WAS HIS DUTY TO DO
WHAT HE COULD TO MAKE CONDITIONS BETTER IN THE
COUNTRY IN WHICH THE CHILDREN WOULD LIVE AFTER
THEIR FATHER’S DEPARTURE.
Mr. Roosevelt also said that Mr. Perkins had made all the
money he wanted, and now wanted to do something really useful
and worth while for the country at large.
This country is glad to see men of ability come out in the open,
work politically in the open, use their influence and intelligence in
the open—instead of working in the old-fashioned “rich man’s
wav’’ behind closed doors, using cash to buy those in office, or pro
mote legislation.
This country needs men of ABILITY in public affairs. Gov
ernment means something more than getting offices and dividing
them up, something more than collecting taxes and spending them
extravagantly.
This country needs all of the ability of its ablest men.
It should have such men as J. J. Hill working for the nation,
instead of working, however usefully, as railroad builders for
themselves.
The big rewards in this world attract the big and the able
men. And the small rewards, outside of periods of great national
excitement, attract the small and the feeble men.
Our government has been offering small rewards to its em
ployees, while industry, railroad building, great corporations and
organizations of all kinds, have been offering great rewards.
Therefore, men of unusual power and ability have been drafted
into the industrial field and away from the field of politics and of
government.
It is a good sign when a man like Perkins, as able as any of the
big organizers and managers, decides that it is more worth while to
share in government than to make additional money.
Agassiz, the great scientist, preached a whole sermon when he
said. “1 am too busy to make money.’’
It would be an excellent thing f’rir America if more of the
ablest men should tire of the money making game, as Perkins seems
to have tired of it, ami should find themselves “too busy to con
tinue money making.” too much interested in public and important
affairs to continue working for private profit.
The articles in the Hearst Magazine show us our collection of
senators and other public officials acting as toadies, servants and
handy men for the big geniuses of the industrial world.
It is humiliating to see the representatives of the people and of
the government accepting the pay of industrial organizers and act
ing as the lackeys of those organizers.
The country needs the work of such men as E. H. Harriman,
powerful and strong enough to build thousands upon thousands of
miles of railroad in a life that ended too soon The country needs
the imagination and power of such a man as J. Pierpont Morgan,
wasting his energies now in the accumulation of money that does
him no good, ami spending the money in the accumulation of col
lections that will do him no good—although they may be useful to
the country in future.
A man like Morgan, if he were interested in the United States,
instead of beiue interested in .1 P. Morgan and Company, would
give this country the canals, roads ami other facilities that it needs,
and very soon give it the beginning of government ownership that
it needs.
The country ha«> been served too long and too often by men
who went into politics and got places in government BECAUSE
THEY WERE FIT FOR NOTHING ELSE IN PARTICULAR, or
because of a hysterical, half-baked ambition that led them nowhere.
One first class BIG man of the type that this country produces
in its industries and its railroad building would keep half a dozen
legislatures honest
One such man as George Perkins, giving to the business of the
people the energy and capacity that he has given to private busi
ness undertakings, would be a good, new thing in politics, and a
useful man in government. And the people are bound, until they
have proof to the contrary, to assume that Perkins is sincere tn his
advocacy of the new party—which has antagonized and is de
nounced by most of the ineu rich and influential as Perkins is.
A proof of the value of Perkins in a political organization was
given at the Roosevelt convention in Chicago.
Mr. Perkins directs the financial and practical management of
the Roosevelt party--LUCKILY FOR THE PARTY.
The Roosevelt convention hired the hall occupied previously
by the Republican convention. It had the same bands; it printed
’.he same finely engraved tickets.
And the Roosevelt convention cost all together in Chicago
$17,060, whereas the regular Republican convention, managed by
the old-fashioned grafting politicians. COST MORE THAN
NINETY THOUSAND DOLLARS.
hi other words, under old-fashioned political management, a
Republican convention cost about seventy-five thousand dollars, or
500 per cent, more than exactly the same kind of a convention
managed by a man used to business undertakings.
It would be interesting to know who got the $75,000 difference
In the cost of the Republican convention.
The fact may also be mentioned that the Roosevelt convention
no* only cost only $17,000 as compared with ninety-odd thousand
for the Republican convention, but the Roosevelt convention sold
tickets of admission took in $19,000 in eash from the public which
was really interested in the birth of the new Progressive partv.
