scandal that constituted the “past” has been publicly known; in other cases it has been hushed up and lost in a maze of rumor. In at least one case it was made the special property of a syndicate of men who, while protecting the official from public knowledge, compelled him to pay rather stiffly for their service. Men with a “past” are not uncommon, and it is not always the “past” but the concealment of it that concerns them most, and in this lack of frankness, this distrust of the understanding and mercy of the people, they usually fall into another slavery, namely, the slavery of political or financial blackmail.
- “We will manipulate the election of Presidents whose past contains some undisclosed dark affair, some ‘Panama,’ then they will be faithful executors of our orders from fear of exposure and from the natural desire of every man who has attained a position of authority to retain the privileges, emoluments and the dignity associated with the position of President.”
The use of the word “Panama” here refers to the various scandals which arose in French political circles over the original efforts to construct the Panama Canal. If the present form of the Protocols had been written at a later date they might have referred to the “Marconi wireless” scandals in England—though on second thought, they would not have done so because certain men were involved who were not Gentiles. Herzl, the great Jewish Zionist leader, uses the expression in “The Jewish State.” Speaking of the management of the business of Palestine he says that the Society of the Jews “will see to it that the enterprise does not become a Panama but a Suez.” That the same expression should occur in Herzl and in the Protocols is significant; it has also another significance, which will be described at another time. It must be clear to the reader, however, that no one writing for the general public at this day would refer to a “Panama” in a man’s past. The reference would not be understood.
It is this practice of holding a man under obligation which makes it needful on the part of the true publicist to tell the truth and the whole truth about aspirants for public office. It is not enough to say of a candidate
