The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1895-09-20

den. Passaic, Union and elsewhere, the
color of excuse for trampling on the
will of their constituents.
These are recent events. and really
we are amazed at the effrontery of the
Republican party in presenting the man
who so VIGOROUSLY played such a part
in them as a candidate for the SURFACES
OF the citizens of New Jersey.
The baleful Intervention of Joh W.
Grisgs in the water question is no less
conspicuous and no less recent. There
are those in this city today who are
violently aroused by the inroads which
the recently made water contract is
likely to make o the city finances.
Certainly the matter is one of grave
care to every citizen, and to us who
nave thought this contract a necessity
at this time, the financial element is no
less a subject of anxious solicitude than
to our fellow citizens who are opposed
TO it. We may say that the formation
of a contract has finally forced itself on
And here and now. we appeal to all
the people of Jersey City to visit all
the responsibility for this contract, which
has been forced upon US by hard neces-
sity, upon the man through whose I'M
firing efforts at Trenton this necessity
was created. John w. Griggs has been
sented the water sy%ndicates in their OPP
position to all the schemes of Mr.. Leb-
beus B. Ward. He is the man who has
addressed committees in opposition to
the State Water Commission system with
a diabolical skill in making the worse
appear the better cause, and with a
that the natural sympathies of his heart
were all with the cause of monopoly and
against the efforts of the people trying
to get the use of the natural gift of
Heaven.
The part played by Mr.. Griggs in the
liquor legislation of 1888, though further
Jack in his life, is still recent enough
to be sharply remembered by thousands.
In this matter he figured as an apt fore
runner of Mr.. Robert B. Roosevelt of
New York. 1t showed him to be a true
representative of that Republicanism
which proclaimed itself with the shrill
and sour voice of Warner Miller in the
convention of that party in New York
State, recently held at Saratoga.
The liquor law of 1855, of which Mr..
Griggs was sponsor, for which he ar
gued n grated and pulled wires,
which he finally placed upon the statute
book, a very triumph of medieval mar
rowness and fanaticisrn. was the prin-
cipal element that brought about the
tremendous political revolution of 1889,
and subsequently the enactment of the
Werts law, which, upon the whole, is
the best excise measure enjoyed by any
State in the Union. In that ~conjuncture
Mr.. Griggs proved a leader of disaster
to his party. and if liberality, enlight-
eminent n fair play have any par in
the coming contest, he will once again
lead the cohorts of the C. o. P. to dis
eoqnfiture and defeat.
Mr.. Griggs is a characteristic Republi-
can. That is the most damning thing
that can be said of him. If he were in
Congress he would be a leader in the
cause of pampering monopolies with
subsidies, direct and indirect. High
prices for capitalists and the people be
ID. would be his economic law. He
would be an advocate of strong govern
ment and the bayonet at the polls. His
instincts are a menace, and his strength
is a peril. He is the enemy of the people.
Now is the time to take alarm and re-
solve that he shall never occupy a
position whore his pernicious impulses
may be potent for evil to the State.