The Holland Society of New York - Yearbook (New York, NY)

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184 I did n't have much chance to see you in the last campaign, said he. You thought we were radical. We were not. We simply asked for that which we thought to be right. Beware the radi- cals who come after us--the men who will not be content to stop the wrong, but who will demand that you go back and restore the wrong. . This ended Mr. Bryan's apparently unpremedi- tated outburst--an outburst doubtless prompted by Mr. Beck's brilliant arraignment of what he deemed to be an overreaching and wicked spirit of organized labor. But for Mr. Beck's positiveness and for Mr. Bryan's rhetorical pugnacity, the palm of adding the greatest degree of spice to the speaking pro- gramme would have rested with the Rev. Dr. George C. Lorimer, of the Fifth Avenue Baptist Church, whose toast was Holland-Our Ally in the Revolution. The clergyman gave the descendants of the dike--builders a shaking-up by eulogizing Presi- dent Roosevelt,--a second Peter Stuyvesant, 'he called him,-and warning Wall Street to be wise in their day and generation and stop the warfare on him. It was all said in a good-fellowship vein' and with consideration for the amenities, but, after all, it was a significant and daring admonition. w It comments editorially as follows: TVVO PRoPHETs. Mr. Bryan and Mr. Beck both spoke the trnth at the Holland Society dinner, and both spoke it im- pressively. Each dealt with one side ofa great evil threatening the perpetnity of American institutions. The apparent antagonism between them is only .the antagonism of emphasis. - p . .

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I Ss , to Mr. Beck andraising his voice to 3, it' 11 t - ' r hat swept it through the ball- 1'k I P C before a storm, he said: room 1 e the breeze When TIIY friend here suggests a danger from labor organizations I wish to call attention 130 other and greater dangers. Greater than any danger that can come from organized labor is the stock-jobbing and stock-watered organizations that plunder the people and defy the laws of the land. CApplause.j g H We cannot bring peace by attacking labor organizations. Give labor organizations .credit for what they have done for America and American citizenship. They have elevated that citizenship. Raising his voice to its maximum of vibrancy, the speaker turned to the specially invited guests and said: ' , A man who is fit to die for his country ought to be permitted to live for it. Instantly there was a thunder of applause by men who sprang to their feet and cheered and waved handkerchiefs. Not every one got cup. There were many who sat with closely shut jaws and red faces, and who looked defiance at the speaker, just as if they would like to have a chance to say something themselves. Why not give these men the protection' that justice demands? continued Mr. Bryan. Why not deal with them as brethren? Go and see their children in the factories. Children dwarfed in mind and soul. And yet these children are made in the image of God, just as your children are, and you must love them, just as you love your own children. CGreat appl-RUSS, and CUSS of That's right! D j , Here Mr. Bryan paused and made as if about to stop speaking. Immediately there were cries for him to go on.

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185 We age bglad tlfiat M r. Beck made his eloquent plea for free a or an individual liberty against the labor oligarchy which will not let even the dead be bwied ve frequently spoken without the union label. We 'ha of the tyrannyof the boycott and the closed. shop, which ought to be utterly unendurable to ree s respecting American citizens.. We are glad: tedbc, that Mr. Bryan spoke of the corresponding tyranny of the great corporations that plunder the people, corrupt the citizenship, and defy the laws of the land. I t is especially worth while for such an audience to hear this, for the abuses of trusts do rnore to rnake honest wage-earners tolerant -of the abuses of labor unions than all the walking delegates and derna- gogues under heaven. , A I t would be well likewise if those who focus. their attention so exclusively on the abuses of trusts could hear with their spiritual ears the truths which M r. Beck declared. I f each could listen to the other side with open rnind, thousands who are now bound by prejudices of occupation and condition rnight be brought to co-operate for the preservation of true, historic American liberty. p g The New York Arnerican, formerly the New York ffournal, says : Labor Assailed at Banquet by I. M. Beck-Former Assistant U. S. Attorney-General Qnee1'S at Unions and Talks of Slavishness to LabO1' S Oligarchy. More than usually distinguished was the assileiiii- hlage last night at the annual dinner of the f . tri - land Society, held in the Astor GallefY 0 e