Arizona silver belt., 1896-10-15
SPOILS THE TOUCHSTONE OF
 PARTY FEALTY.

The fretful stir that always precedes n general election is agitating the outs and especially those who like the lilies of the field toll not, and who live by hook or by crook in hopeful expectation of something turning up with which to "cloy the hungry edge of appetite.
 Party Is the madness of the hour with those who make politics business. They are true to party obligations as the needle to the pole, as long as it is to their interest to be so, but no farther. There are, however, honorable excep- tions, and now we recall an instance in which man charged with felony es- capped from a county jail on the eve of an election and secreted himself under barn, and when discovered resisted every importantly to surrender until |, the sheriff, who was candidate for re- election, informed him that unless he complied with the request his opponent would be elected, to which the response was heard, ''I surrender in order to save the party"
 Although political fidelity is seeming ly lost art during the present canvass, nevertheless, memory, the warder of the brain, recalls the time when the register of the ballot box before it was opened was not regarded as mystery. The character of those exercising the franchise were known as steadfast to party obligations. Political bosses were then unknown, and had one ap- peared upon the hustings he would have been regarded with as much cu- riosity as Barnum's woolly horse. Then, indeed, the ballot box was the palladium of our liberties
 The stake now played for, Tn Presi- dentisl and Congressional elections, is the key of the federal treasury, which suggest the timely warning of the negro who had just robbed neighbor' s smoke house and meeting the propri- etress, said, "Mrs. McCarty, you had better look little out, there are rogues about" It is still mooted question whether the negro or Frank P. Blair, senior, in 1926, when editing the Wash ington Globe, is entitled to the credit of originating the cry of "stop thief. ' The character of Mir. Blair's political philippics incline to the belief that he, and not the negro, is its deserving au- thor. The BELT basis its belief upon the fact that Mir. Blair first sounded the alarm against "bargin and corrup- tion," the mesmeric words used during the Jacksonian era, to turn the public eye in the direction of the other fellow.
 Ann Royal was contemporary of Blair, and also publisher of paper in Washington entitled the Huntress, which, as well as the Globe, used plain language, too plain, indeed, but having fewer friends than Blair, she was for mally indicted as common scold, tried and found guilty. The English law, then in force in tbe District of Colum- bia, introduced the dueking stool, and not to be the first to give effect to that mode of punishment, Ann Royal was let off with fine, but notwithstanding the rigorous law, neither Mrs. Royal nor Mir. Blair abandoned the political tripod.
 Interest in Presidential elections does not arise, as is generally supposed, in the welfare of the nation, as much as in the inspiriting words, "to the victor belong the spells" which has been the rallying cry and which is kept con- stantly in sight during canvass since Jackson whooped 'em up" And what IS the result ? You may well imagine multitudinous army of dis contented martyrs after the inaugura- tion reviling the President because he could not give all applicants an office, for the reason that the spells were not commensurate with the demand.
 But notwithstanding the meagre re- past, four years later the same bill of fare is offered to hungry partisans as m inducement to be sIeadfast to party obligations, "vote the ticket without 0 scratch" as instructed by the chief fuglemen of the party, in order that