Los Angeles herald., 1891-01-14
THE COUNTY DIVISION MOVEMENT.

only possible to the man who can wait,
as the poet says, but in California things
are possible at break-neck speed. The
state just nov is the victim, or the ben
efciary, as the case may be, OF the
surgings of politicians, whose local
aspirings can be sated with nothing but
the blood of the old counties.
There is something Of the lively re-
frain of Figaro here, Figaro there,
Figaro everywhere" in the sprightly
repetition OF the demands for county
division which reach us from every side
in this fair southern land.
When the proposition was first started
to dismember the lovely and imperial
county of Los Angeles, the HERALD was
appalled, at the notion. Our idea was
purely sentimental one. 1t seemed
pity that, just as Los Angeles county
was looming into prominence
which threatened, in another de-
cade, to challenge the primacy even
of the city and county of San
Francisco in population and wealth,
to have her put on the down grade in
the line of growth as to both, for such
the exhibit would appear. 1t is not
every one who would know anything
about a separation of large portions of
territory, numbers of people and figures
OF the assessment roll which, explained,
would show that Los Angeles county is
still going on in her victorious career.
There was, in our mind, sentimental
Los Angeles, which not only ought not
to be divided, but which was indivisible.
There was much the same kind of an
idea in the minds of the people of Texas,
and which has kept the Lone Star state
a single commonwealth, notwithstand-
ing the fact that, in the terms on which
she has been admitted to the union, she
has the right now to be cut up into four
states, which would give her enterpris-
ing people eight instead OF two senators
OF the United States. Texas stuck to
her autonomy in spite of the manifest
political advantage which would have
accrued to her people from division.
For good or i'll, the old Los Angeles
county has gone. The people of this
city propose to hold on to the name,
however, and for aye. Recognizing the
situation, and sympathizing with the
popular movement, the HERALD pro-
poses to stand in with all the new coun-
ties. 1t is willing to be godfather to
them all. In the charming polyandric
opera of Tom Thumb, Dumdalcla, Toms
queen, says to her waiting maid, who
wants a husband, "Here are the gentle
men of my guard. Take as many hus-
bands as you think you'll need" Apos-
trophizing the genius of Southern Cal
ifornia, the HERALD says, ''Make as
many counties as you think you want"
All the while, we must insist upon our
city and county OF Los Angeles, in the
near future.
There are just now three aspirants for
the honcrs of having the dignity of a
county of the imperial state of Califor-
MIA inscribed on their brows. They are
to be called, respectively, if they ma
the counties of San
Jacinto, Pomona and Riverside. They
all advance claims that are by no means
to be despised. The HERALD, having
been disappointed in its pet desire to
keep Los Angeles county as a magnifi-
cent entity, cares little whether school
keeps or not. In fact, we recall the
Democratic idea, inherited
directly from the wise teachings of JET
ferson, that the more LOCALIZED govern
ment can be made the better. Let the
counties grow, Ii not, why not?
Riverside Is the latest aspirant in the
list. Few people who have looked over
that esthetic region will feel like dis
putting the fact that this cunning coign
of vantage in semi-tropic California is
entitled to say what she wishes, and
there are few communities who can
give more intelligent expression to
their needs and desires. Yet, in her
attitude, Riverside is really modest.
Her people say that they have only
been impelled to ask for or desire a
county existence by the ambitious
schemes OF the proposed Pomona and
the proposed San Jacinto counties,
which encompass her on the one side
and the other. They claim that if
these two counties are created they will
meet at point on the long stretching
line of Riverside, which will leave only
a narrow tail-a sort of fantail, as it
two miles wide, between
Pomona and San Jacinto county.
Under such circumstances it is per-
fectly natural that Riverside should
wish to have county and county seat
Of her own. Her population and pecu-
liar advances in civilization entitle her
to- this recognition. We notice that the
opposition to the project in the San Ber-
nardino Courier is becoming faint and
perfunctory. The creation of River
side county would leave the Democratic
party one of those old fashioned coun-
ties which could always be relied upon
to return a staunch Democratic assem-
blyman, to elect Democratic judges and |
to do good work generally in the line of
tariff reform and the placing of all de-
tails of government on the splendid |
plane that a public Office is public