THIRTEENTH ANNUAL YEAR BOOK— PART IV 181 



that names of candidates shall be shuffled on the ballot so that each 

 man will have the luck of position at the head of the ticket in order to 

 secure a fair chance in a primary election. Now what sort of a commen- 

 tary is that on the voters of the most intelligent state in the nation? My 

 friends, the people of the state of Iowa have got to take a more intelligent 

 interest in their city, in their state, in their own duty and responsibility 

 as citizens if they are going to be able to meet on equal terms the rail- 

 roads they are dealing with, for they are intelligent to their own interests. 

 It is going to be necessary for the people of the state of Iowa to vote 

 more intelligently, and to devote more time to a serious consideration of 

 their part in this government, and to come together more intelligently and 

 effectively if they are ever going to compete on even terms with the cor- 

 porations with which they are dealing. I agree wholly with Judge Davis 

 that the time is coming when the railroads and the stock shippers and 

 all people should come together in a fair and intelligent consideration of 

 their mutual interests, but I say to you, my friends, that we are not going 

 to come together on an equal basis until you and I and the rest of us 

 come together with equal information and equal intelligence, as to our 

 part of the bargain. It will require not merely this organization that you 

 are members of, it will require not merely an organization that covers an 

 individual state — it will require an organization that is national in its 

 extent, that can appear before the Interstate Commerce Commission, be- 

 cause, as Judge Davis says, your interests are largely interstate, and you 

 know it has been the orders of the Interstate Commerce Commission that 

 have largely affected your rights and your rates. It will require an organ- 

 ization that is national in its extent, and in order to form such an organi- 

 zation it will require intelligence, it will require a serious consideration 

 of public affairs, and it will require a stern determination on the part of 

 every man in the state of ours to be at the polls and to do his full duty as 

 a citizen. 



Now it has been said here by Governor Clarke and by others that the 

 great possibilities of the future lie in this Mississippi valley, but, my 

 friends, they do not lie with the soil, and they do not lie with the cattle. 

 They lie with the men in this Mississippi valley. The cities of this world 

 have not been built where the wealth was, where the natural resources 

 were, but where the men were. There is more gold tonight in the city 

 of London than in any other one spot in the world, and yet there was 

 never an ounce of the precious metal discovered in the British Isles. Mex- 

 ico produces almost as much or more silver than all the rest of the world 

 together, and yet there is not much silver in Mexico. Even the wealth 

 of the mines is not where the mines are, but where the men are. The states, 

 the cities, the business, the commerce of the world are built by men, and 

 the future of this Mississippi valley is not with its natural fertility and 

 not with its resources, but with its men. I want to say to you tonight 

 that it is just as possible for Iowa to become a worn-out state, as some 

 of the New England states are, as it has been for them. You can mine 

 the soil of Iowa as easily as they have mined theirs, and if there is not 

 greater intelligence in the people of this Mississippi valley, we will ac- 

 complish no more than thev have aocomnlished Tbp. future is with vnn 



