Morning journal and courier., 1891-07-30

THE ELECTION CONTROVERSY.
The letter of Mr.. William G. Case, who
acted as counsel for the Republicans before
the House committee, is natural sequence
of the Harrison and Porter controversy,
but it has not added much to the informa-
ton which the public already had upon
the subject. In the discussion of this
controversy by the press many of our con-
temporaries have wandered away from the
substantial facts Ind charges made by MIR.
Harrison in his letter of July 9th and have
assumed that dishonesty and improper
motives were attributed to the mem
bers of the committee A careful
reading of the letter of Mr.. Harrison
shows that no such charges were made.
The first portion of that letter stated what
the honorable position was, taken by
General Merwin and the leading Repub-
licans in the months of November and
December, in relation to the minor Offices.
position taken by the JOURNAL AND CoU-
R1ER on the subject and neither Mr..
Porter nor Mr.. Case has denied that the
general tenor of Republican sentiment was
in favor of seating the Democratic minor
officials who were elected, and against the
doctrine eff the Democrats want to be
mean we will be mean too"
Mr.. Harrison's letter then went at length
into a discussion of what took place with
the committee in the month of January,
and especially the changes that were made
in the report on the night of the 9th.
Upon that issue, the telegram sent by Mr..
Judson and Tuttle, showed that Mr.. Har-
rison's statements were substantially cor
rect. It is in the latter portions of the
letter of Mr.. Harrison that some of our
contemporaries seem to think that there
were charges of improper motives and un-
due influence, exerted by Governor Bulk
eley. We quote from the letter of Mr..
Harrison as follows:
"In making that change you did not dare
to follow the lines of boldness suggested in
November, but you imposed upon the hon
est members of the House. by making a
report which in the light of all the events
since that time is clearly and unequivo-
cally false. DR.. Alsop did receive a ma
jority of all the votes lawfully cast for
lieutenant governor, and John j. Phelan
did receive a majority of all the votes law
fully cast for secretary. I believe that
Mr.. Sanger received majority of votes
lawfully cast for treasurer; and it is GER
tain that there is no sufficient evidence to
show that he did not. The facts which I
have given in detail are absolutely true,
and I challenge you, if you are disposed
to deny them in any material particular,
to submit the questions at issue between
us to Senator Shumway of your county,
who is at the present time the Republican
leader in the Senate"
AS we read that letter the committee are
could certainly be said to be false at the
time 1t was made, but one which in the
light of the events since that time, that is,
the examination of the ballot boxes in May,
can now be seen to be false. In the light
of those developments Mr.. Harrison as
serts that DR.. Alsop and Mr.. Phelan did
receive majority of the votes, and that
probably Mr.. Sanger did. AS Mr.. Porter
has not accepted the repeated challenges
of Mr.. Harrison to submit all the questions
that have been raised by their correspon-
dence to Senator Shumway, the general
public will assume that Mr.. Porter does
not feel sufficiently sure of his position to
go before Senator Shumway on any of the
charges that have been made either by him
or against him.
In the letter to Mr. Porter, Mr.. Harrison
says:
IT do not ask you why you changed
that report. 1t is quite certain that nei-
ther General Merwin, DR.. Bowen nor Mr..
Mclean nor any one authorized to speak for
them asked you to make such change. 1t
is equally certain that nothing has been
gained for General Merwin by it.
By some means or other your associates
were induced to sign the report which you
changed. The Republican members of the
House accepted that report as true, be-
cause they had confidence in the commit
tee. The only way by which the Repub-
ican members of the House could be in
duced to sustain you was by your making
a finding of facts the inconsistency and
falsehood of which was not understood by
the House at any time prior to its adjourn
ment in April. The Republican members
of the House all, or nearly all of them,
acted ignorantly and in good faith"
There is nothing in the foregoing portion
of the letter which charged the Republican
members of the House, or the committee
as whole, with dishonesty or bad faith.