The Vermont Watchman

POLITICS IN THE WEST.

The secretary of agriculture who recently returned from the West declares that the most prosperous conditions exist throughout the West and that, while there is no active interest in national politics, the people are too well satisfied to desire any change.

When asked to define the tariff plank in the Iowa Republican platform, he said that it meant that the people desired some modification of the tariff schedules. That in this time of plenty they considered such modification could be judiciously made. That while true to the principles of protection, they believed there were certain industries which no longer needed the same protection that was essential to their prosperity when the Dingley law was enacted and they expected the party to modify those schedules. They were particularly desirous of a modification of the schedules affecting trust made articles, but were convinced that any revision of the tariff could be intrusted only to the Republican party.

Speaking of the President, he said that the people of the West were all enthusiastic in his support and even the Democrats approved of him and many expressed the wish that he was their leader instead of the leader of the Republicans.

"Mr. Roosevelt," said the secretary, "is the type of man westerners love. He is fearless, honest and brilliant. They are for him to a man. They regard with the greatest approval his attempt to regulate the trusts. They consider that he is following the rational path in his effort to secure that regulation through the courts and by means of the Sherman law. If that law should prove defective, they believe Mr. Roosevelt will so inform Congress, pointing out its defects, and that Congress will promptly remedy them. Such a course, they say, is in marked contrast to the revolutionary methods advanced by Democratic leaders who would seek to destroy the trusts by a radical revision of the tariff, thereby throwing hundreds of men out of employment, rendering worthless the investments of thousands of business men and undermining the general prosperity with which the country is blessed."