The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1898-03-04
BRYAN COUNTY.
Kentucky Proposition Has a Prece-
dent. but No Prospect of Success.

hentucky PrOpOsttlon mas Prece.
dent. but No Prospect of Success.
From the Sun.
Carlisle county, Kentucky, is one of
the smallest counties of the state. 1t
is on the Mississippi river, just across
from Illinois, and south of Cairo and
is one of the new counties of the Blue
Grass state, having been established in
1883 as a cut from Ballard county, one
of the large counties of the state. The
area of Carlisle is 1870 square miles only.
II isn't as large as Rockland county,
New York, and a majority of it's vot-
ing population are Silverite Democrats,
who gave majority for Bryan in 1896.
1t is by reason of such partiality per-
haps that in the Frankfort legislature
the other day Representative Mount
introduced a bill to change the name
Carlisle county to William Jennings
Bryan county. The name of Carlisle,
It must be added, is not an agreeable
one to the Kentucky silverites.
There are 119 counties in Kentucky,
but there isn't Bryan county in any
other state of the Union with the SOL
itary exception of Georgia, which has,
and has had for number of years, a
Bryan county, a small affair just to the
south of Savannah and fronting on the
Atlantic coast. In the Northern states
it is not a custom to give full names
to counties. That is to say, it is not
customary to give such titles as "Abra-
ham Lincoln county" "rhomas Jeffer-
son county," or Alexander Hamilton
county" Lincoln county, Jefferson
county or Hamilton county is thought
to suffice. But in the South and such
states in the West as Southern ideas
pr eyail in, longer designations for
counties are not unusual. There is in
Texas a Jeff Davis county, though
Davis county would probably serve as
we'll the requirements of those who
desired to perpetuate the memory of
the president of the former confeder-
acy There is also in Texas, very far
up Ia the forsaken region OF the Pan
handle. what is known as Deaf Smith
county; but there Is a good chrono-
logical reason for believing that Deaf
Smith was not made so by the oratory
of William Jennings Bryan, for the
designation was bestowed before Bry-
an had been heard of in Nebraska.
There is a Charles Mix county in
South Dakota, a Roger Mills county in
Oklahoma a 10 Davis county in Illi-
nois, and Kit Carson county in Colora-
do. The proposition, therefore, to es-
tablish in Kentucky, not Bryan coun-
ty, but a William Jennings Bryan
county, is not altogether a novelty in
nomenclature. Nevertheless, by reason
of the form of the proposition, If for
no other reason, IL Is not likely to gain
serious consideration. Bryan did not
carry Kentucky when candidate for
the presidency in the election Of 1896.
Mckinley did, and Mckinley was the
only Republican who did carry 1t, for
prior to the beginning of the civil war
Kentucky was what was then called
"a Constitutional Union party" state,
and it went for the Constitutional
Union party candidate, John Bell, in
1860, against both the Democratic and
the Republican candidates, and after
the beginning of the civil war it was
uniformly, until 1896, Democratic.
While the voters of Carlisle might be
willing enough in their allegiance to the
cause of free silver. and campaign ora
tory to substitute for the present deslg-
nation that of William Jennings Bryan,
this formality, to be official. requires