Roosevelt Crowds Worry Republicans.

New York Times 100 years ago today, August 17, 1912:
Demonstration in Providence Interpreted as Indicating Rhode Island Will Be for Wilson.
COLONEL SPEAKS TWICE
Prayer and Hymn Singing at Opening of One Meeting — Seats Sell at $1 — Colonel Denounces Old Parties.Special to The New York Times.
    PROVIDENCE, R. I., Aug. 16.— Col. Roosevelt opened his campaign here today, and the enthusiastic welcome he received worried the Republican leaders. In fact, many predictions were heard tonight that at election time Gov. Wilson would capture the electors even from this rock-ribbed standpat Republican State as a result of the split Col. Roosevelt and his third party has brought about.
    Elated by his party reception, the Colonel in an address at Infantry Hall tonight declared that he believed the Progressives would win by a handsome majority if they could get the people to realize what they were trying to accomplish. His managers here, however, are not making such confident predictions, but they do declare that they will "break the Republican Party."
    It is the fact that men from all ranks of life, who never before took much interests in politics, are now turning out, that has thrown the scare into the camp of the Taft leaders, headed by Gen. Charles A. Wilson, Gov. Pothier, ex-Senator Aldrich and his successor, Senator Lippitt. The crowd that greeted the Colonel when his train pulled into the station was a different crowd than they had ever seen before. Fully 7,000 persons, many of them from the textile mills, many from the shops, lawyers, and business men crowded Exchange Place, City Square, and Dorrance Street, along which Col. Roosevelt passed on his way to the hotel. They blocked the pathway twice and demanded a speech before the short journey was finished. The loudest cheers came when he slashed out at the "rule of the bosses," and appealed for aid in bringing about the rule of the people.
    Col. Roosevelt made two addresses here to-night, the first to a crowd of perhaps 1,800 in Infantry Hall, and the other before an overflow meeting at the opera house. In many respects the Infantry Hall meeting was like the Progressive Convention in Chicago. The meeting was opened with prayer and the crowd joined in singing "Onward Christian Soldiers," "America," "We'll Rally Round the Flag, Boys," and other religious and patriotic songs. The heads of two huge bull moose were on each side of the platform, and swung over the speakers' stand was a huge banner with the inscription: "We will stand at Armageddon and fight the battle of the Lord."

Explains the New Movement.
    The Colonel's set address dealt principally with the need of leadership in the fight in Rhode Island and the tariff, which is the issue on which much depends in this State, but the Colonel right at the start tossed aside his manuscript and jumped into an explanation of the Progressive movement.
    "I have been asked," he said, "if this movement is going to go on, or if it is just a movement connected with you. I want to answer that question first of all. It is a permanent party, a new party.
    "This movement is going on just as sure as fate. This is a real movement springing from the needs and the hearts of the people of the United States. The only part I have had in it is that I brought it on two or three years sooner than it would have come otherwise.
    "The man is blind who does not see that our people are tired of having the bosses govern them. The man is blind who does not see that the people are growing seriously anxious to see economic social and political injustice blotted out.
    "They are about making up their mind that there must be a new party which will deal with the live issues and not with the dead issues. They see the need of a new party which will meet all the promises it makes and will only make promises when it intends to keep them — a party which when it declares itself for popular rule intends to have popular rule all the time, even when the Legislatures are in session.
    "The platforms of the old parties are thrashing straw that was thrashed thirty years ago. There is no sincere purpose back of either platform to reduce that platform to legislation. As this movement develops I've been growing more radical instead of less radical. I'm even going further than the platform.

Going to Reform the Senate.
    "We ask you all to join us, no matter what were your past party affiliations; if he is a decent man we ask him to come in with us. Every one who wants to do his share of the work in the Government belong with us. The only trouble is to get enough of you.
    "The Progressive Party has made up its mind that the United States Senate shall represent something else than it does represent.
    The Colonel then closed the extemporaneous part of his address by asking for the support of all men, farmers, business men, and railroad men.
    When Col. Roosevelt got here to-day he was informed that the Progressive movement which was organized ten days ago had grown beyond the expectation of the leaders. He immediately went into conference with the members of the Executive Committee, headed by Edwin F. Tuttle, an insurance man, who never figured in politics until he went to the convention of the Progressives in Chicago and was made a National Committeeman. John E. Bolan, a lawyer in whose offices the Progressives have their temporary headquarters, is Secretary, and ex-Gov. Garvin, a Democrat and an ardent single tax advocate, is a member.
    They demanded right at the start to know the Colonel's attitude on the tariff, and Bolan said afterward that what the Colonel said was perfectly satisfactory to the Progressives of New England.
    Mr. Bolan said later that the movement already had the names of 5,000 voters enrolled.
    "If The New York Times is right in its statement that 4,000 votes for the Progressive Party will break the Republican machine," he said, "and I happen to know that The Times is right, then the machine is going down to destruction."
    Mr. Bolan was asked from what source most of the strength of the Progressive Party was expected to come.
    "At least 80 per cent from the Republican Party," he replied, "and the other 20 from the Democrats and other parties. The Republican Party made the mistake of its life when it sent delegates from this State instructed for President Taft and nominated him. The Rhode Island people didn't want him. There will be a complete third party ticket in Rhode Island."

