Mississippi leader. (Jackson, Miss.) 1892-1895, 1892-03-10
FROM AN ALLIANCE srANbroIxr.

Ah0 OChNHt0aotte ANNtAhAeAoah ""A
ed by Hon. Frank Burkitt TO Senator
David ID. Hill, candidate for the Prcsi-
dency, by inviting him to lay aside his
official duties at Washington, and
come all the way to Mississippi to adj
dress the Legislature on a subject Of
his own choice. has been a matter of
general surprise, and to none so much
as to Capt. Burkitt's Alliance friends.
The fact that Capt Burkitt is editor
of the State Alliance organ and State
Lecturer of the Order has been con
strued in certain quarters as giving in
creased significance TO this special
honor conferred by him upon the as
piring U. S. Senator from New York.
whereas it should only emphasize his
one inconsistency and fill Alliance men
throughout the State with alarm.
With due appreciation for what is
termed practical politics" the LEADER
wishes to state some reasons why ALI
ancemen cannot, with any sort of grace,
lend themselves to a movement for
booming the candidacy of such man
as Senator Hill. What we say is not
said in the interest of any special can
didate or party, but, as we conceive 1t,
from nom partisan Alliance stand
point. 1t is assumed that large ma
iority of the Alliance men of Mississip-
ri are Democrats, and will act in good
faith with that party in this years
campaign. While we are not of those
who believe this ought, of necessity, be
done. yet we recognize the tenacity
with which men cling to old party as
sociations, right or wrong, and their
reluctance to embrace new ones, and
hence the assumption stated.
But if Alliance men of Mississippi do
cooperate with and act inside the
Democratic party, they are none the
less interested in getting that party to
declare in its platform for the reforms
the the Alliance seeks to accomplish,
and nominate candidate for the Presi-
dency in sympathy with these reforms.
| Is Hill such man? He is the veriest
antithesis of what the Alliance desires
in President. He is to-day the bold
est. most adroit and INSCRIPTIONS ma
chine politician on the American con-
tinent, and because of this fact, the
mere politicians and Office seekers all
over the country who place party sue
cess and the lOaves and fishes of office
above party principle and the general
welfare, are telling the people that he
is the man to nominate. He is at once
the ideal and idol of Tammany, the
most corrupt and treacherous political
organization in this country.
A few things may be stated as illus
trating Hills character as a bold and
unscrupulous machine politician. In
January. the State Central committee
of New York, of which he had complete
control, met and called State conven-
ton to meet Feb. %, to appoint dele
gates to the National Democratic Con
yention which does not meet until the
10Th. of June Those who know any
thing about the climate in a State as
far North as New York, can appreciate
the difficulty of holding primaries at
such a season of the year, especially in
the country among the farmers.
1t is asserted that only 5000 voters
attended the various polling places
even in New York city, and only three
per cent. of the Democracy of the en-
tire State voted. 1t is further declared
that Hill and four of his machine lieu
tenants, actually named all of the del
egates that were to be voted for at these
primaries. The machine was deaf to
all protests, and when the Convention
met at Albany on the Odd it was cut
and dried affair. Hill was endorsed as
the choice of the New York Democra-
cy for President, and he, instead of be-
ing at Washington, attending to his
official duties and bearing himself in a
manner becoming the dignity of man
aspiring to the greatest office within
the gift of the American people, was
there on the ground, in person, to see
that there was no hitch in the eXecu-
ton of the program previously arrang-
ed.
The farmers and Alliance men of
this State have not forgotten how a
State Convention, called at Jackson
last July, ostensibly to nominate three
Railroad Commissioners, was manipu
lated by machine politicians in the in
terest of a certain candidate for United
States Senator, and the voice of the
farmers scarcely heard in that Conven
ton, whilst the Alliance platform was
spit upon. Yet that was not so high
handed proceeding as the late Con
vention in New York to boost the can
didacy of David B. Hill for the Presi
dency, by having it heralded all over the
country that he is the choice of the
Democracy of that great State.
And is it not amazing beyond degree
that one who has inveighed against the
Mississippi Convention and machine