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Show Confession of an Eltction Thlf. "When ihe devil was sick, the devil a saint would be; when the devil got well a devil of a saint J was he.". So runs the old couplet, of which we are reminded re-minded by the story which comes from St. Louis. v CoL, Ed Butler, sick over the wiping out of the Democratic majority in Missouri, has been confessing confess-ing his political sins. Col. Butler says and nobody will dispute his statement who knows anything of political methods in Missouri that he has been stealing elections from the Republicans for thirty years. The doughty Colonel then declared that he intends to quit, which is another story and one that will not be accepted so readily. Elections in St. Louis, where Col. Butler has flourished, have been notoriously corrupt for years. With all its noted conservativism in business and social affairs, with all its record of integrity in the business world, St. Louis has swallowed more in the way of political thievery than any city in the country. That the Republicans have been the victims vic-tims in the main i3 only incidental. One accidental Republican victory in that city failed to cure the evil and it appeared to be merely a case of which set of political thieves held the offices. The State of Missouri, with its big Democratic majority, stood by to back up the St. Louis thieves in all State elections, until Joseph W. Folk, a brave young man and an honest one, captured the Democratic Demo-cratic nomination for Governor. He made a campaign cam-paign against boodling and election thieving and was elected, but Missouri, awakened to the evil swept out the whole Democratic regime and gave its electoral vote for the first time in its history to the Republican nominee for President. The confession of Butler, who has been known as fbe chief manipulator of elections in St. Louis, is not news, but only serves to "point a moral and adorn a tale." But will he reform? Will he not, at the first favorable opportunity, resume his old trade and tricks? It is a safe bet that he will be "a devil of a saint" when he gets well. |