The advocate. [volume], March 14, 1894, Page 4, Image 4

About The advocate. [volume] (Topeka, Kan.) 1894-1897

Image provided by: Kansas State Historical Society; Topeka, KS

                
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Ettwcd at the postofflcsat Topeka, Kansas, as
sensona cuui ma tier.
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 14, 1834.
Once more we venture the remark
that the United States senate is a
disgrace to the country, and that the
Populist members are about the only
caving feature in it
Tnx trouble with the republican
press of Kansas is that it don't really
know whether it is for or "agin" sil
ver coinage. It will probably find
out before the next election.
M0E3 REPUBLICAN SCELLDTJQGXRY.
There is yet some hope of saving
the good name of Kansas, since a
movement has been started looking
toward the suppression of lying cor
respondence to eastern papers.
Some editors are so unsophisticated
3 to think that the only reason the
republican party lost its 82,000 ma
jority is that they nominated the
wrong men for state officers. Let
them keep on thinking so.
Tbxbi la something wrong with Cleve
land, but hanged If we know what il is.
Who does? Kansas City Gazatte.
That's an easy one. He has joined
hands with John Sherman to carry
out the republican financial policy of
the Wall street gold-bugs.
The Kansan's hope of the future,
according to republican doctrine,
should be based on the prospect of
borrowing seme more money from
eastern investors. In other words
we are to beg loans of the money
sharks or else vacate the state.
Vest few old party men can be
converted in politics after their party
has opened an election campaign and
begun beating drums and firing
guns. This is a fact nobody will dis
pute. The time to do educational
work is before the campaign opens.
A man who knows where reform lit
erature ought to be placed and does
cot try to place it now is wasting
time. Every day that passes leaves
f ha campaign of education that much
c h ortcr. This ia a serious subject
Another Sickly Attempt to Appeal to the
Prejudices of the Old Soldiers.
Republican editors, who base their
hopes of future party success upon
appeals to the prejudices rather than
to the intelligence and the reason of
the people, never miss an opportu
nity to play upon the prejudices of
the old soldier. The last legislature
passed an act amendatory to article
23 of the general statutes of 1889 and
making certain appropriations for
the soldiers' home at Dodge City.
That act contained this section:
Inmates of this home shall not lose their
legal residence in the county from which
they oame, nor acquire any legal residence
in Ford county, Kansas, while they remain
as inmates of said home.
Although this act was passed by
the legislature in the regular way, it
was not law. Some people have been
foolish enough to think that the sen
atora and representatives sent up to
the state capital once in two years to
play law-makers really make the laws
of this state. This is a mistake. The
courts make our laws, and no aot of
the legislature is entitled to be re
garded as law until the courts have
passed upon its "constitutionality."
The expense of the sessions of the
legislature is a useless waste while
this system prevails and either the
pyatcm or the legislature or both
should be done away with.
In the case of the law in question,
as in several others of recent date,
the interests of the republican party
required that it should be declared
unconstitutional, and it has accord
irjgly been done. It came about in
this way. The county clerk of Ford
county, E. S. Crane, was a democrat
At the late election in that county,
Henry Leidigh, the republican can
didate for the office, received some
four or five votes more than his com
petitor and was given the certificate
of election on the face of the returns.
Mr. Crane, the democratic olerk,
claimed that some votes cast by in
mates of the soldiers' home were
illegal, inasmuch as the section of
the aot above quoted, provided that
the legal residence of the inmates of
the home should be in the counties
from which they came, and he there
fore refused to surrender the office.
Thereupon Mr. Leidigh instituted
mandamus proceedings in the su
preme court to obtain possession.
The supreme court held that Mr.
Crane could not act as judge in the
case, and that Mr. Leidigh was en
titled to the office by virtue of his
certificate, the theory of the Kansas
supreme court being that a certifi
cate of election ia prima facie en
dence of title to office, no matter
whether the certificate is regular or
is forged or stolen. In this decision
the question of the legality of the
votes was not passed upon, neither
was that of the constitutionality of
the law in question. The title of Mr.
Leidigh to the office, by virtue of his
certificate, was alone settled. This,
however, did not settle the dispute,
and the next move was on the demo
cratic side to test the legality of the
votes of inmates of the soldiers'
home. Among these there happened
to be one Populist and ha was ar
rested on the charge of illegal vot
ing. The case has just been decided
in the federal court at Wichita, and
the decision holds the section of the
law fixing the residence of inmates o:
the home in the counties they came
from to be unconstitutional, and de
clares that they may legally vote in
the precinct where the home is lo
cated. This had to be the decision
because any other would nave de
prived the republican county clerk
elect of his office, and that was a
thing not to be thought' of. So much
for this part of the story. Now a few
