The Providence news. (Providence [R.I.]) 1891-1906, 1896-01-23
rrE REvERsEs OF REFORM.


politics ridden town.
Wo ere again chilled upon TO bownil the
plucking OF another tail feather from the
proud bird OF nOn-psriizanship and 10 ez-
tend the right hand Of sympathy In the
evident distress OF that purest, rot to say
l%oucest, ezroaent OF The twin rinciplss Of
reform and non-par izlnship, the Hon.
CHARLES CoTroEsEED NICHOLS, Alder
man, by diviI inhiotlon, from Ward l.
1t appears at this time that the end
and object. Of the political uphcaval, the
an,i-partizapstip revolution, tie reform
movement, that moved 50 t~umuiiuously
that tire prophecy Of the Hon. ALFRED
DAWSON, late If the Crimea, TO the
en5,t that tsey'd "gi,e 'em fts'' was
more than fulfilled Oh tho 2cth Of Novcm-
Der last, were not as we bad been led to
surrcse the aholl hing OF Fourth OF July
In the interests of the tender tympanum
OF tie Providence Jou nal. This proposed
reform, It appears, was simply a tlind
TO deceive tie voters. Neither were the
Goo Coos sirceye in their propositions in
event of their elections to give US the
blessed privil &c OF riding back and
forth all Gay letweeu Randall square
! and Fox Point for one fare, 10 reduce the
taxes, TO Iuriiy the police department, or
TO cause the sun to rise an hour earlier
over Providence and set an hour later
than the Almanac provides for in 1896,
SO that moro light might be rad on the
evil things OF this corrupt and corrupt
ing town. That nothing of all this was
ever seriously contemplated is now dis
closed. these propositions did but mask
tie real purpose, and the real purpose was
10 politically execute a gentleman OF the
name OF MURPHY, who luxuriates ia tho
sinecuro of Lighting lamps down in
Ward /.
1t is hardly the fault OF this newspaper
that It did not discover this scheme IN
time to use 1t for campaign material.
While we regret this seeming neglect Of
the public confidence imposed in us at a
critical moment we cannot assume all the
blame. We sought diligently, but in vain
to find out what 1t was that the Goo Goo
movement sought to accomplish. We
searched everywhere for the motives that
were behind The effort to inflict upon us
a non-partizan administration. We
didn't discover MURPHY, and we regret it
because We are confident that had Cotton
seed CHARLIE made an issue of MURPHY
instead OF prating about transfer tickets
and finances md such petty things he
would have been anpihilated at the polls
on election day. The people would have
risen In their might for the support OF
MURPHY. C~ottonseed CHARLIE knew
this full we'll and ths result is he is to-
day not Cottonseed CHARLIE any more,
hut the Hon. CHARLES CoTToNsEED
NIcuoLs, Alderman from wsrd /. We feel
that we do not 60 too far when we ex-
press the opinion that Alderman NICHOLS
thus won his position by a fraud upon
the electorate, to compare with which
we know OF nothing in recent political
history since some wicked Republicans
OF Ward Z permitted BILLY KNIGHT to
delude himself with the idea that he had
Influence.
But this concealed conspiracy Of re,
form has failed, as 1t ought to have
failed. 1t has failed as dismslly as the
assault upon the Fourth Of July celebra-
ton. MURPHY, the lamplightor Of Ives
street. is secure in his position. lie will
not be bounced. The pledge row exposed
as having been given by Alderman MICH
obs 10 his constituency In the humble
Hope Club and the palatial cafe of Har-
Dor Master MAGU1RE, that there should
he reform and ~nou-Fattizan lamp light