Show OGDEn POLITICS1 in Impartial History of the Junction City From a Social and Political Standpoint The Different Clans That Form the Commonwealth of the InterMountain Inter-Mountain Junction The Rise of the Liberal Party and Its Struggles Against the Baling Power By Leo Halfcll The political history of Ogden City is an epitome a concentrated quintessence of the politics of Utah Territory Has it never occurred to any one before the present writing that Ogden is the Junction City not only in a railroad geographical sense but in a far deeper sense in a psychological and social signification Indeed she is the minutely min-utely representative microcosmas of the largely developed inacrocosmas of the entirebasin the waters of which Dow t and the mountain ramparts of which encircle en-circle the Dead Sea of the New World a crcle dead sea with shores the loveliest For thirty and odd years Ogden has occupied a phenomenal position I appears strange that at its very inception it was far more business than religion worldly interest rather than selfsacrificing faith that reared the stakes of the first tents and hollowed the foundations of the first humble huts Well it was then already a junction it was the key that on one side opened the door to the uninhabitable but not hopelessly sterile valley bottoms and on the other offered an exit to and a connection with the world abroad Doth to the settled east and the settling west No railroad ramifications were then thought of except in the ever fertile brain of Brigham Young the town building Kadmus of this age who appears ap-pears to have at an early date ap the manifest destiny of this location endowed en-dowed so richly by nature and blessed by natures God Still in her infancy in her childhood and in her virginal maidenhood Ogden remained a Mormon town having her share of nonbelievers in all but universal church but being perturbed by only a few spasmodic echoes trom the occasional mutinied and separatist sepa-ratist movements in the body of the church such a the Morrisito heterodoxy and the Godbeite reform Ogdens situation on the overland route not only east and west but also north and south soon developed her trade Stores became more numerous and visits from strangers more frequent often extending into prolonged sojournS and eventually crystalizing info permanent settlement Then Ogden had settement many wooers for her favors especially when the iron horse brought the innumerable caravans car-avans of outsiders many of whom grasped with eagerness the favorable and smilingly inviting opportunity of becoming becom-ing insiders at least l in a social sense and on the nonsectarian platform of commerce All such were made wecome with that openhanded readiness which distinguishes this community as tho most cosmopolitan of the beehives of DCS ere t I is not the writers task or desire to follow the course of events in political life in all its personal rainutiaj and parti zan strifes The object of this is averse to any such effort But it must bo admitted ad-mitted that at an early dato in the history his-tory of Ogden City l which ccteri82 > uribus means also Weber county two great elements arose with individual pregnancy and independent poignancy namely the homespun nativeborn rural agricultural conservatism represented represent-ed by Lorin Farr and the more cultured imported civic and polit ical progression established by Franklin Frank-lin D Richards Both of these two men had not only I large families of intelligent offspring making successively and successfully their mark in the community com-munity the ones more in the practical every day avenues of life the others the others rather in tho higher but no less arduous walks of official capacity but they also had at once the fortune and the misfortune of being surrounded admired ad-mired and upheld by numbers of camp followers and friends whose zeal for their individual condottieri blinded them against the fact that the two leaders themselves were following one and the same flag were likening to one and the same word of supreme command only interpreted by each according to his personal per-sonal bent of mind and the innate inclination nation of his own unbending and unyielding unyield-ing nature Thus the union of mind among the leaders did not always succeed in squelching the fire of jealousy between the hosts of followers and the first political politi-cal dissensions if it is right to call a mole hill by a mountains name originated origi-nated from the very bosom of what was at an early day called the Peoples party thus giving the lie to the oftmade assertion as-sertion that slavish submission and blind subservience submission are all of a Mormons Mor-mons politics Bnt real politics such as understood in the vernacular of American public life only come into play when the Liberal party commenced play struggle against 1 supposed overweening over-weening usurpation of public power by an alleged prestly class Ogden then resounded with the patriotic eloquence of a Maxwell and Baskin but the effect was epheweral As a rule only the apos aps tates and a few Gentiles mostly