OCR Text |
Show I How the "News" Elected the American I Council. M Truth feels to give honor where M honor is due. For that reason it is H; impelled to announce to its readers M that the, Dcscrct News elected a suf- M ficient number of "American" party H i councilmcn to give to that party con- M trol of the city council for years to M This fact can be demonstrated be- H yond the peradventure of a doubt. H Everybody familiar with the situ- M i ation knows that on Tuesday after- M noon there was a large "waiting" H vote that republicans and democrats H had not been able to get out; the H "American" vote was out early. This H waiting vote was composed of Mor- H mons who were ready to vote for M cither Plummcr nor Morris which- H ever they were advised was the H stronger to beat Bransford; and of H Gentile republicans who wanted to H vote for Plummcr but were so im- H bucd with anti-Mormon sentiment H that they were watching to sec if the H Mormons slumped to a Mormon H democrat, Morris, in which event H their chief thought was to "get even" h by supporting the anti-Mormon M ticket when they felt their own party M would fail. This "waiting" vote ag- M grcgatcd fully 5000 at 3 p. m. Tucs- M The situation was further accentual accentu-al atcd in this respect by the frequent Ml announcement front democratic hcad-M hcad-M quarters, "wait till you see the M News." Along Brokers' Row, over M an hour before the News appeared, M it was stated freely that that paper M would come out with the declaration M' of democratic gains, though it could fl have no means of knowing anything B about it and thus affect the result. M This report was the chief promoter M of the Morris sentiment in the bct-M bct-M ting on Brokers' Row Tuesday after-V after-V noon. The News came tint as schc-M schc-M dulcd. M "Fcattuc democratic gains," said M the News in a big, bold heading. H "Democratic Gains," it announced in H capital letters in its front page poli- B tical article. The Third municipal M ward was going "almost unanimous- M ly'' for the democratic ticket, it said 1 in its article. Yet at that same moment mo-ment the democratic ticket was trailing trail-ing far behind in the Third, and even when it secured the benefit of hundreds hun-dreds of votes turned to it by the H, "News" announcement, Morris pulled H through with a paltry hundred plural- H M The democratic leaders were ready M for action. They had been prepared M in advance for the News' announcc- M ment. To every clecton district in M the city they telephoned that the H , News had declared that the demo- M crats were making great gains, and M consequently the republicans were M going to pieces. They supplemented B this by buying up extra copies of the m News and rushing these around by m automobile to the polling places, M 1 where the paper wis used effectively. The republican workers sought to s'em the tide, but in vain. It is safe to say that after the News came out, the republican ticket got practically no votes probably not more than 500 out of the waiting 5000. On seeing the News," the Mormon voters who had been waiting cast their votes for the democratic ticket. It is susceptible of proof that more than a thousand such voters who were expecting to vote for Plummcr Plum-mcr were diverted to Morris in the vain hope of beating the "Americans." "Ameri-cans." By this slump of Mormon voters, Callistcr, republican, was defeated de-feated in the Third, and Cowburn, democrat, elected. By the same thing, Bennett, republican, was defeated de-feated in the Fourth, although Maxwell, Max-well, democrat, who never was within with-in cannon shot of the winning post, did not get enough votes to elect him. No wonder Ashby Snow told the "News" next day that the paper had been "fair." It enabled him to gain one democratic councilman, Cow-burn. Cow-burn. Docs anyone but a fool suppose sup-pose that Ashby Snow or the democrats demo-crats would have used the News as a campaign document if it actually had been fair if it had not been em phatically beneficial to. the democrats? demo-crats? Nit. Mayor Bransford also thanked the News. Why shouldn't he? It helped him; for the slump it caused was a two-edged sword. Those thousands of republicans whose sentiment is unfriendly to the Mormon people were as quick, or quicker, to take the hint than even the Mormons themselves. As soon as the News came out, they got down to action. A leader among them declared, de-clared, "As the Mormons are going to Morris because he is a Mormon, we will give them some of their own medicine, and elect Bransford." The "American" leaders wctc not slow to take advantage of this; they had been prepared by the Brokers' Row report, re-port, and by democratic committee promises. The word was passed everywhere, "The Mormons arc rushing rush-ing to Morris; Gentiles get together." togeth-er." And they got. Thus the New's action drove hundreds of voters in each municipal ward to the "American "Ameri-can ' ticket. The net result of this in the Second Sec-ond was the drawing away of hundreds hun-dreds of votes fromi Currie and Smith on the fusion ticket, and giving them to Wood and Raybould, "American" "Am-erican" candidates. By its action the News directly elected the "American" "Ameri-can" ticket in the Second, and gave the City Council into the hands of the "American" party. By similar effects in the Fourth, it gave Stewart, "American," votes by which to overthrow Bennett's lead. The News was the direct means of electing three "American" council-men council-men Wood, Raybonld and Stewart. Without these the "Americans" would have had only six members in the council, while the other parties would have had nine, instead of the : averse, as now. On the general ticket, Morris gained more than a thousand votes from Plummcr, in the manner stated; and Bransford gained from Plummer many more than a thousand votes. Truth does not attempt to figure how close the result would have been on the general ticket, but for the- News. A is sufficient to know with absolute certainty that the News gave the "American" party its majority in the next city council. We do not charge that the News did this with any knavish intent; we think not. But there arc occasions when the action of a fool is quite as disastrous to other people as it would be were he a knave. Whether in or out of politics, those people who are responsible for the News ought to inject into its cranium crani-um some political sense. In the present pres-ent case it deserves all it will get as the result of an "Amrican" majority in the city council, for which it is directly responsible. |