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If the President meant what he said in his message and if he still believes that the Government of the United States does not desire to intervene in Nicaragua, why does he not send a messenger over to the State Department and summon his Secretary and ask him how it is that he is embezzling the power the President placed in him by running contrary to the President's explicit expression in that respect?

Whenever we land troops in a country, whenever we take armed possession of the cities of a countryand we have already taken possession of all of the important cities in Nicaragua except two-whenever we take charge of a railway traversing a country and issue orders to the revolutionists that they must not come within 2,000 yards of either side of the railway with their troops, whenever we issue an edict to the revolutionary commander and tell him that he must not bring his troops within 2,000 yards of any city in Nicaragua, then we commit acts of war. It is not necessary to spill blood to wage war. It is not necessary to spill blood to conquer a country. To conquer a country is to take armed possession of it and establish your authority over it, and that is what Admiral Latimer has done. He has taken over sovereignty along the railroad and around every city. His answer is that Diaz, this puppet; Diaz, this paper President; Diaz, this theoretical President, has asked him to do it. Mr. Chairman, if I were the President of a country with an army, I would not ask any other nation to come in and exercise the functions of my office for me; and the only reason that Diaz asked Admiral Latimer to perform these functions is because he can not perform them himself, because the minute American marines are withdrawn from Nicaragua, Diaz will be ejected from office by the wrath of the people of Nicaragua.

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We had no opportunity in the Committee on Foreign Affairs to have a representative of the Department of State come before the committee and give us information. The committee of which I happen to be a member absolutely refused to invite the Secretary of State or any of his subordinates to appear before the committee. The committee simply got behind that mouth-filling phrase "to protect American lives and property," but I rather suspect that the American lives and the American property that the State Department is so anxious to protect in Nicaragua are a few American-owned corporations that have loans in Nicaragua and corporations holding mahogany concessions, and interests that are now planning to acquire the railroad which the marines are now protecting.

This man Diaz says he planned the railroad. Well, I am not able to vouch for this information, but the best information I can obtain is that there is a group of financiers in New York who are planning to take over the railroad from the existing Government of Nicaragua, and I am informed that the day following the Diaz inauguration he borrowed $300,000 from a banking concern in New York. I am not able to vouch for that. I regret we have not available information on this subject. The Department of State has not vouchsafed to the committee the information, and there is such a prejudice in the Com

mittee on Foreign Affairs against information that we were unable to get any from the department.

Let us see what we are going to do for 100 years. They are going to propose a treaty for 100 years. Thank the Constitution, however, a treaty to be effective must be ratified, and, thank the Constitution, there is a Senate over at the other end of the Capitol. Before the treaty can become effective the Senate must approve it. Yet the Department of State and the Department of the Navy as soon as Congress adjourns can go on putting into practical effect the terms of that treaty without the ratification of the Senate. We predicted more than a month ago what is transpiring now in Nicaragua. Wait until Congress adjourns, wait until the Senate adjourns, wait until its return home, and the Department of State and the Navy Department will have a free rein. They will have the marines at their disposal; they will have the Navy at their disposal. I hesitate to predict what will happen in Nicaragua and Mexico when the administration and State Department are free without Congress being in session to let the country know what they propose. Do you know how many marines there are in Nicaragua now? The New York World of this morning states there are already in that territory and on the way over 5,000 marines-5,000 marines! Why, my friends, you could give every American citizen in Nicaragua a corporal's guard to protect him, and to do that we would not need half as many marines as there are there now.

Mr. Chairman and gentlemen of the committee, we are in a state of war in Nicaragua; not perhaps with all of the people, but we are at war with the dominant faction in Nicaragua. We are at war with the majority of the people of that Republic, according to the last official expression of that people. We have neutralized all of the zones where any fighting was imminent. We have taken over the independence and sovereignty of Nicaragua to all intents and purposes.

Congress has not declared war. The President has not announced the existence of a state of war. But two departments of this Government, not responsible to anybody except the President, have created a condition of war yonder in the Republic of Nicaragua.