words concerning the dispatch an
nouncmg the decision, wmch ap
pears in all the great moral dailies of
the coantry. Here it is, clipped from
the daily Capital:
Wiohita, Kas., Maroa 9. In the federal
oourt here to day Judge Williams made a
deoision of great importance to indigent
old soldiers. He held that inmates of sol
diets homes, otherwise qualified, could ex
eroise their franchise under the constitu
tion of Kansas at any election held in the
preoinot in whioh the home may be looated.
Judge Williams held that the constitution
did not contemplate soldiers' homes from
the f aot that the constitution was adopted
before suoh homes were thought of.
The deoision renders the Populist aot of
1893 unconstitutional. That aot expressly
provided that inmates of the soldiers'
homes should not be allowed to exercise
the right of suffrage while the home was
supported by the public expense.
Bead the latter part of this dis
patch carefully and than consider the
facts. The act is designated "the
Populist act of 1893." The facts as
disclosed by the senate and house
journals show that the act was passed
Dy unanimous vote in both houses,
every republican and democrat as
well as Populist voting for it, and
Mr. Sutton, the republican represen
tative from Ford county, was the
leading spirit in uging its adoption.
The dispatch further says:
The aot expressly provided that inmates
of the soldiers' homes should not be allowed
to exeroise the right of suffrage while the
home was supported by the publio expense.
The act expressly provided no such
thing. The act expressly provided
that the inmates of the home at Dodge
City should "not lose their legal resi
deuce in the county from which they
came, nor acquire any legal residence
in Ford county while they remained
as inmates of the home."
Here we have a sample of the old
tactics of the republican party an
attempt to play upon the prejudices
of the old soldier by making him be
lieve that the law in question was a
Populist law, and that it absolutely
disfranchised every soldier in the
homes supported at publio expense.
The reader may draw his own conclusions.
THEIR SIGNS DON'T AGREE.
The professional politician is just
now industriously engaged in throw
ing up straws to see which way the
wind blows, and the variety of infer
ences drawn from these sisras is
amusing. Some of them are quite
sure that an early Populist state con
vention is to be held in the interest
of the "fusionists," while others are
quite sure the "middle of the road"
men want the early convention,
There seems to be some doubt as to
which wants the early and which
the Late convention, yet our friends,
the enemy, are quite certain there
ia & great deal of contention about it
And, again, there is a decided con
flict of authority as to who are the
fusionists, and who "middle of the
road." Some place the state officers
in one category and some in another,
and the staunohest, old-time Populist
is liable to wake up any morniog and
learn by the papers that he has
flopped and become a rank f usionist
The truth ia this fusion ghost has be
come a nightmare which haunts
some people, even some Populists,
day and night
A UEXLOUS CAMPAIGN STORY.
It has become a habit among the
Kansas editors who wear collars, to
scrutinize the business affairs of the
Advocate, at regular intervals, and
to make such reports to the publio as
they think may injure the business of
this paper and the prospects of the
People's party.
From a political point of view these
reports are in keeping with other po
litical matter usually found in repub
lican papers, as they are generally
"made out of whole cloth" and are
without any foundation. From a
business view they are the most con
temptible and malicious violation of
all business principlea No decent
man will attempt to injure the busi
ness of another by making false state
ments concerning his business affairs.
And above all, the Topeka Capital,
the most jaded, down at the heel,
debt ridden, God forsaken, foreign
newspaper concern in the whole state
of Kansas, is engaged in circulating
such reports. We refer now to an
item which the Capital lately repro
duced from a cross-road sheet called
the Parsons Son. The substance of
the item is:
A scheme is on foot by whioh persona in
terested in the Daily Press are soon to get
hold of the mortgages against the Advo
cate, and the Adyocati will then be con
solidated with the Press. This will stop
the influence of the Advooats and its ran
tankerous editor against fusion.
It is difficult for us to keep track
of all the "schemes on foot" but it
will only require a short statement to
show that this is a republican
"scheme" in other words, a repub
lican lie. In the first place there is
not and never was a mortgage on the
Advocate. The county records will
show that Since mortgages represent
prosperity we are fortunately not
so prosperous as the Topeka Capital
company whose obligations and stock
have been hawked about and ped
dled out to railroad officials, politi
cians,eastern investors'and local banks
until its "prosperity" exceeds its re
sources about 500 per cent, and whose
editorial expressions are tempered
according to the kindness or severity
of its benefactors of the above-mentioned
classes. It is true that there
are people in different parts of Kan
sas who have in the past kindly ad
vanced money to build up the Adyo
cati, and some of them now own
stock in the paper. They are of that
class which may justly be called the
bone and sinew of the state, and not
of the blood-sucking class which sus
tains some of our republican contem
poraries. This company can hardly
be clrjsad among Jhe bloated corpo-