not of the heavy taxpaying kind received the new message The Peoples party remained re-mained secure in its eeUpoised all but unanimity until the campaign of Allen G Campbell By this time or rather for a few year previous there had come to Ogden a strong influx weighty men over from Corinne such a Kiesel Gold bery Adams the Kuhns Harkness Me Nutt and others who rapidly built up the town especially Fourth street and soon conquered for themselves a front jrank They took the first really determined de-termined party stand in 1881 the election man uvcrs in 1879 having been betrayed a day or two before the municipal February election and fizzled out in a fiasco no less ludicious than lamentable as witness the columns of the Junction of that day for the former and the pages of the Freeman for the latter But in 1887 the Liberals to not 1 small fraction liquor dealers to tell the truth made their influence felt in a strong degree by throwing their weight for what was then called the Meick side against the Farr factioi i lit I municipal election out of which Lester J Herrick issued as Mayor for the hart time had been preceded by some bitter hostilities among the Peoples party men themselves in the course of which acerbities were indulged in which are better shrouded in the discreet cloak of oblivion The February of 1883 however how-ever found the two great political parties the Peoples and the Liberals arrayed together or rather against each other in a fiercely martial array It was the first really determined municipal contest in a Utah community and the eyes of the friends and wellwishers of either side were eagerly looking toward Ogden In this contest the Peoples party pat forth its best strength or rather such of that element as could best reconcile the various individual predilections and give least offense to the most pronounced prejudices of so heterogeneous a population popula-tion as even the Mormon half of Ogden has turned out to be in some things where personal likes and dislikes will crop out over all discipline barriers Q H Peer was the standardbearer of the Peoples party while J S Lewis headed the Liberal Lib-eral rank and file Both were tolid representative rep-resentative honest prudent a prominent promi-nent men ot unspotted person I c arac ter Tho sam applied prae > whole t the other candidates for comrr R l preferment pre-ferment The Peoples party u Jncd the victory but the Liberals werr ony de fet not conquered I Again they entered tho arena in 1883 both strengthened with new accessions I and old topes D A Poesy again carr car-r v ried aloft the Peoples party standard while F Kiesel was the guiding star of the Liberals I was a tough tussle Each party brought out what there was in it of manhood and brains argument and blandishment influence and promise The election was the ovent of tho season for all Utah Ogden was the bulwark of Mormon control bf f local politics it also was the goal of Liberal patriotic ambition am-bition Earnest and potential was the struggle and its result astonished both sides The relative fighting strength of the two parties was shown by the result to be five to four and once more the helm of the Ship of State remained in the hands of tho old ruling party Overall these vital contests family feelings and family feuds became obliterated The last great contest for the ascend ency in Ogdens municipal control is still fresh in everyones memory I was the city election of 1887 February This time the Peoples party selected another head of the ticket David Eccles an Alderman in the previous administration administra-tion while the Liberals were confident in their trust in Fred J Kiesel who had once before led them so gallantly to the fray and front and even after defeat effected a proud retreat with flying colors Never before in the history Utah had a public event so engrossed the general mind a did that campaign in which the press and the pulpit all through the Territory took a more or less direct interest Excellent tickets had been made the Liberal decidedly a little in the advantage Tho canvass of votes had been scrupulously and sedulously careful Even the lame l the halt and the blind were mustered out and for hours on the momentous day betting was alternately reckless and still yet after all again the eagle of triumph pushed on the Peoples party banners although the Liberals had good reason to feel proud over the result of their unpreccdentedly energetic endeavors to snatch victory from the teeth of Fate a their increase of votinc strength relatively exceeded that of their victorious opponents Thus from the first administration up to the present one the management of Ogdens public affairs has been in the hands of the Peoples party What it will be in the future is written in the Sibyls lost books One thing is certain That thetwo great parties are approach inc each other in rapid aggregation Tho victors of yesterday may well remember the victory of Pyrrhus One more such and I am lost At any rate the growing interest in public affairs and polity will accelerate tho benign blessings bless-ings of peace progress and plenty |