Seats Sold at $1 Each.
    Some of the enthusiasm at the Infantry Hall meeting may have been due to the fact that every one occupying seats on the main floor was an enrolled Progressive. Those who enrolled and agreed to support the candidates received free tickets as far as they went. The seats in the balcony, reserved for the women, sold at $1 each and went like hot cakes. The price of seats at the overflow meeting at the Opera House was fifty cents. This plan was adopted to pay the expenses, said Mr. Bolan. At the overflow meeting Col. Roosevelt made another attack on the tariff plank of the Democratic platform.
    The trip to Providence was not marked by any great enthusiasm on the part of the towns along the line. At Stamford, Conn., there was a crowd waving bandanas and calling for a speech. Connecticut is a State where the Progressives are making little headway, according to reports. At New London there was a small crowd, but there wasn't a sign of a Roosevelt enthusiast at New Haven.
    The Colonel held another conference with the Progressive leaders in Providence late to-night. To-morrow morning he will go by automobile to Revere Beach, near Boston, to make a Progressive speech. An address on the Boston Common at night will follow.

Col, Roosevelt's Speech.
    In part the Colonel spoke to his audience in the armory as follows, being frequently interrupted with applause:
    "I take particular pleasure in making my first speech as nominee of the Progressive Party here in Rhode Island. You have suffered, as in my own State of New York we have suffered, from boss politics in the most extreme form of development. The Progressive movement is aimed at the rotten machines, the rotten boss systems of both parties. Only by supporting the Progressive Party can you strike any effective blow against boss rule and machine and ring politics in the United States.
    "There is nothing whatever to choose between the two old parties in this respect. At this moment the domination of Tammany In New York, of the Taggart machine in Indiana, the Sullivan machine in Illinois, within the Democratic Party, is as unquestioned as the dominaton of the Barnes-Guggenheim-Penrose machines within the Republican Party. Nothing whatever of permanent value is to be gained by exchanging one set of bosses for the other, one set of machines for the other. The success of the Democratic National ticket means enthroning in power one set of bosses; the success of the Republican National ticket means enthroning in power the other set of bosses. The effort at this time to rebuke one set of bosses by voting for the candidate of the other set of bosses is from its very nature bound to result in mere futility.
    "In their essence the Democratic and the Republican machines are alike. Both are controlled by the like powerful beneficiaries of privilege; privileged political and privileged financial. To try to punish one set of defenders of political and industrial privilege by occasionally voting for the nominee of the other set is to play into the hands of both. Nothing pleases the bosses of the two parties more than the action of the nominal Independent who shows his independence purely by raising to power first one party and then the other.
    "We Progressives stand against both. We take as our motto Emerson's phrase, 'The best political economy is the care and culture of men.' We are interested in property; we will defend the rights of property; but we put man above what man has made. We feel that the rights of humanity ordinarily coincide with the rights of property, but if there is conflict between them then our allegiance is due to human rights first.

