The Hawk-eye and Iowa patriot. (Burlington, Iowa) 1839-1843, 1840-12-10
For the flawkcyc.

John b. Lash, Esquire:
Sir-As you are now holding respon-
sible and honorable station, as the Repre-.
sentative Of the Wing county of Henry.
to which station, you know, you were
elected by wing votes. take the liberty
of addressing you on the subject of some
of your late votes in the House of Repre-
senta,ives; and, while my hand is in, l
may possibly revert to your far.faned
and celebrated report as chairman of the
Committee on Expenditures.
Do you honestly believe you were re-
presenting the will of a majority Of your
constituents, by refusing to give any part
Of the public printing to the editor and
printer of the Hawkeye? You do kao,O
that you, in that matter, misrepresented 4
majority Of your constituents. But it
may be that you do not consider yourself
the representative of the mhole county,
but only of the loco foco minority, or that
you do not believe in the good old demo.
cratic doctrine that the representative is
bo,,,,d by the will Of his consti,uents-it
Nigh. be we'll for you to give your views
of these matters, as they would, no doubt,
be sage, judging from your aforesaid re-
port. Some Of your friends say you do
not intend being candidate again. But
it might be to your advantage TO recollect
that you are not yet an old man, and that
these votes and this report may some day
be troublesome "reminiscences; therefore
you had better attend TO them now.
Or do you believe that when man has
pre- essea to be democrat, and 10 regard
the will of the people as sovereign, that
the mere circumstance of his intending
not to be candidate again o5solves him
from all obligation to regard the will of
those from whom he received all his dig
nifty? Your sentiments on the subject
might be amusing if not instructive, to
your constituents. perhaps your loud
prefens;ons to democracy, after all, ere a
mere hnmbug, or at least may be only of
the patent kind, protested and practiced
upon by your liege lord, king Martin, who
forced the odious sub-treasury on the
country against the will of an overwhelm-
ing majority. We would really like to
know whether you are democrat or not;
and if so, to what genus of the species
you belong. Answers 10 these queries
might enlighten us here at home, and
might beguie some of the tedious hours
Of leisure you have between times.
Another matter, which rather puzzles
some of us who are uuinitiated in the
mysteries of democratic legislation, is,
that we all know that the Hawheyc office
prints better and with more prcnpfness
the public printing than i: has ever been
done in the Territory. Why. then, by
your vote, have you endeavorcd topro-
scribe and put doUra that press9 Did you
fear that it would show your patent de-
mocracy not to be the ''reaL grit9 It's
certainly unpleasant, after pre- BLESSING so
much democracy as you have always
done, to have an impudent printer come,
like .sa frost, killing frost" and nip ones
..blushing honors' while they are "thick
upon him. However. now, just between
You and me and the bed post, | do not
believe this will satisfy the impuden,
wings 1of Henry county; they will be en-
curing into the reason of things. You
know wings are given to that. as
A.word in your ear about that report,
and shall close This first letter.. Mr. Ed
wards, it seems, offered to print cheaper
than the organ of loco focoism in Bur-
lington. How comes it, then, that you
did not accept his proposal. OF that you
voted against accepting iss Now | will
tell you what the wings hereabouts say
was the reason They say that you be
long to party tina. wormed themselves
into power by the promises Of "retrench-
ment and REFORM and that soon after
they 90. into power they retrenched the
government expenses from twelve NIL
lions to forty millions! or, as 8 Patlandel