And i non the convention was over, the Progressive party, tinaii
c ally managed by Perkins, had two thousand iu cash more than it
Continued in L ast Column.
The Atlanta Georgian
TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 3, 1912
A GIRL'S VIEW OF POLITICS
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TjA ? litl - aW /X
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vx-.iA'W'yb ''Va \ » X-y GvLmjUm I
This cartoon was suggested by Nell Brinkley and drawn by Tad. It shows that woman's
touch can make even the prosaic beautiful.
SOMETHING has already been
said about the value of small
sums of money saved regu
larly. To eite one instance again:
Five cents a day amounts in ten
years, at four per cent compound
interest, to a trifle over Two Hun
dred and Twenty Dollars.
But there is absolutely no way in
the world of making a man prefer
to have Two Hundred and Twenty
Dollars ten years from now, at the
cost of five cents a day, as against
the remembrance of having swal
lowed three thousand six hundred
and fifty glasses of beer. The
choice of this is, you see. entirely
up to the man.
Some savings banks have tried to
encourage thrift by printing tables
that show the growth of money
regularly deposited and left at in
terest. Few of them, however, take
the trouble to rub in the principal
fact hard enough.
The principal fact is this:
When you deposit money at In
terest you must also deposit
Time. For Time is that which per
mits interest to get moving, to
create a momentum, and finally to
work up a good total for you.
Any one can build a fortune, ac
cording to his status in life, if he
will begin early enough In life and
give time a chance. Even men of
40 and 50 can begin to save small
sums for a pension at 70, for there
are 30 or 20 years available for in
terest to do Its work.
Difficult at Forty.
Rut it is hard for a man of 40 or
50 to accomplish this, and for this
reason:
It Is difficult to establish a new
habit, that demands regularity, so
late tn life. But if a man of 50 has
a job. and is in fair health, and is
scared to death lest he be in want
at 70, he may be able to brace up
and give time a chance to work its
wonders for him on his nickels and
dimes.
11.
Much old age poverty and want
are due to waste in early years.
We complain of taxes. But the
willingness with which we pay
taxes of our own assessment is
amazing. We pay willingly for
countless things we do not n.eed.
When want pinches. In later years,
we grumble at the times, at hard
luck, at never having had a chance.
And yet few of us are such fools
as to believe the lying reasons we
give for our own poverty.
Baek of countless old people who
have nothing stretch years of Im
providence. So it is true, as one
writer says: 'Society suffers more
from the waste of money than from
the want of money." To be well
to-do is the result of self-denial
and daily economy. Self-denial and
economy are common sense applied
to everybody's money transactions.
A man with a little extra change
in his pocket can buy a lot of
things he does not need. If he does
buy them, he has paid a tax on his
habit of waste. He may be skilled
in earning money, but he is a flat
failure in governing his own use
of it.
The man spoke truly who said:
"If every man who sports an auto
mobile only by having mortgaged
his furniture and his wife’s furs
hud to state that fact on his li
cense number plate, there would be
HOW TO BUILD A FORTUNE
No, 7.—-Taxes
By THOMAS TAPPER.
fewer of them in the streets.”
This is paying taxes on vanity.
Many a man at Ten Thousand
Dollars a year is farther behind in
the game than the economical la
borer who puts a dollar or two a
week aside from his wages. An
unwise man. with a love for dis
play, can be awfully foolish on Ten
Thousand Dollars a year, and a
man on Fifteen Dollars a week’can
be very wise. It all depends on
W’hether self-government has been
set up and the man knows how he
stands every night.
111.
Don’t pay useless taxes, but tax
today for tomorrow. By following
this rule you can not remain poor.
It braces up tj»e mind, and the re-
Sirius
By ILLA WHEELER WILCOX.
Copyright, 1912, by American-Journal-Examlner.
("Since Sirluj crossed the Milky Way, sixty thousand years have gone."
-Garrett P. Servlss.)
OINCE Sirius crossed the Milky Way.
K -' Full sixty thousand years have gone,
Yet hour by hour, and day by day.
This tireless star speeds on and on.
Methinks he must be moved to mirth
By that droll tale of Genesis.
Which says creation had its birth
For such a puny world as this.
To hear how One who fashioned all
Those solar systems, tiers on tiers.