Leaders Needed in New England.
    "There la peculiar need of leadership for this fight here in New England. New England took the lead in the great contest which resulted in the founding of this Government in the days of Washington; it took the lead in the great contest which resulted in perpetuating this Government in the days of Lincoln. Surely it ought not to be content merely to follow in this great third contest for the rights of the plain people.
    "It has been a matter of concern to me to see so many of those here in New England who should be leaders in the new movement turn cold-heartedly from it. I believe that half of the opposition to our cause In New England is due to sheer plain ignorance, half of the remainder to hard-shelled prejudice, and the other half of the remainder to craven fear of what is new.
    "One of our great troubles, here in New England as elsewhere, is that the representatives of privilege in finance and politics control most of the newspapers, so that the ordinary man finds the channels of information choked. I do not so much mind the editorial columns being against us; but it is a matter for real regret that the news columns are closed to us,
    "There is good reason why many men should bitterly oppose the Progressive Party. Every political jobber, every crooked business man, every beneficiary of privilege, and every paid employe of such beneficlary — all these are naturally against us. But I hold that every self-respecting ordinary citizen should be for us. I challenge as our right the support of all the men from the humbler walks of life, and of all really sincere, upright, and far-sighted men, no matter of what walk of life.
    "We are making our fight for the plain people, for their right to rule, and for their duty to secure for themselves and for others social and industrial justice. The men for whom we are making the fight are not politicians, and are not men of great wealth. They are busily engaged in their daily toil; they do not appear as speakers at public meetings; they do not take prominent parts in political canvasses, and they cannot contribute large sums of money for the furtherance of the campaign on their behalf. But I believe that their feelings are all the more intense and their sympathy the more keen just because of the fact that hitherto they have never been stirred as now they are stirred.
    "Hitherto, as a standpatter, a reactionary Congressman from Kansas, with involuntary truthfulness put it, these plain people have been regarded by politicians as only entitled to pay the price of admission and sit on the bleachers and watch the politicians play the game for their own benefit. Under this Congressman's view, the plain people have nothing to do except to pay the expenses of the contest which the rulers wage for their own benefit. The Progressive doctrine, on the contrary, is that the plain people of America are not after this to sit on the bleachers and look on at the politicians play the game, that the plain people are to be their own masters and masters over all their public servants.

Duty of the "Average Man."
    "We do not for a moment pretend that what we advocate will bring about the millennium. Unless the average man has the right stuff in him he can neither be master of himself nor avoid falling under the dominion of those men who should be his servants. We understand thoroughly that after everything that can be done by law has been done it will yet remain true that the fundamental factor in determining any individual's success must be that individual's own character.
    "But we also insist that we can do much for furthering happiness and prosperity in this dearly beloved land of ours by introducing the right type of law, by insisting on the right kind of administration of the law, alike by the executive officer and the Judge, and, finally, by arousing the public conscience so that it will refuse longer to tolerate iniquity either in the world of politics or in the world of business.
    "We intend to work for prosperity; but we wish to see prosperity cast around. We stand for a protective tariff, but we wish to see the benefits of the protective tariff get into the pay envelope of the wageworker. Instead of decreasing, we, wish to increase the amount of the prize; money that is rightfully due those who work hard in industry; but we stand for a more equitable division of the prize money. Moreover, our movement is not only for economic but for ethical betterment. We hold that no man can be permanently benefited unless we make it easier for him to get for himself and his wife and his children a proper share of what is necessary for their bodies. But we insist no less upon the need of each man taking thought for his soul as well as for his body.
    "We do not accept the view that greed and selfishness are the only factors to be considered in government. We intend to work for the economic betterment of the average citizen. We intend to insist upon the average man having a greater share than now of the good things which by his labor are produced. But we intend also to work for a broader and kindlier charity of relationship as between man and man.
    "We are opposed to the sordid views of those who base morality, and therefore, law, only on fear and on greed, and who have twisted a just regard for property rights into the creation of a noxious fetichism which would make of privilege masquerading as property an idol before which the rights of men, women, and children are to be sacrificed without remorse. We stand for real popular government, for the overthrow of the dictation of the boss and the crooked financier, the dictation which has corrupted the political management and the economic policy of this Republic, and which treats with sneering derision every attempt to replace our Government on a basis of human equity.

