Hon. Chester H. Aldrich: Governor of Nebraska

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Hon. CHESTER H. ALDRICH, Governor of Nebraska
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Hon. Chester H. Aldrich, Governor of Nebraska
A Few of the Things Championed by Governor Aldrich, Many of Them Forced Through a Legislature by Him, Others Made into Law During His Administration.

He was leader of the most progressive Legislature of Nebraska—that of 1907.  Author of the Railway Commission Law, the first effective law regulating railways in the state.  This law also regulates sleeping car companies, telephone and telegraph companies.  When attacked by the railways in the Federal Courts, Governor Aldrich appeared as special counsel on behalf of the state and his law was sustained.

Author of the Aldrich Freight Rate Law, a law compelling lower freight rates.  During the first three years operation of the law there was a saving to the people of Nebraska of $7,500,000.00.

He led in the fight that brought a 25 per cent reduction in express rates in the state, which has saved the people more than $60,000.00 a year since.

He led in the fight for the passage of the two-cent passenger fare law which won.

He was retained by the Nebraska Railway Commission to assist in the conduct of the grain rate inquiry which brought about a reduction in freight rates on grain of from 25% to 60%.

He drafted the Nebraska Pure Food Law, a more stringent law than the national law.

He drafted a law prohibiting the sale of intoxicating liquors within two miles of any military post.

He drafted the Nebraska Primary Election Law, Employers' Liability Law and Child Labor Law.

He pushed the Anti-Pass Law through the Legislature.

He advocated County Local Option.

He had passed, while Governor, an Initiative and Referendum Law, and a law to suppress the White Slave Traffic.

He enthusiastically supported in speeches the Canadian Reciprocity Measure before the National Congress.

He vetoed the Telephone Merger Bill.

He has done more than any other man to put Nebraska in the very van of Progressive States.

He was elected Governor against the combined opposition of the railroads and big corporations.


Lecture Subjects

Progressive Citizenship
A Twentieth Century Republic
The Philosophy of an Education




A Brief Sketch Copied from a Recent Issue of The Nebraska State Journal:
CHESTER H. ALDRICH, Governor of Nebraska, is a hustler.  He came to this state only twenty-three years ago and is now not only Governor, but he holds the championship belt for the largest number of veto messages distributed to members of the Legislature.  Not a single veto was overriden, and there were fifteen of them from which the Legislators might have picked a weak one if there was one of that kind.  Soon he will go back to Ohio, his native state, to make a speech at a college commencement and he proposes to tell his old Ohio friends what a great thing the direct primary is for the people in the selection of candidates and adoption of constitutional amendments.  He was nominated for Governor at a primary election.

Governor Aldrich has been so busy since he was born in 1862 near Pierpont, Ashtabula County, Ohio, that he has not had time to tell all he has done.  That is left for others to do.  His parents not being millionaires he was obliged to work at frequent intervals or starve.  He puttered around in the public schools and colleges, finally winding up in the Ohio State University and that institution graduated him with an A. B. degree in 1888.  He wisely decided to remove to Nebraska.  For two years he was called professor by the people of Ulysses because he was principal of the high school at that place.  School teaching was too slow for him so he studied law with a view of giving vent to the belligerency that welled up in him.  He was admitted to the bar and removed to David City and set the pace for lawyers not only in that part of the state but from the world at large.  As a reward of merit he was allowed to come to the Legislature in 1907, having been elected a member of the State Senate.  This was his first public office of any consequence and here it was that he rubbed up against the ablest bunch of Senators ever assembled in Nebraska Legislative halls, and he more than held his own.

Governor Aldrich will admit it if you ask him that he was the author of the railway commission law and nearly all of the big measures of that session.  He is the author of the Aldrich freight rate law, a law which did not wait for the railway commission to reduce rates, but which reduced them at one fell swoop.  As a progressive and a reformer in a reform Legislature, none outdid Governor Aldrich.  He had no idea at that time that in four short years he would sidetrack Governor Shallenberger, pound Mayor Jim Dahlman into the soft political earth and become Governor of the great state of his adoption.  But he did and did it on a county option platform, with 15,000 votes to spare.  During that campaign he often delivered ten speeches a day and the people cried for more.  It is recalled that there was once an Aldrich in the United States Senate, and it is sometimes hinted that there may some day be another—of course of an entirely different kind.




