ancis Bellamy is right. Every impartial person does want the kind of
Nationalism Nationalists are after, as soon as their minds are
disabused of this foolish talk about military despotism, and helpless
subordination, etc., for every one can see that it works for the
liberty, equality, and welfare of all.

Misinformed, is the word for Mr. Savage. For if he had kept but one
eye on this world, as Humboldt said every well regulated chameleon and
priest is in the habit of doing, he would have known that every word
of this "No. 3," above quoted, is exactly wrong: To wit: The other
kind of Nationalism, which is not military despotism, has not only
been definitely talked about but definitely put in practice, not only
in the New York Fire Department, but in our schools, roads, canals,
waterworks, post-office, and in many other ways the world over! And
never ("hardly ever") has monopoly been able to recover its chance to
tyrannize and rob!

"No definite talk"! Yet our present Postmaster-General is asking
Congress for the postal telegraph; and the Interstate Commerce Law is
to be made practical to head off the People's Party? Let Mr. Savage
pick up the very same August ARENA which contains his article, and
read the clear and definite articles of _C. Wood Davis_, "Should the
Nation own the Railways?" and of _R. B. Hassell_, on "Money at Cost,"
and then tell the Editor with a straight face that _they_ are not
"clear enough to be clearly discussed!" The facts, laws, and arguments
are definitely _there_, and clearly discussed. Why have we not the
discerning eyes and impartial brains of Mr. Savage to read them?

We ask Mr. Savage to bring such eyes and brains to bear, and we defy
him to show any other plan by which the fatal monopolies, which are
_natural_ or _beyond_ competition, can be usefully and safely checked,
controlled, or destroyed. The attempts to do this by legal
prosecutions have notoriously failed. How to replace monopolies and
yet increase the benefits they have conferred is _the_ question of our
age, and Nationalism answers it. Mr. Savage, as we have shown, admits
the difficulty. We are entitled then to a practical answer, or to
silence. Ridicule, however witty, is neither answer nor remedy.

But instead of silence we have his amusing "fourth and lastly,"
thus:--

"4. Nationalism, as commonly understood, could mean nothing else but
the tyranny of the commonplace."

The way in which Nationalism is _commonly_ unders