The record-union., 1896-06-03
THE TACTICS OF SMALL MEN.

Congressman Barham announces his
candidacy for reelection to Congress
and Congressman Hilborn also desires
to be returned. This promotion Of their
ambitions is their abstract right, as also
it is the right of the people to defeat
them
Neither Congressman has been large
in his Office They have neither Of them
made any noticeable mark in their
terms. IF they have accomplished any
thing for their State Of any especial con-
sequence the public has yet to hear Of it.
Nor was much to have been expected OF
either Of them, since both are small
men, and there Is no better evidence of 1t
than the fact that the chief reason they
advance for their reelection is that they
are anti-railroad men, as if in that
shibboleth there resides all virtue and
excellence.
But it happens that there are other
citizens who honestly and properly as
pire to run for Congress and to succeed
the two Representatives named. We do
not know all Of those who aspire, but
the names Of some Of them stand for ca
pacity, Intelligence and a broad-gauge
spirit No sooner, however, do these
citizens announce themselves than,
from the Barham and Hilborn amps,
comes the charge that these men are
out in opposition to the incumOents be-
cause they are tools of the Octopus"
are railroad hirenngs' and corpora
ton servitOrs."
We say that this assault proceeds di-
rect from the camps Of Hilborn and Bar
ham It is at once bundozing tntoler-
ably. offensive and unfair Has it come
to this that because candidates openly
and honestly propose to ask for nomina-
ton for places filed by Barham and Hill
born. that they are to be stigmatized
and assaulted as hirelings and subser-
Went tools7 Ordinarily we might not
expect much better than this from Hill
born and Barha.n, considering how
chary nature has been IN confer
ment Of her endowments in their cases.
but In the name Of common decency are
citizens to be clipped of honest anbi-
ton to contend for place by such mean
attacks from the redoubts of such in
ournbents7 Man1iness is a virtue that
may not be too highly priced, but It has
no place in the nature Of those who
charge upon contestants for political
honors, that because they oppose the
return OF Hflborn and Barham 10 Con-
gress, therefore the new candidates
must be railroad servitors and slaves.
Such argument If It may be so dig
nihed. is mean, bulldozing, coercive,
Unmanly and indecent 1t smacks Of
political chicane and savors of insult
ferable demagogy. California, unhap-
PLY, is pustuled with small natures of
this order, who, strddent upon the dung
hills of sen1shness. roar their alleged
hatred Of railroads as pre-eminent vir-
tue, and denounce all who have the te-
merlty TO differ with them as railroad
hirelings. 1t is demagogy Of the Ieanest
and most unspeakabIe order. It reveals
a littleness that is impossible to honest
manhood, and the desp3cable tactics of
incarnate dennagogy, that a high
minded man cannot bend to-
We incline TO the belief. however, that
the people are heartily sick Of these de-
vices; they are awakening TO the truth
that something other than capacity to
roar at a railroad IS demanded in the
economic capacity Of a Representative
in Congress or the Legislature They
are not insensible to the truth that the
anti-railroad demagogue is just a shade
worse than any other kind of intellect
ual fraud and political trickster.
II the railway companies in this State
really had less regard for capacity,
courage and manliness, and more for
gross self-interest, they would COM
mend the ambitions Of the two-ply order
of politicians who aspire to represent
the Stata ia Congress, since men of that