Daily inter mountain. [volume] (Butte, Mont.) 1881-1901, 1899-12-28
THE PRACTICAL SIDE OFT.

AS an investigation into the charges
of bribery against Senator Clark will be
instituted by the committee on privileges
and elections next week, the case is ap-
preaching a point of renewed interest
to the Montana public. In the past, the
controversy has been waged with fac
tional ardor by the two wings of the
the state, other thar the serious injury
of it's reputation at home II abroad.
But the situation now points to a speedy
attainment of the climax-a narrowing
charges and counter-charges to concrete
accusations and a definite defense.
In the forthcoming investigation,
blanket asseverations as to wholesale
bribery will give way to specific charges
of crime; and silence on the part of the
accused, with which criti-
risms nave been met, must be replaced
by unmistakable p~rotestations of inno-
cence and the proper evidence of igno-
France of wrong-doing. Under these cir
cumstances, a controversy which has
been worn ~threadbare through the per-
sistency Of contending factions, takes on
new points of interest.
! The average Montanian realizes that
the outcome of the Clark trial before
the committee will have no appreciate
Ehffect upon the interests of this state,
insofar as it's reputation is concerned.
The damage has been don The exon
Of Mr.. Clark from any connec-
zion with the corrupt o~vertures which
Were made to members Of the Legislature,
according to the findings of the supreme
~lcourt, will not give a certificate of purity
Ito the Sixth assembly, or guarantee a
Ireign of honest politics while the democ-
lfacy is In power. Neither will his con-
Eviction n expulsion from the senate
Eembellish his accuser with spotless
probes. Every Montanian, who is not
tied up with one faction or the other Of
the democracy, keenly realizes tina there
is essentially little difference in the po-
1itical methods of the two wings. The
past is fragrant with the achievements
OF each in the line of political deviltry.
The outcome of the senatorial contest.
whatever it may be, will not affect the
well established pot-and-kettle relation
ship of the respective wings of the demo-
cratic party in this state. Occasionally,
one wing secures an advantage over the
other, gets a strangle-hold on it's throat,
and in the name of public purity begins
ditions reverse themselves, in the nature
OF things, and the sacred name of purity
is again overWorked by the other side,
when it gets on top for a spell. Mon
for years, until accusations and denials
emanating from either side are looked
upon with suspicion.
1t is clear to the average observer Of
events that if the truth, the whole truth,
and nothing but the truth, could be es-
tablished in court as to the political
manipulations of the contending factions,
fewer men in both wings would feel at
lliberty in the future to take upon them
selves any further direction of public
affairs. Circumstances over which they
would have no control would entitle
some of them to brief periods of repose
for their country's good.
If the decision to be ultimately rem
dered in the Clark case could wipe from
the archives of Montana history the
legislative auction block of six years
ago, in which both factions of the de-
mocracy We'd with each other in an
illegal and r~eprehensible struggle for
power-if it could transmute the blood
suckers and sycophants of the Sixth as
sembly from the activities of life to the
fading shadows of a political nightmare,
and permit the commonwealth to
wake into. the sweet forgetfulness of
q new morning in it's political career
1t would conserve an enc as important
to our people as the birth of statehood
in the red-letter day of our history.
But the conditions are such that the out
come in the pending investigation signi-