The Wichita daily eagle., 1896-06-11
THE PASSING OF DOUGLASS.

The removal of George L. Douglass
/ from the state is q serious blow he
is one of the ablest and cleanest men
! we have. 4 strong partisan, ne al
ways assures himself first that he Is
right We have always thought that
he had a career before him and GER
tainIy he ought TO have. II does not
speak well for Wichita that IL practic-
ally drives such bright men out or
the state. Kansas needs more Doug
Iass's. not Iess.-Lawrence World.
Doubtless, and sad it is that it is
true. Yes. he had a career" before
him. but unfortunately he overlook II
TOO soon. It's now behind him. He
swas." but he nc longer dis" As for
the strength OF his partisanship, i
proved too strong for his personal OBJ
legations. Wichita did not drive Mr..
| Douglass away. He tried 10 drive
Wichita and got left, then left him
self. Kansas undoubtedly needs more
Douglasses and Wichita will not OBJ
iect to the importation, but Wichita has
had enough. Mr. Douglass delighted
Wichita with bis auditorium effort 10
substitute himself for the Eagle.
Wichita couldn't see it. And so his
effort also to defeat Wichita'S candi-
date for the national convention right
here at home fairly set Wichita to
screaming with delight. Such ability
and patriotism have their reward.
Speaking of that career" the Doug
sS-Lieurance-Jersey COW commission
and its police judge, Tucker, and all the
racket growing out Of that cOmbina-
tion of pulpits and politicians to down
the Eagle, and TO hold the nose of
Wichita TO the grindstone while Tiger
Bill turned the tune of the crankS, was
a brilliant one, indeed. But it failed
to be a sustaining one, as Mr.. Douglass
and several preachers who have al
ready preceded him in hunting new
locations, found out. Wichita didn't
bright confereeS out Of the state, nor
does Wichita harbOr for them any i'll
will. She hopes that they may all do
we'll But Wichita wouldn't consent
TO be run by them. She didn't drive
them, she dropped them. Wichita,
seconded by the Eagle, sent Mr.. Doug
lass 10 the legislature before he had
been in the state long enough to name
or locate its counties Wichita, backed
by the Eagle. secured him the chair
manship of the judiciary committee of
the house and secured for him that dis
tinctive honor at a time when he would
not have recognized a volume Of the
compiled statutes of Kansas if he had
met it in the big road Wichita, fired
by the ambition of its newly adopt
ed son, who was championed in
d0uble-leaded leaders in the Eagle, saw
him installed at the next session as
speaker of the house, chosen TO the
honor by majority of the legal votes
Of that body. but where as such head
in falling to fearleSSly assert his
authority by kicking a pretender out of
the presiding officers chair, he nearly
precipitated a revolution. True, he
afterwards mustered sufficient courage
to buy a sledge-hammer which was, in
fact employed not by him but by an
other to smash in an inoffensive and
unresisting door, when it ought to have
been used on the head of the man who
was endeavoring to usurp the place to
which Wichita's champion had been
chosen The Eagle subsequently offer
ed to relegate its own editor in the in
tereSt of the owner of that Sledge-ham-
mer and to carry said hammer as an
emblem of unequalled courage and pa
triotism until its possessor should be
landed in the chair of the states chief
executive. But the Republican party
didn't seem to care to have it that way.
The leaders of the party said he was
Pop, and they wanted none of him.
The Eagle tried to force said leaders
to swallow their words, but it couldn't,
so Douglass tried to swallow the Eagle
with exactly the same result
As for anything else, the Eagle is
magnamimous if it is anything. 1t
never crows over a fallen foe, and is
even disinclined to boast we'll earned
victories. Its editor has condoned
more outrageous offenses OF traitorOus
friends and Of avowed enemies against
himself than any editor in the state;
has served men after they had done
everything in their power to defeat
him. and destroy his paper; has praised
public men year in and year out in the
interest of harmony and the party
when such men were all the while ma
llgning him personally and plotting
against his paper; has never permitted
n personal grievance TO withhold COM
for those who deserved il
IN the estimation of the public. all that
and much more in the same direction;
and when they have departed has
either bid them God speed" or held
MS peace; but, no paper, editor or poll
Ccian, on the outside, can misrepresent
either Wichita or the Eagle with i'm
pEnity. As the World says. Douglass
Is gone, but Wichita did not drive him.
or the others away. They dug their
own graves and slid into them as quiet
ly as might be; the wall that they tried
TO butt down proved harder than their
heads; the hat they kicked didn't kick
back, but it had a brick in il; the
spinal cord of the neck of the bird they
attempted 10 decapitate proved too
tough.
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