Daily inter mountain. [volume] (Butte, Mont.) 1881-1901, 1899-12-04

against the laws OIL MOlildId. IL was
impossible for him to accuse Mr.. Clark
of being a bribe-giver without accusing
those who voted for him with being
bribe-takers. Governor Smith is the
chief executive officer of the state, sworn
to administer the laws impartially and
see that the statutes are enforced. He
has taken official cogniZance of what he
has branded as a crime on the part of
the late democratic legislature. and hav-
ing placed the men who voted for Mr..
Clark before the nation in the attitude Of
criminals, it becomes his duty to see
that they are punished. "
Having officially announced. in adj
vance of any court decision bearing on
the question of Mr.. Clarks guilt Or in
n%Ccence, tina the senator-elect is guilty
of bribery and should not be seated, he
owes it to the public to take such steps
as will likewise bring to justice the men
who accepted brides. The governor
cannot make flesh of one and fowl of
another, when it comes to taking official
action against any one who has violated
the laws of this state. 49,.
*x
Presumably, he has acted officially in
the Clark CONTROVERSY from the high
motive of purifying political conditions
in this state, and not from any desire to
secure a denomination for governor from
the hands of the anti-Clark democrats.
1t would be just as unfair to accuse the
governor of having any Interior motive
in signing the protest against Clark as
it would be to attribute Attorney Cen
eral Nolan's opposition to a desire to
run for congress, after Campbell has ex-
hausted his energies, or to imagine that
even P%oindexter or Tim Collins have
political ambitions of any kind.
Yet there are some who will m%isunder-
stand the governors motives in using
the administrative branch of the govern
ment to destroy the work of the legisla-
tive branch, before the judicial branch
has had a fair whack at it, unless his ex-
cellency shows that he is after the parties
who accepted brides, and who are Still
members of the legislative assembly,
just as actively as he is after the man
who is alleged to nave been elected to
the senate of the United States through
the corrupt use of money. Some of the
governors friends will doubtless express
regret that the duties of his office have
been so burdensome as to prevent him
from commencing his work of reform
with the legislature in the first place,
rather than with the product of that
body. Had he protested against the
bride takers in that body at the outset,
and turned his gubernatorial batteries
upon them, his official pronunciamento
against the seating of Clark might have
been wholly unnecessary. 1t might have
been just as Easy to have prorogued the
legislature and prevented the crime of
electing a democratic senator as to
create a vacancy in the senatorial repre-
sentation!
Moreover, if his protest against the
seating of Clark has the expected effect,
it Will compel his excellency to ]reconvene
the same body of bribe-takers that elect
ed the alleged blibe-siver, to so through
the Work of being bought up again by
somebody who wants to go to the United
States senate, and is willing to pungle UP
literally for the go! On the whole,
therefore, it seems that the governor
not only cyarcical pcpr toct, in n1io;oJlu
a~ligning the administrative branch OF
! the government against the Legislative
branch, by trying to destroy the work
of the latter officially performed, on g
zeal Judgment a. we'll. Does he expect
to get any better results from a legisla-
ture which he accuses of criminal con-
duet, after the senate of the United
States reads his official protest and tells
Mr.. Clark to pack his grip and go home.
Does he imagine that the anti-Clark wing
can work that body to any better advan,
tage the coming winter than it did last
winter? Or, does he imagine that il
!, extraordinary session, to elect a success
E sor to Mr.. Clark, the bribe-takers of las,
winter will become the purified agents
of a top-lofty democracy and send Boil
, Smith or the editor of the Anaconda
Standard, or some other incorruptiblt
f democrat to the senate?
Unless his excellency can show somt
!, such justification for his action in off.
cially trying to annul the work of tn,
/ legislative branch of the state govern,