We certainly have a right to see to it that neither Dr. Cook nor Mr. Peary are treated as though they were the scum of the earth. Dr. Cook has brought charges against Mr. Peary as a Naval officer. He still brings these charges, and he should be made to prove them. Peary, an officer of the Navy, has brought charges against Cook and he should be made to prove them.
Mr. Peary is an officer of our navy, drawing an old age pension. His position is such that he cannot ignore Dr. Cook's open charges. He is honor bound to protect the good name of this great country by asking an investigation of these charges. To remain silent, is to stand to be branded as the arch-degenerate of our day. Don't forget it was he who opened up the mud batteries and caused this undignified controversy.
No honorable man can allow such open charges of gross immorality as Dr. Cook preferred against Mr. Peary in his telegram to President Taft. These have been printed in magazines and newspapers as well as appearing in Dr. Cook's books, now in the sixtieth thousand edition.
Here in Illinois press stories of improper conduct implicating Lieutenant-Governor Barrett O'Hara were circulated and he immediately asked the state legislature to investigate them. The legislature appointed a committee that took testimony and reported these stories were groundless and false.
Is a retired Admiral less important in the eyes of the world than the Lieutenant-Governor of Illinois, or has the "old tar" taken an immunity bath?
Are we any farther along than were those who put Columbus in chains and stoned the Prophets and nailed the Christ to the Cross? Are we so engrossed in the material things that all questions of honor are of no concern to us?
It is true that the bar of public opinion is the court of last resort in a real democracy, but it is equally true that it is essential to see that the source of public opinion be not polluted. Should our school children be taught that Peary discovered the Pole if Dr. Cook was there first?
Senator Robert M. LaFollette says: "You can't buy, you can't subsidize the Lyceum. At least, it never has been done. The Press has been subsidized. Papers and magazines which were printing the bad records of public officials and political parties have, in many instances, been forced out of the field or silenced. Special privilege organized as a System has its own press.
But the Lyceum platform is free. Really, I sometimes think that, from the days of Wendell Phillips to now, the Lyceum has pretty nearly been the salvation of the country."
The Lyceum and the Chautauqua have given Dr. Cook a fair hearing, and it is now a matter of National pride that when the press was silent or hostile, Congress indifferent, the Chautauqua, the one distinctively American institution, gave him an honest, impartial hearing.