Expressed in little Adam’s fall
The purpose of a million spheres.
And, witness of the endless plan.
To splendid wrath he must be brought
By pigmy creeds presumptuous man
Sends fotth as God’s primeval thought.
Perchance from half a hundred stars
He hears as many curious things:
From Venus. Jupiter and Mars.
And Saturn with the beauteous rings.
There may be students of the Cause
Who send their revelations out.
And formulate their codes of laws.
With heavens for faith and hells for doubt.
On planets old ere form or place
Was lent to.earth, may dwell—who knows"—
A God like and perfected race
That hails great Sirius as he goes.
In zones that circle moon and sun.
Twixt world and world, he may see souls
Whose span of earthly life is done.
Still journeying up to higher goals.
And on dead planets gray and cold
Grim spectral souls, that harbored hate
Life after life, he may behold
Descending to a darker fate.
And on his grand, majestic course
He may have caught one glorious sight
Os that vast shining, central Source
From which proceeds all life, all light.
Since Sirius crossed the Milky Way
Full sixty thousand years have gone.
No mortal man may bid him stay.
No mortal man may speed him on.
No mortal mind may comprehend
What is beyond, what was before.
To God be glory without end.
Let man be humble and adore.
sult of that is that you will get on
better in life, for the mind is the
motive power.
Don’t believe in influence, in pull,
in better days to come unless you
make them come. Be your own
banker, and account for all that
comes and goes. A man earning
Ten Dollars a week, or Five Hun
dred and Twenty Dollars a year,
is an investment representing 5
per cent on Ten Thousand Four
Hundred Dollars. That is, if ho
should die his family would need
this sum to keep on as they had
been going.
This show’s how necessary it is
for a ten-dollar-a-week man to be
a banker, and keep joint accounts
with present and future.
THE HOME r-APER
Dorothy Dix
Writes on
Doing Things Well
I HAVE received a letter from
a young woman, who says:
‘‘l am a working girl. It is
absolutely necessary for me to earn
my own living. I have had several
good places since I left school, but
I have lost each one because my
handwriting is so bad. What shall
I do?”
Learn how to write, little sister.
Get you a copy book, and pen and
ink, and sit down at a table and
never get up until you have mas
tered the art of chirography.
Spend hours, and days, and weeks,
if necessary, acquiring a plain and
legible handwriting. Eat pot
hooks; dream upward slants and
downward slants, and curves, and
curiecues. Give every particle of
intelligence you’ve got, put every
ounce of determination in you to
learning to write, and, my word
for it, you will soon have Jim the
Penman looking like a carver of
Egyptian hieroglyhics.
You’re not going to sit down be
fore an ink pot and pen, and give
up, are you? You’re not going to
admit that you have so little in
telligence that you can’t learn how
to write decently, are you? You
haven’t so little ambition that you
are going to be a quitter the first
time you strike a real difficulty in
life, are you? When we find out
what is our handicap in the race
for success there is just one thing
to be done, and that is to over
come that particular drawback.
There's just one way to get on in
the working world, little sister, and
that is to do good work, and the
sooner you master the fact the bet
ter it will be for you. There are
plenty of good places for the com
petent, but there's no room for the
clerk whose sales ’ slips look like
chicken tracts, or the bookkeeper
whose ledger won’t balance, or the
stenographer who can’t spell.
Therefore It’s up to you to decide
whether you are going to be one of
those Invaluable employes who
climb up to situations of trust and
honor and profit, or whether you
become one of the shifting army of
incompetents who are always look
ing for a job.
Why They Fail.
People who fail in life always lay
the blame on circumstances, or
fate, or the state of politics, or
heredity, or some other convenient
scapegoat. This lets them down
easy, and gives them a chance to
sniffle, and cry’, and make a bid
for sympathy when they strike us
for a loan. But the truth is that
we make our own luck, little sister,
and we are the architects of our
own misfortunes just as much as
we are of our own fortunes. The
drunkard and the beggar on the
street are self-made men, just as
much as are Mr. Rockefeller and
Mr. Carnegie.
It doesn’t make a bit of differ
ence what we choose as a life work
If we do it well. Success or fail
ure in any line depends upon the
kind of handiwork that we turn
out. and this is something that w’o
men have yet to learn.
