Daily globe. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1878-1884, 1878-07-25
STRAIT A MINORITY CANDIDATE.


Ho,c He and His Oficeholders Fooled the
Contention.
To the Editor of the Globe:
RED WING, July 23, 1878.-The opposi-
ton to Strait in his Shakopee convention
was much more general than even your re-
porter described it; and the feeling over his
denomination here is intense, and none the
less SO because quiet-the fact is, the Re
publicans are disguised. But to return to
the convention. Being one of party to
whom one of the delegates to that conven-
ton spoke more candidly than Maj. Strait
would consider polite, 1 heard enough to
satisfy meas it will you and every one ac-
quainted with the situation-that Maj.
Strait was not the choice of the Shakopee
convention, but was, Notwithstanding all the
efforts of his collared tools GUS. ofice-hold-
ers) minority candidate. Our friend, the
delegate, showed conclusively that this was
the case by the following undeniable facts.
He said: 'sYou know that this (Goodhue)
county was opposed to him, and that Rice
county instructed their delegates to support
Gordon E. Cole. Well, after we got to Shak-
opee Collector Bickel, Postmaster Leavens
and Wilson of Faribault and other bench
men of Strait made tremendous effort to
have the different candidates to withdraw
and not have their names presented, arguing
it would be better all round to give him q
good send off by nominating at once, and by
reclamation, and succeeded so far as to get
Rice county to drop Cole, and Chandler, of
this county, to withhold his name. But
Kandiyohi, Wabashaw and others refused to
do this, insisting that Strait was not their
choice. and they would only vote for him
when it was seen he had majority without
them. He got ffty-nine out of eighty-fve
votes cast, and of those ffty-nine there were
the eleven from this county, and ten from
Rice, and six others that / know of that did
not want hin.So you, see, gentlemen, thai if
you deduct from Straits fifty nine votes
these twenty-seven votes, and place them
with the twenty six cast against him, the
vote would have been-Strait thirty two;
against him ffty-three.o Warming up at
the thought of how they had been duped, he
added: ''There's no use in denying it, gents,
Strait and his office-holders were too sharp
for US. They realized their danger, and we
! made id fools of ourselves by falling into
| the trap laid for u.s.
That this delegate stated the naked truth
is borne out by the fscts. Gordon E. Cole
received but one vote, and M. s. Chandler
but two votes, and these were cast by parties
| not from Rice or Goodhue counties, Deduct
the votes of Goodhue and Rice counties from
Strait, and place them with the opposition,
and you will see at once that he is minori.
| ty candidate. The want of concert of action
among those opposed to him was all that
prevented his defeat. Itisapparent that the
desire for his denomination was not sufficient
ly oyerpowering in its influence to prevent
those delegates from showing their disgust,
who cast three votes for d. j.. How, (the
Majors business partner) and one for Hon
Henry Poehler, the Democratic candi
date.
So you see, Strait was not the choice OF
even a majority of the delegates.
TRUTH.