| Show i THROWING OFF THE MASK I I Save us from our friends is a t trite expression and has received a new illustration The Republican paper I I over the way has cast aside all the i pretensions and protests of the Republican I Re-publican convention and Its Republican I Republi-can president and the prayers of the I reverend gentlemen officiating as chaplains and defends the proposition that it is a partisan convention for a partisan purpose All that The Herald and other opponents op-ponents of partisanship in the con rention have said on that question is denounced as humbug On that assumption as-sumption the prayers against partisanship par-tisanship in the conventionwere humbug hum-bug The nonpartisan utterances of resident John Henry Smith also must have been humbug The statement that there was any purpose of sequr ng a nonpartisan convention is declared de-clared to be an insult to the public intel igence 1 If the partisan character of the con rentlon under Republican auspices had been honestly avowed there would not have been so much room for the indignation in-dignation that has been expressed at the manner in which affairs have been thus far conducted But after praying to God Almighty that there might be no partisanship in the conduct of the convention after the official expressions expres-sions from the presidential chair that there was to be no partisanship the I course pursued was so flagrantly inconsIstent In-consIstent with those plus and presidential presi-dential avowals that such comments as have been made have been but mild and gentle protests compared with what was deserved The inference to be drawn from our neighbors openmouthed confession is that the purpose and design were to have a strictly partisan convention and all that praying and preaching to the contrary were a preposterous humbug We hope the Republican President and Republican majority will understand that this declaration is not ours but their organs and that they will swallow it with as good grace as they expect their Democratic associates as-sociates to swallow the discourtesies which have been dealt out to them Our contemporary as usual has avery i a-very bad memory that is the most I charitable way to treat its assertion I that Nothing was heard from Democrats of nonpartisanship until It had become be-come a settled fact that the Republicans Republi-cans would control the convention Everybody familiar with the facts knows that The Herald voicing the views of the Democratic party pleaded for a nonpartisan convention and constitution before the Republican part had taken any steps toward the campaign The first movement of the latter through its chairman Charles Crane was to combat the idea and to announce that the election and convention con-vention must be a Republican affair The Democratic party in its convention conven-tion declared for nonpartisanship It was only after that idea had been rejected re-jected that efforts were made to elect Democratic delegates to frame the constitution We have been expecting that our erratic er-ratic neighbor would put its foot in it considering its present condition It hasdone so now with a vengeance In addition to the blunder we have quoted above it says we complain because be-cause the Republicans have the control con-trol of the committees in point of numbers num-bers That is as untrue as its other remarks We concede that the majority ma-jority in the convention will necessarily neces-sarily have the majority of the committees com-mittees in point of numbers And if it was to be understood that the whole business is a partisan affair we would have had no complaints about the chairmanships or the grouping of the members into classes according to party Our whole contention lias been founded on the avowals of Republicans Republi-cans as to nonpartisanship in the convention con-vention It has been conducted on a partisan basis in complete contradic I tion of those avowals Now if the mask is tQ be thrown off the Democrats Demo-crats whQ have not yet assumed any partisan attitude will know exactly what to do But we warn the Hepubhcan manipulators man-ipulators of the convention for partisan parti-san purposes that they will have to be careful about intruding partisan provisions in the instrument which is iI i > I to be passed upon by the people Unless I Un-less they want to wreck the whole statehood vessel let them avoid the rocks of partisanship in the waters of their constitutional legislation or the ship of state will go to pieces before it is fairly launched |