GOVERNOR ALDRICH has long been known as one of the greatest orators of the West and has been in constant demand for addresses on special occasions.  His ability as an orator helped materially in his winning the election as governor of his state during an election that was elsewhere a Democratic landslide.


Press and Personal Mention

As a Statesman.

Omaha Daily News
—We dub Senator Aldrich the big stick of the Senate.  Since the passage of his fifteen per cent reduction freight rate bill, on last Saturday, he comes very near being the Roosevelt of Nebraska.  Surely his record in the Legislature is one of which any man might well be proud.


Lincoln—Senator C. H. Aldrich, author of the railway commission bill and the Aldrich law reducing commodity freight rates in Nebraska by fifteen per cent, has been retained by the Nebraska railway commission to assist in the conduct of the grain rate inquiry now in progress.  Nominally, Senator Aldrich is to be assistant counsel to Attorney General Thompson for the state.  Actually, he will have charge of the showing to be made in behalf of the grain rate schedules proposed by the commission, which reduce the charges now in effect within Nebraska from nine to eighteen per cent on the terminal tariffs to the Missouri river and from twenty-five to sixty per cent on distance tariffs.  Inasmuch as Senator Aldrich took a leading part in the reform enactments of the last Legislative session, his selection is regarded as an exceedingly fit one for the purpose in view.  He arrived from David City this forenoon and was present at the hearing of the Burlington-Great Northern protest against the forthcoming reduction in grain rates—
Editorially in Evening Daily News.


Hastings—Did you ever stop to figure the savings to the people of this state brought about by the Aldrich freight rate law?  The first month after the law went into operation the total amount of freight paid by the people of this state was $1,247,585.85.  Under the old rate it would have been $1,467,000.00—a saving of $220,000 for the first month or about $2,500,000.00 for the first year.  The law will soon have been in operation for three years, making an approximate saving to the people of Nebraska of $7,500,000.00.  This saving to the people is the direct result of the workings of Senator Aldrich's freight bill that became a law in 1907.  Senator Aldrich was one of the leaders in the fight that brought about the reduction of twenty-five per cent in express rates, and this has saved to the people approximately $60,000 every year since it took effect.  He was also a leader in the battle that resulted in a two-cent passenger fare in this state—
Journal.



As an Orator and Lecturer
David City—You make no mistake in securing the Governor as a Chautauqua lecturer.  I have been in the Chautauqua business a good many years and was secretary of the David City Chautauqua for a long time and have heard all sorts and kinds of talent and I know that Governor Aldrich measures up with any of them and is far superior to a great many.  He has a fine presence, a splendid voice, and is a finished orator with a splendid command of the English language.—L. B. Fuller.


Alma—The closing number of the Junior Normal Lecture Course was given by Senator C. H. Aldrich.  The Senator gave a rousing chapel talk on Friday, and in the evening spoke at the Opera House on the subject, A Twentieth Century Republic.  The address was true to the saying, the best is kept till the last.  The Senator vividly described the events and conditions that have resulted in giving us the ideal democracy—a government of the people, by the people and for the people.  This was considered to be the best number in the course.  The address was well received—
Record.


York—Senator Aldrich addressed the public in the chapel room of the Business College, Sunday afternoon.  Mr. Aldrich gave a splendid address.  His topic was A Twentieth Century Republic.  The tribute to the motherhood of our land was strong sentiment of his lecture.  Mr. Aldrich is a pleasing speaker and it is to be hoped he will visit our city again soon—
Times.


Columbus—I did not hear the address of Senator Aldrich at the Columbus M. E. Church last Sunday, but friends tell me it was a good talk in favor of good government.  I heard one man say that a candidate for Governor should not do a church stunt during his campaign.  Why not?  Aldrich has made church talks before.  Why should he quit making such talks, simply because he is a candidate?  If a man has any good message to carry to men, he should get busy with the message.  In campaign times or any other times, I rather like the courage of Senator Aldrich.  It takes courage for a public man to be active in church work.  Some cynic is always standing by to charge such a man with insincere motives, and a weak man will sometimes so fear the scorn of the cynic that he will fail to do his own part in good works in order to escape the sting of that scorn.—
Telegram (Democratic.)