I know’ dozens of girls who have
chosen stenography for a profes
sion, who blandly’ say, “I never could
learn to spell,” and it never seems
to occur to them that their w’hole
future success depends upon their
George W. Perkins and the Roose
velt Progressive Party
Continued from First Column.
had when the convention opened—something quite new. as politi
cians will admit.
The country needs to get rid of political hacks and professional
candidates. It wants to interest in politics and in government the
ablest men that the country possesses. Wherever big work has been
done in a country, it has been done by men of power-—and usually
by men that have proved successful in something else besides
politics.
George Washington was a good soldier—and about the richest
man in the country, when he did his great work for this republic.
Nobody suggests that he ought to have kept out of politics becauss
he happened to be rich.
Jacques Coeur was the richest man in Europe when his power
of organization and his great capital were put at the service of
France in a crisis brought on by incompetency in government.
Disraeli, who did so much for England—more than any other
man, perhaps, except Pitt—was a man of great power, and would
have been a man of vast wealth if he had thought it worth while to
make money. He made millions for England in his purchase of the
Suez canal bonds, and hundreds of millions in other ways.
If other men, having proved their ability in the big industrial
work of the country, will follow the example of Perkins and take a
share in government and a place in politics, they will do much to in
crease efficiency in government affairs.
And they need not abandon their big undertakings—if those
undertakings are legitimate.
A man should be a builder as well as a talker and a lawmaker.
The ablest men in government have been unusually able in
practical affairs.
The wonderful fight that Voltaire made against oppression and
vile injustice did not prevent his building up a prosperous com
munity and making himself a very rich man. Necker was a great
business man, as well as a great statesman.
Colonel Roosevelt should not seem to apologize for having
Perkins with him. On the contrary, he should be proud of having
started a progressive movement that can attract successful men. and
not merely attract the hacks and the failures of other political
parties.
By DOROTHY DIX
learning to spell, and that they can
find the whole art of how to get
there in the dictionary. I know
cooks who have cooked for 40 years
without ever learning how to make
bread, or boil a potato properly, and
will still wonder why they are al
ways changing place®.
I know dressmakers who admit
that they are bad fitters, yet they
go on ruining people’s cloth year
after year, and complaining about
the fickleness of customers who
never come back.
These women know where their
fault lies, but they are too lazy and
too Indolent to correct it. And
they are always poor and ill paid
for there’s just one kind of work
that commands a high price in the
market, and that is first-class w«rk
If you can do that you can write
your own price tag for it.
Why can one dressmaker get $75
for making a gown while another
can only get $5?
Because one woman turned out
sloppy work and the other turns
out a perfect job.
" hy can one cook command a
salary of SIO,OOO a year while an
other can only get $5 a week” Be
cause one has raised the art of
cookery to a science, and the other
never takes the trouble to learn
even the rudiments of it.
Willing To Pay.
Why can one stenographer com
ntand a high salary while the town
Is overrun with girls who are al
ways advertising for a job? Be
cause busy men are willing to pay
for expert work that is always
right, and nobody wants to pay for
bungling, blundering work that is
full of ill-spelt words and erasures,
and that can never be depended
upon for accuracy.
It pays to learn how to do things
well, little sister. It pays to be on
the job, and if you know wherein
you fail to make good you’ve got a
signboard pointing you to the ways
of success. Just correct your faults
and make of your weakness your
strength.
Don’t say you can't write, or you
can't spell, or you can't add up fig
ures. or you can’t cook, or you
can’t sew, because you can if you
want to. Any girl with ordinary
intelligence and a particle of back
bone in her body can make herself
an expert in any of these lines if
she will give it half the time and
trouble and serious thought that
she does to the way she combs her
hair.
Os course, girls are like boys,
they succeed best In the occupation
for which they have a natural apti
tude. In selecting one's lifework
it is important to pick out some
thing for which one has a turn and
a liking, and w’hich one enjoys do
ing, but having once made this se
lection. stick to it and learn to do
that thing supremely well.
That's the open sesame to suc
cess. little sister. It’s just doing
things well, and whether it's learn
ing how to write a legible hand, or
singing grand opera, it’s up to the
individual. If you have the deter
mination and the energy, and the
courage to work, and work, and
w’ork until you conquer your dif
ficulty, and learn how’ to do that
particular thing just right, you
will succeed. Otherwise you will
be a failure. It’s all up to you.