Platform Faces the Real Issues.
    "The Progressive platform has really faced the real issues of to-day. It has done this as regards the trusts, as regards the rights of labor, as regards the tariff. I do not see how the people of New England can for one moment support either the Republican or the Democratic tariff platform.
    "Remember that when I use the word Republican now I do not refer to the rank and file of the Republican Party, but to the bosses, the Barneses, the Penroses, and Guggenheims, who have usurped the control of the machinery of the party, who have betrayed the rank and file of the party, who have twisted it into direct and fundamental opposition to the principles for which Abraham Lincoln stood, and who have made the party of financial and political privilege.
    "The Republican proposal is a tariff for privilege in industry. The Democratic proposal is a tariff for the destruction of industry. The Progressive proposal is a tariff in the interest of labor in industry.
    "At the time the Payne-Aldrich bill was put through Congress it was currently reported not only in the newspapers but by private men who ought to know that the cotton schedule, for instance, was written by a then private citizen of Rhode Island, now a Senator from your State, Mr. Lippitt, and Mr. Lippitt was credited with making the statement that Mr. Aldrich had been 'good to him.' The Republican purpose is to have future tariffs written by the Mr. Lippitts of the party, or else by the party leaders who are 'good' to the Mr. Lippitts.
    "The Democratic proposal is to hurt the Mr. Lippitts by hurting everybody, big and little, connected with the industries which have built up States like the New England States. Our proposal is not merely to reform schedules of the tariff, but to reform the methods and purposes of tariff making. We propose to reduce the various schedules as to which the duty is undoubtedly too high. We propose to deal with the tariff, schedule by schedule, in accordance with the reports of a non-partisan commission of experts who shall make their reports not on the theory of being 'good' to anybody, but with the theory of doing justice primarily to the American wageworker and the American consumer.
    "Acting after getting full information from such a commission we will give to the Mr. Lippitts their rights; we will do them full justice, but instead of permitting them to make the tariff to suit themselves we shall carefully investigate how their business is carried on. We shall get the judgment of those able to say what the needs of the workmen employed by the Mr. Lippitts are, and able to say whether enough of the tariff gets into the pay envelopes of the workman; the judgment of those able to say, after full investigation, whether the consumer, the average citizen who buys Mr, Lippitt's products; also gets fair treatment.
    "In other words, we shall do full justice to the Lippitts industry; but we shall also do justice to the workmen employed by the Lippitts, and we shall see that no protection is afforded to the Lippitts unless a full proportion of the benefit gets past the front office into the pay envelopes of the workingmen; and finally we shall see that the general consumer has his rights fully protected.

Democrats Against Prosperity.
    "If the Democratic platform were carried out in good faith your factories would have to close altogether, for their proposal is to prevent the Mr. Lippitts from prospering by the simple process of preventing every one from prospering.
    "The Republican proposal is only to give prosperity to the Mr. Lippitts and then to let it trickle down according as they may condescend to permit such trickling.
    "Our proposal is to keep the factories open, to see that the Mr. Lippitts receive full justice, but to see also that they do justice as well as get it, that they do Justice to the wageworkers whom they employ and to the customers whom they serve, and make their own profits only as an incident of thus rendering service to the advantage of the public as a whole.
    "One of our National problems calling for immediate solution is that of our banking and currency system. It has been demonstrated beyond any question that the present system is unscientific and ineffective, and that if we are to enjoy a full measure of prosperity we, must adopt a modern and proper system necessary to our needs, a system that will be on a basis at least as stable as the financial systems of France, England, and Germany.
    "The suffering and loss occasioned by our present defective system of credits and reserves has in time past been very great and very general, and we cannot be confident that panics so widespread as to affect one and all will not recur unless we change our present banking laws. This country should have as good a system as any in the world, one that affords protection to all legitimate interests, one that insures proper and reasonable accommodation at reasonable rates to all who may be entitled to it, whether they be laborers, farmers, manufacturers, or merchants, in any and all parts of the country; one which will at least retard and minimize, if not fully prevent, inflation and speculation and thus insure a proper use of the funds of the people of our country.

Currency Must Be Elastic.
    "We must have a currency that will meet the requirements of the whole country. It must have elasticity. It must be absolutely beyond question in character, ranking with the best in the world. The issue of currency should be a government function, and, therefore, the currency issue should, every dollar, be as good as gold, and this it can only be if issued against assets so good that the general business sense of the community will unhesitatingly accept them as being as good as gold.
    "Above and even more important than these requirements, any system adopted must be beyond the control of the great Wall Street and other similar interests. The Monetary Commission which has recently reported to Congress has collected an immense amount of valuable information, especially on the foreign banking systems. This should be more generally disseminated among the whole people for their information. Some of the recommendations of the commission are excellent. I Strongly object to certain features of their plan, because in my judgment they do not sufficiently safeguard the public against the danger of control by special or speculative interests in Wall Street .
    "Any plan adopted must keep the control absolutely in the hands of the Government; only in this way can we prevent the growth in this country of the most dangerous of all trusts, the Money Trust. Even at present there are disquieting symptoms of the appearance of such a trust; the Aldrich proposal, as far as concerns the proposed methods of control, would tend to increase the danger of the growth of such a trust. Our proposal is absolutely to prevent it by keeping the, control in the hands of the Government."