The record-union., 1899-03-31
VOICE OF THE PRESS.
EXTRACTS FROM EDITORIAL
EXPRESSIONS.
State and Coast Opinions on Sub
jects of Living News
Interest.

| Reed and anti-Reed men has once more
been given a start by those who would
! enjoy nothing more than to see the
| Republicans split into such factions.
There is no more foundation for the
story now than there has been for its
| numerous predecessors. If Speaker
Reed lives, he will be elected Speaker of
the next House, unless he positively
declines to serve as SUCH
| ADVANTAGES ILLUSTRATED
! Fresno Republican,: Nothing could
better illustrate the natural advantages
of California than a comparison of the
recent climatic misfortunes of our own
and rival States. We have had
drought; the Eastern fruit growing
States have had a blizzard. All through
the drought we still had reason to hope;
their hopes vanished with the first blast
/ Of the blizzard. If our hopes had been
disappointed we should have lost one Of
our three principal crops; they lost
theirs irretrievably. AIT the worst our
evil was for a year, while theirs is per-
manent. DroughIs and frosts have him
dered single crops in California, but
nothing has ever destroyed the trees
and vines on which our best crops grow.
A single freeze in Florida, on the other
hand, may destroy. and just has de-
stroyed, the work of years. A single
rain changei our prospects to hope, an
other has changed them to certainty.
The milder evils of Eastern conditions
are our extreme Of danger; their great
er evils touch US not at all.
LET CONVENTIONS NOMINATE.
San Jose Mercury: The Sacramento
Record Union" republishes in full the
'Mercury's' first editorial suggesting
that the State conventions of the sew
eral political parties nominate each
candidate for United States Senator,
and in a clear and forcible editorial
| that paper proceeds to expand upon
the idea and to show how feasible it is.
| 1t points out, as we have attempted to
do, the close analogy between the Elec-
toral College and the Legislature, in SO
far as the latter is authorized to elect
| a Senator and observes that the plan
by which the Electoral College was re-
duced to a mere rudiment that is, by
party nominations, is analogous, also,
to the Mercury S" plan for replacing in
the hands of the people the delegated
power now held by the Legislature. AS
If remarks, the original intention of the
method of electing Presidents has been
| overthrown by the people, who have
seen fit to nomina ter their Presidents in
national conventions, the Presidential
electors chosen by the State conven-
tions having TO choice whatever in the
selection, their own election being made
| dependent upon their selection of the
candidate of their party In like manner
| c ba
their Senators, and to make the election
of Senators by the Legislature as is the
election of the President by the Elec-
| toral College. a mere formality. the
election in fact having been previously
| accomplished by the people themselves.
In case the "Mercury's" plan were
adopted, says the Record Union" .tbe
candidates for legislative positions
would be pledged by every considera-
tion of party fealty and discipline to
vote for tie nominee of the State con-
1 vention, thus achieving a direct vote
| of the people. Whoever voted for a
| Republican candidate for the Legisla
ture would be voting for the Repuhli-
can nominee for the Senator. and like
| wise the votes cast for Democratic
candidates for legislative positions
]
inee for Senator. As the Mercury,
clearly shows, here is an opportunity
to put the doctrine OF policy of the cleo
ton OF Senators by the people into i'm
mediate and direct operation without
any change OF the Constitution, and
under existing party exigencies this an
pears to be the wisest policy" The
Mercury welcomes the RECORD
/ a
popular representa- ton in the unner
mouse of Congress, knowing with what
perslstency, directness and force that
paper is able to present the salient faa-
lures OF this plan to the people of Cali
fornia.
| SMOKELESS POWDER.
! uiare register: 1t would appear
from later advices that smokeless pow
oer may not be so great an advantage
III ,laVai conflict, after all. Expert med
icai authority has determined that one
OF the contributing causes of the tre-
mehoous defeat of the Spanish at San
tlago was the sickness and incapacity
Oh the men at the Spanish guns caused
by the deadly fumes of the smokeless
| powder. 1t is known that the fumes of
nitro-glycerine are Of a most sickening
1
1acture of that explosive have gone
home and taken baby in their arms.
ana nave the baby die while they held
II, 1or no other cause than the effect
OF the odor of nitro-glycerine carried
about in their clothing One lying down
on couch where worker in dyna-
mite factory has reposed will be seized
with a violent headache from no other
cause than the fumes of dynamite or
nitro-glycerine. What is wanted is a
form of smokeless powder that will be
more severe upon the enemy than upon
the men who are using it,
OF FICTION.
Stockton Record: Miss Lillian Bell
has succeeded in breaking out in a
fresh place in Chicago. She was in
vited to speak before the Baptist Social
Union, and she proceeded at once to
clear the American deck of all litera-
ture, all art, and all good taste. The
free and easy way in which she swung
her broom must have amused, if it did
not amaze, the Baptists. The problem
of our insufficiency, she said, lies with
a country that can make Anthony
Comstock and the American girls
ment in America was killing art She
! thought that our novels were too ex-
plunged. Zola and Rabelais and Paul
de Kock were not expunged. Altogether
Miss Lillian Bell sloshed round very
piquantly and gave judicious souls a
stitch in the side. for she tried to con-
vince them that no country could lay
any claim to art or literature in which