Jamestown weekly alert. [volume] (Jamestown, Stutsman County, D.T. [N.D.]) 1882-1925, 1885-05-21
TtH IUke that Reelected John 4. La.
gan United States Senator.

Perhaps the grimmest conceived and
slicxest executed joke ever known IN the
history Of American politics IS that just
contaminated IN the re election of John A
Logan United States senator by the leg
islature Of Illinois. II IA of national in-
tercst now that a natl ional result has been
accomplished by it.
II will be remem bered by those who
kept track of political events that IN the
early part of April Hon. }. Henry Shaw
one of the democratic members of The
lower house OF the legislature for the 34tl
district was found dead in his bed at the
hotel one morning having died Of sup.
posed heart disease during the night
The election OF United States senator
was then pending upon tie vote between
The two parties. The governor called al
election to fill the vacancy.
| -,,l,a-sf ~ II -WnngAr- ,ni,h ,.h hn',, '',I
editor OF this paper has been intimately
acquainted for the past fifteen years, who
was the successful candidate and whose
genius conceived the plan by which sue
cess was accomplished, now lives at Pc
tersburg, the county seat Of Mcnard coun-
ty, and pursues the business of auction
eer and tornado insurance His place OF
residence is on the Sangamon river only
two miles below the site OF Old Salem
where the immortal Abraham Lincoln
made his start in 1882 as pioneer store
keeper aud postmaster under Gen. Jack
sons administration. There is also an
other coir -idence. L,ncoln was the best
story teller IN the state in his day and
Weaver is the best in that lien now.
Capt. Weaver is now bigger man than
Logan, aud the following Is the way it
was done as told by Weaver himself to a
newspaper reporter:
"On Thursday night before the e.ec-
tlon,'' said he, "ihc matter was first
broached When the candidate fell to
Menard, a caucus of the leaders here de-
cided to. offer me the place. But only on
the most urgent soliciting did | consent
to fun. But after was once in tor 1t,
did my best. Only two or three in a town
ship were made acquainted with the plan,
and they the most trusty ones. A day or
two just before the election rode into
one section Of the county, and did some
of the biggest work in insurance that
ever did IN my life. My partner, Mr..
Wilson, worked another part, while 8
stock man here went through another
corner, with his cattle whip thrown ove:
his shoulder, and plasterer with his t,ow
el diligently worked other places. Ii d
MAI had ever voted anything but the re-
publican ticket, he was passed by. Men
weIe pulled out of their beds a. dead of
night and laborcd with. One township
over here has twenty democrats to one
republican. The question arose, Who
will we take into the scheme over there?
told them We had better give that place
the 60 by, for If the democrats got on TO
it they would swarm out aud bury us.
! No votes were TO he cast till nearly night,
aud so successfully was the plan carried
out, that in many places the democrats
didn't know any Weaver ballots had
been cast till they began to count them.
One old democratic Judge up here, bully
good old fell w, was reading the ballots.
lie called "Leeper,' "Leeper," pc haps
dozen times, when directly he found
Weaver bsllot. He looked at it from all
sides, and saying lie thought there must
be some mistake, he laid it aside. His
eyes opened bigger and bigger as the
Weaver ballots piled up beside him, and
when finally he strung and counted them
all aud Weaver was twelve votes ahead
the old fellow turned loose and cussed
worse than ''the army in Flanders. In
townships where the democrats did gel
onto it, they we're nearly terror stricken
In one place you would see one hors|
standing tied in the fence corner IN
field, the other one gone; here, two biz
fellows would come tearing up to thu
polls on one horse; there goes mar
across fields afoos, putting aud sweating
like Turk. An old jew down here, q
soon as he got wind of it, mounted
horse, struck down the lane to the poll .
break neck gait, yelling at every demo
crat he could see. "Herel The d.
Republicans are stealing the senator
G- d. it, come and vote" In Pc
tersburg even, they knew nothing OF !
] untila telegram came from . scared OIL