Page:Back to the Republic.djvu/78

 words might be displayed all over the world in letters of gold by day and with moving electric lights by night as the last solemn warning of the mighty Lincoln against the wholesale appointment of commissions, which is one of the evil tendencies of the present time.

As people come to know that Lincoln spoke those words and come to understand the full purport of their meaning, the spirit of the great Emancipator will live on, freeing the world from a dangerous experiment that is weakening the effectiveness of our government and undermining the efficiency of other governments throughout the world.

It would take many large volumes to review the expenditures and failures of the various boards and commissions that are gradually wrecking the republic.

The Inter-State Commerce Commission was heralded as an innovation that was to do great things. Its net result has been the expenditure of millions of dollars wastefully while it made unreasonable rulings that retarded the extension of railroad tracks and the building of cars, so that today the service does not meet the demand. Several roads have been wrecked and innocent investors have lost their money. Confidence has been shaken in railroad securities so that they are