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Show SPRY'S IMPOSSIBLE DENIAL. If avoidance is confession, then Governor Gov-ernor Spry has confessed that Smoot made the remark attributed to him, to one standing by him. that the launching of the battleship Utah on December 23rd was a happy coincidonco with the anniversary of the birth of the prophet Joseph Smith. Governor Spry is quoted in the News last night-as saying: This report circulated by the n,rops that tfcimtor uccd Smoot made a speech saying say-ing that II was a llttlnf.- tribute to tho momorv of I lie Prophet .Joseph Smith tb have the. battleship launched on the :in-nlvenmrv :in-nlvenmrv of hl.s birth whs all nonsense. Senator Smoot made no such remark nor anything' like It. The story caused somo comment, but I take great pleasure In denying' It. Now there has been no report circulated circu-lated by the press, so far as wo have soon, that- Smoot made : a- speech say-ing say-ing that it- was a fitting tributo to the memory of the Prophet Joseph Smith that the battleship was launched on tho anniversary of his birth. Nobody has ever claimed, so far as we know, that Smoot made a speech at all on that occasion. But when tho Governor proceeds pro-ceeds to say that "Smoot made no such remark nor anything like it" we con-cludo con-cludo that he is still referring to the speech. If he means to say that without with-out making a speech, Smoot made no such remark I lion it must be replied that evidently ihc Governor didn't hear what Smoot said. Nobody has said that he heard it; but in denying that Smoot jinado such a remark, Spry must make 'the claim that he heard everything that Smoot said to anybody upon that occasion, oc-casion, which is not supposablc. Tho DcHcret News, 'true to its malevolent malevo-lent traditions, says that it was a Tribune story. Yet Governor Spry evidently evi-dently saw it in tho Eastern press. It was a story telegraphed to The Tribune Trib-une by our Washington correspondent. The Tribune printed it simply us a matter of uews. The Tribune still believes be-lieves it to be true. Our Washington correspondent, it appears, got it from Ihc Washington Post. If it is an-paper's an-paper's story, it is tho Washington Post's story; and we know of no reason why tho Washington Post should have misrepresented Smoot in this matter, nor do we believe for one moncnt that it did. |