Show THE OGDEN controversy ROVERS Y now is the winter of agdens discontent that is discontent prevails there it is lindly baldly general enough in its character or compass to ta be considered a lapal trouble troubie but should rather be regarded as the dissatisfaction of a portion of the population A number of gentleman who delight in ia being beine called liberals are opposed to the division of the city into wards as provided by toe the city council pursuant to the law on en that subject enacted by the late legislature they were opposed to the enumeration of inhabitants which formerly lOrmer lv took place also pai pui pursuant saint to the law they were opposed to the last c city t election going as it did aid and in short seems disposed to be sati sai isrie with no bobbing ing tuat that is in these regards th they appear to be more pessimistic and intractable than their brethren elsewhere in the territory A few days ago mr C B hays of the junction applied to and obtained from the first district court coat t an alternative writ of mandamus to compel registrar corey to place him hays on the rolls as an elector of the second district of that municipality this the official had refused to do but proffered his services to the extent of enrolling the applicant as an elector at large of course this was not satisfactory not being within the terms of the ordinance clawy passed governing the subject benee the petition to the halls balls of justice for alleged relief we say alleged advisedly for to even the casual observer the tha transparency of the whole proceeding must be plainly discernible A striking peculiarity in connection with the proc proceeding eeling is the attitude of the registrar himself if he had no authority to enter the app applicant llant as from the second avard what right in law had he to enter him at all he fie is not a court of review and cannot determine the abe question whet whether tier or not a law that has become such in accordance cor dance with the customary forms borins including the actual sanction of the territorial executive and the implied sanction of the national congress is valid the process by which it became law was formal enough and solemn enough surely even for an official holding an appointment indirectly from the government itself in announcing noun cing his willingness to perform the duties of registrar for a district not provided provide d for or contemplated by law he be virtually ignored the law or pronounced it t a nullity a 4 performance which W we hardly deem within toe scope of fis Is official functions it can scarcely be urged in his behalf that a as there othere are officers at large to be voted for the fayeg marshal marsh ai treasurer and recorder his proffer extended only to aiding the applicant to vote for these without the design of conferring con authority to vote forward for ward officers in the wards where was he to vote if not in his ward and now how could he vote there it if not registered there the only registering places and the only po polling ila places provided for are to b be el in u the respect tive wards wardi and being registered there is being registered generally the balloting for city officers and for forward ward officers effic ers taking place in the same operation the only logi call deduction from froin this is that the officer acts as a partisan in the pretended ful fal a in which lieis keis supposed to no parties parses and to exercise only perfunctory jurisdiction of course all this Is to test teat the ordinance of course the object in testing it is not to em eienor enor improve it anywhere but to kill it and of course thirdly the design in killing it ft is not pro bow bono publico but the consummation and maintenance maintenance of liberal interests to the exclusion of other considerations the fact that liberal attorneys appear tor the petitioner that liberal attorneys were engaged tor for the cespon dent that the whole thing was engendered in the liberal comp camp and was to be engineered and concluded by Liber alsis a pretty fair illustration of itself that the bewer aud and pelt pelf resulting from the gaining ol of the offices Is what is aimed at and in an admission that under the law as it has been all along and as it is now they were and are unable to win and here another ridiculous feature of their conduct appears they were dissatisfied with the old law bt cause as they claimed it gave them coshow no show to win and want paiit the new law aane away with because it permits them to wi win n about in proportion to the ir strength and the old law to be rc restored that would of course be tte result of sue suc casa c ass in their present movement and it does seem as though nothing short of abject and complete surrender on the part of their po political opponents would be satisfactory at all this of course is not net to be thought of As a minority party they are provided for under under the new ordinance something which majorities jn in politics rarely concede and the proper plan one would think after so mul much h gained would be to take it and thereafter do as parties elsewhere do increase their voting strength by conversions from the other side by natural growth and by immigration and in tais manner become themselves the majority the democrats of vermont have practically had no na hand in the forma tion of the laws by which they were and are controlled for more than a generation it if they ever lid did yet they maintain their organization put forth their nominations tor for each election and vote for them as cheerfully as though they expected to win know ins fall well that they will not until providence intervenes and yet they accept the inevitable grEe gracefully fully there is no hatching batching up of legal schemes by means of which unrecognized advantages may be obtained far from it and what is true of vermont is true of many other states dozens of cities and hundreds of sections in the united states only in many of them the preponderance as between the parties is the other way seldom do we hear of ef trouble of a serious character over it except where fraud is practiced or charged why should a rule which obtains everywhere else la in the union be so distasteful to our northern neighbors perhaps the most untenable if not stultifying position taken by the ogden liberals Libers iq i iq tb claim of gerrymandering man dering that Is the arrange arrangement meat of the population by geographical division such inch as masses the liberals in one ward by themselves and thus leaves all the others sure for the people A survey of the plat of the new apportionment falls fails to bear this out there are five wards and the population in round numbers is or about 2000 to a ward A portion of the city that nearest the centre is tolerably densely populated but becomes less so as t the e outskirts are rp reached ached thus a division that would be equal in point of territory would not be so with respect to population and vice versa the only plan then that could properly be adopted was to make due dite allowance for both by striking an average and making each of the thickly peopled wards as large in latitudes latitude as possible without having many more than its quota of the people and the outside ones to nave have as many people as possible without making their ward t too bulky As the city is divided by squares it would be awkward to have wards otherwise than as square as possible ble or at I 1 least it was designed irregular abat irregular overia overlapping p ing should be avoid avoided ed it bouls would be entirely impossible for toe the work to be done over and come nearer to this rule nearer to the provisions and spirit of the law two of the wards contain a little more the others a little less than 2000 souls Is not this all things considered as near an equation equation as could be reached we s should think so and the talk of shoestring districts b by the ogden liberals libe ralo should be indulged indulged in with more discrimination else it may be deemed a blow where it to is not intended there is nothing in the ogden plat remotely resembling even by the rule of at proportion and comparison a legislative district extending from pik park city to salt lake cly or from tooele thoele to somewhere in the vicinity of the weber Riv erand the peoples party create the tatter latter either they were created for them and not ot one member of that party has jet et thought or at least has not acte acted e I 1 in it the direction ot of circumventing exis existing aln 9 things |