The San Francisco call., 1896-06-04
DEMOCRATS FROWN
ON WOMAN'S CAUSE
The State Convention Will
Not Indorse Equal
Suffrage.
GOLDBUGS CONFIDENT,
But the Silver Men Are Sure of
Victory and of Downing
Daggett.
A PROBABLE JUNTA DEFEAT.
The Populist State Executive Com.
mittee Gives Long Hours to
Campaign Plans.

going 10 give the new WOiHdu d UldCk ey
This ungallant deed will be accomplished
by refusing to indorse in the platform the
proposed eleventh amendment to the con-
stitution, bestowing suffrage on woman.
The report of the committee on platform
and resolutions will not mention the better
half of society, and if some friend of the
equal suffrage cause brayely gets up in the
convention and offers a resolution that
would please the workers in the cause of
woman hewill be downed without elaborate
ceremony.
The statement is based on the almost
universal expression OF sentiment and
opinion that one may hear throughout
the Democratic party from North to
South. The party will be against woman
suffrage, partly through sentiment and
partly through the operation of practical
political perceptions.
The ladies who are most actively labor
ing in the cause have slight if any hope
that the fourth State Convention to be
held by political parties will do what the
three others have unanimously done.
Miss Anthony and other ladies propose to
be on hand at Sacramento, however.
The principal cause of this attitude is
generally explained to be the foreign ele-
ment. This element naturally takes a
conservative view of the proposition in
itself, and there is an unfounded fear,
shared by others in the party, that sum ptu-
ary legislation might follow when the
women vote. Others oppose it simply in
recognition of this feeling.
There are many warm supporters of the
suffrage cause among Democrats, but they
coneede that the majority will be against
it. When the Trinity County delegation
was elected the only instructions it re-
celved were to oppose woman suffrage.
The hardest workers in the administra-
ton cause are keeping up their licks and
maintaining their faith that gold will
control the State Convention, but the sill
yer men are gaining fresh courage as the
party tide throughout the Union turns
with increasing volume and speed toward
silver.
A week ago the party issue in this State
was extremely doubtful, with the chances
largely in favor of the administration-gold
machine, which was effectively organized,
powerful and assiduously at work against
the unorganiZed silver element.
The rout OF the administration forces in
Kentucky the other day has made It's effect
felt here, though not as strongly as in
some other States. This effect is naturally
to weaken the gold forces and strengthen
the silver ones by turning with the tide
doubters and those who look for the win
ming side.
But this is in a large measure Offset by
the fact that the Federal machine is espe-
ciaily strong and effective in this State.
The practical political power welded
| through patronage has nothing to do with
political economy. The Federal brigade
forces are held firmly in line. They are
| still confident of victory.
| This confidence is, of course, based on
| the calculation that the Junta delegation,
controlled by Daggett, Rainey and Nc
Nab, will be seated, and that the rival
delegation, representing the bulk of the
| party, will be thrown out. If the Junta
! delegation were to be seated the victory
of the gold and administration forces
would unquestionably be secured, as but
| about 140 additional delegates from all the
rest of the State would be needed.
1t is the prospect that the State Conven-
ton will not turn the party in this City
over to Rainey, Daggett and McNab and
their small coterie of followers which
chiefly promises victory for silver at Sac
ramento.
The Buckleyites are pledged to silver
and to anti-funding resolutions and favor
Foote, Mcguire and White for delegates-at-
large to Chicago, all of whom are bitterly
opposed by the Junta. The silver men
| are not inclined TO sacrifice their cause on
| account of a family quarrel in San Fran
cisco, and an increasing number of lead
ing silver advocates are quietly letting it
be known that they are not going to back
up the Daggett- -Rainey- McNab gold dele
CATION.
Added to this is the anti -Daggett senti-
ment that pervades the party. Daggett is
resurrected after twelve years in the polit-
cal tomb and he would be the party boss
in this State with the State Central Com
mittee in his pocket, and with control of
the machine when the State campaign
opens two years hence.
The animosties that were born at the
Stockton convention of 1884 when Daggett
was read out of the party as traitor, in
the platform of that year, will flame anew
and with old-time heat at Sacramento on
the 10th of June. There is widespread
prejudice against Daggett and against the
Federal brigade of which he is chief, and
this opposition will be visited with all its
strength on the Junta delegation, which
Daggett will WELD at his pleasure if it is
seated.
Com bined with the nti-Daggett feeling
will be hostility to McNab and Frank
| Gould, who are helping Daggett with his
slate programme. This hostility is partly
due to the wide impression that McNab
and Gould made combinations with the
A. P. A in the last campaign and partly
to other reasons for unpopularity. So the
gold programmes have much to contend
with in getting their ISL San Francisco
voters recognized.
The Buckleyites are rapidly Iengthing
their list of friends as the county delega-
tions are chosen throughout the State,
and are expressing increasing confidence
that the convention will express the judg-
ment that Congressman Mcguire has so
vigorously and often expressed that they
constitute the regular and legal organiza-
ton here, represent the mass of the local
party and are entitled to be seated in the
convention.