The representative. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1893-1901, 1894-11-21
HOW IT HAPPENED.
An Interesting Letter From DR.. G.
Johnson.

Johnson.
To the Editor:
L suppose 1t is in order now to tell how it
all happened We were little too prev
ious. 1 had hoped that the people. had
woke up. But no. The average man holds
to his political creed just as he does to
his religiuos creed. A recent convert will
on his death bed pray in his vernacular
language and in his old faith. Thus recent
converts to Populism, when brought to the
test, failed to carry out their intellectual
convictions, but acted in accordance with
their old prejudices. Take Kandiyohi coun-
ty, for example. A week before election,
could we have voted then, we should have
carried the county by a good majority
But the Republican managers saw, of
course. how things were working. What
could be done to stem the tide? They tried
to argue in the first part of the campaign
but found themselves badly beaten Next
they tried to overwhelm the county by i'm
ported stump speakers. Professors and ex-
editors from Chicago, ex-mnisters, con-
gressmen and celebrities with various titles
and appendices, both before and behind
their names, came like the grasshoppers
in 1876 But they had overdone the bust
ness. The farmers began to ask who pays
for all these imported stump speakers?
What do these men from far off cities
know about our business? What next? All
at once it was discovered that the legis,a-
tive candidates on the Peoples party ticket
were immoral monsters. 1t was secretly as
serted and openly insinuated, that they
were, or had been in times past guilty of
almost all the crimes in the calendar Rut
even that move proved boomerang. Staunch
Republicans came out and openly denounced
such Infamous election methods By this
time, about week before election things
looked bright for us. But a scheme was
Matched and quietly executed that STAN
peded enough of our men at the last mo-
ment to defeat US. Several ministers were
made to believe that the Peoples party up
held anarchy and was in league with the
Catholic Church, and would, if it should
come into power, destroy both common
schools and Protestant churches The min
listers, of course, felt it their duty to warn
their church members against such terrible
danger to religious liberty. Several of them
preached about this danger of anarchy from
the pulpit. l am told that one at least
went from house to house pleading with his
people to save this country from anarchy
by voting the Republican ticket. 1 am sat
isfied that this roorback scared out hun
dreds of voters.
There another argument or rather
assertion used with terrible effect against
us, to-wt: eff the state goes Populist all
the money will leave the state, your mort
gage on your farm cannot be renewed, and
you will lose all you have" Here was a
banker and money loaner, who is supposed
to know all about these matters, deliver
ing such a message TO the debtors
throughout the county. And here is a
debtor with wife and family needing food
and shelter, and no ways nor menas to
pay that debt. Why, that debtor, even if
convinced that we were right, did not dare
to vote according to his conviction on the
economic question, for fear that money
men might actually carry out their threat
Lots Of men lack the sand to stand by
their convictions under such circumstances
1t is wonder that we had as many votes
as we did, 1t is n compliment to the hon
esty and intelligence of the citizens of
Kandiyohi county that one-haf Of them