I want here to register my solemn protest against that action. I protest against it as a representative of the American taxpayers, who will have to foot the bill. As the representative of mothers and fathers whose unwilling sons must carry on war when it is waged, I protest against it. In the name of the rights of small nations as well as of great I protest. As a representative of the American people I protest against it. In the name of justice and fairness to the people of Nicaragua I protest against it. Above all, as an American citizen who loves his country and who glories in its traditions I protest against it, because it is wrong. (Applause.) I protest against it in the name of the Monroe doctrine, a doctrine that was enunciated for the protection and independence of the nations of Central and South America and not for their exploitation and destruction. (Applause.) I protest against it in the name of international good will and fellowship. I protest against it be

cause, by the course which these two departments of the Government are pursuing, we are alienating the respect and confidence of Europe and stirring up the hatred and bitter passions of every people in South and Central America. I protest against it in the name of American business, because the course we are now following will drive the people of South and Central America into European markets for the purchase of goods. I protest against it because it increases the number of our enemies and lessens the number of our friends.

What are we going to do about it? Is there no way by which the American people can have their voice registered?

DEBATING THE FARM RELIEF BILL

(Continued from page 10)

000 acres of our farm lands in North Dakota were operated by tenants. Now that situation is changed, and the number of acres farmed by tenants has grown from 4,000,000 to 10,000,000.

The value of all farm property in North Dakota in 1920 was $1,759,000,000, while in 1925 the value of all farm property had dropped to $1,191,000,000 -a loss, if you please, in that short period of five years of a half million dollars in the wealth of the farmers of the one State of North Dakota.

A Statesmanlike View

Senator Sheppard, of Texas, made this contribution:

Agriculture is not only the essential accompaniment of industry, commerce, and every other form of human enterprise, but it forms almost half the buying power of the country; and if that power be lost, or substantially impaired, untold losses and retrogression will occur in manufacturing, banking, transportation, and trade, to the infinite injury of our whole economic fabric. The disappearance or substantial impairment of American agriculture will mean that the multitudes in American industry and commerce, if such industry and commerce are to continue on the present or on an increasing scale, must be more and more largely sustained by food products and industrial raw materials from other parts of the earth. This will necessitate increasing our naval and military strength in order to safeguard our very existence, probable clashes with other nations in a similar situation, a colossal war establishment with all that such an institution implies, and the ultimate erection of a militaristic Government on the ruins of a Republic which had its roots in a self-sustaining balance within its own borders between agriculture and industry. Once the art of agriculture is lost it can not be replaced for generations.

The collapse of agriculture as a profitable calling enabling its followers to maintain American standards of life and progress is fraught with such fatal consequences to the Nation and the world, as well as to the farmer himself, that no human terms can measure the need of immediate and effective action.

It will not do simply to dismiss every proposal for relief. The legislator who rejects every suggestion and offers nothing of constructive purpose assumes a terrible responsibility. Evidently the supreme problem in agriculture is that of a permanent economic reorganization adapting it to modern conditions. Such a purpose can not be studied and accomplished in a single year or in a few years. Meanwhile the crisis in agriculture becomes more menacing and acute. It must be protected from the influences that are paralyzing it while a permanent adjustment is being developed. The McNary-Haugen bill is intended to bridge the chasm between the unorganized present and the organized future. Economic Farm Slavery

Congressman Kerr, of North Carolina, painted the same kind of picture:

In common justice to the agricultural life of America, this Government should endeavor to right the wrong of the deflation panic of 1920. This was nothing less than the assassination of the American farmer's business. The policy inaugurated by an agency of our Government laid its ruthless hand of destruction upon the crop prices of America and wrecked 2,000,000 happy homes, and left in its wake bankruptcy, suicide, and buried hope. The debt of the American farmer is today $14,000,000,000. His property and crop values, as compared with the predeflation period, has decreased since then $30,000,000,000.

This is one-tenth of the value of the wealth of this Nation; it is ten times as much as the debt of this Nation in 1900; and it is more than our national debt was immediately after the World War. In 1923 the national income of the United States, the annual wealth produced, was $70,000,000,000, the farmer had one-fifth of the wealth engaged in the production of this annual income and one-third of the population engaged in its production, and yet he only realized 14 per cent of this income, and his percentage of this income is less now than then. Crop prices have decreased to below the cost of production, and the farmers' average earnings per annum is just one-half as much as the average earnings of other laborers of America. With this decrease of property values and income, the farmers' taxes in this Nation have increased 236 per cent within the last 10 years. Most of his income now is consumed in payment of taxes and interest on his indebtedness; his family is neither fed, clothed, nor educated as it should be, and his property is passing away from him by foreclosure sales each day; even our Federal land banks, which I believe have been of great service to the landowners of the Nation, have been compelled to foreclose 5,000 homes occupied by farmers in order to satisfy loans made to them aggregating more than $18,000,000. Most of these foreclosure sales have occurred within the last four years, and these are but a small per cent of the total farm foreclosure sales in our "prosperous" (?) country. How long must this continue before our once proud and honest yeomanry is reduced to economic slavery? Not long, gentlemen, not long!

"WE ARE IN AN

UNFORTUNATE DRIFT”

So writes one of the leading political scientists of the
country, who believes, as so many Americans do, that
"our institutions are breaking down."

More and more people—thinking people—are be-
ginning to understand that something is fundamen-
tally amiss in our national life.

There is a widespread growing determination to dis-
cover just what is unworkable in our system of repre-
sentative government, and how to remedy its defects.

To that end, THE SEARCHLIGHT is undertaking a
more comprehensive survey than has ever been made,
and from a new and different point of view.

Are you interested? Do you want to help? Write us.

The Searchlight on Congress

Lenox Building

Washington, D. C.

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HOW MIDDLE WEST REGARDS THE COOLIDGE VETO By Knud Wefald

Rules Reform for the House

Volume XI

The Industrial East Still "Demobilizing" Agri-
culture-A Statement of the Farm Issue-The
President Responsible-In Terms of Politics—
Some Reflections on the "Dave" Reed - "Jim"
Reed Controversy - Wilson May Be Seated

To Find the
Missing Link

Number 12

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Thinking men and women all over the world are likewise becoming deeply conscious that representative government is breaking down. Books could now be filled with outstanding expressions of that reluctant belief.

We are endeavoring to find out exactly wherein the difficulties lie, and what remedies will be lastingly effective. There are two things that you can do to help:

Put some money into the fund that is to be used to make this all-important survey; and

Send us your ideas on the subject.

Undoubtedly more constructive statesmanship could be assembled from among SEARCHLIGHT readers than is now represented in the national public service.

Let us have your views of existing tendencies and conditions.

This comes from Frank A. Day, who was the secretary and political mentor of the late John A. Johnson when the latter was Governor of Minnesota. Mr. Day is now a State Senator and editor of the Fairmount Daily Sentinel:

"Victor Lawson, who sits beside me in the Senate, and Jim Carley, who sits back of me, both tell me I should send you $2 for THE SEARCHLIGHT. They both say they read it, and even if I am hard up as the devil, I owe that much toward the cause of good government, which you are aiding so splendidly in your publication on Congress."

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The House Blocks It... Our State Department... "Jim" Reed Nominated.... Frank O. Lowden... Enough of Coolidge........ A History of Issues... Chester Rowell on "Politics". "Migration and Business Cycles".. How the Middle West Regards the Coolidge Veto, by Knud Wefald..... 9 Still "Demobilizing” Agriculture.

A Statement of the Farm Issue.. "Tender to Big Business". Coolidge Is Responsible..

In Terms of Politics...

10

11

12

12

13

A Program of Rules Reform........ 14

THE

SEARCHLIGHT

ON CONGRESS

And on the DEMOCRACY which gives it EXISTENCE
LYNN HAINES, Editor
DORA B. HAINES, Business Manager

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