Akron daily Democrat. [volume] (Akron, Ohio) 1892-1902, 1902-07-23
In the Race This
Year.
G.. Walt Whitman Has
Been a Candidate
A Long Time Now, But He
Hadn't $50.

Union, s. c., July 23-The most pic
turesque Of the many picturesque men
who have of recent years appealed to
the voters of this state for high Off
cial positions is missing this year from
the Gubernatorial contest. The man
referred to is G. Walt Whitman of this
town, and the reason he is not being
heard at the various campaign meet
ings now being held throughout the
state is due to Col. Wiley Jones, the
chairman of the State Democratic exc
cutive committee. G. Walt was ex-
tremely anxious to make the race for
Governor, but when the time came for
him to sign the pledge to abide the re-
suit of the primary, he was unable to
raise the $50 that all candidates for
Governor are required to pay in to the
treasury of the campaign committee,
in order to have their names placed ON
the ballots.
When Whitman found that he was
not going to get the wherewithal to
make the race he wrote to Col. Jones,
asking that he be allowed to make the
canvass without paying the fee. He
would, he explained to the Colonel,
in the event of his election. pay into
the treasury of the committee 81 900
out of his first years salary as Gov
ernor, provided, of course, that the
people of the state took 1t into their
heads to elect him, a conclusion, by
the way, that he considered absolutely
certain, even if during all the years
he had been running for Office his to-
tai vote out of the thousands cast ney.
er passed the 100 mark in the whole
state. Colonel Jones declined to allow
Walt to run under the conditions pro-
posed, and the campaign was robbed
as result of its most unique charac-
ter.
If Colonel Jones had seen At to allow
Walt to make the race it would have
been the sixth time that Whitman had
offered himself as a candidate for
Gubernatorial honors
In the campaign previous to this one
Whitman managed to raise the cam
paign fee, and his name was duly filed
as one of the regular candidates. When
the time came, two years ago, to COM
mence the stumping of the state, he
did not have enough money to pay his
railroad fare to the different court
houses. Not to be outdone, he raked
together what money he could, and
bought a bicycle of ancient make to
| make the circuit of the state. On this
clumsy machine, over bad roads,-and
| South Carolina is full of bad roads,
through dense forests, where the pine
leaves that covered the ground ow-
ing to their sickness, made his pro-
gress almost impossible, he toiled
along and managed, Notwithstanding
the handicap, to make nearly every
county in the state in time for the
campaign meetings.
His speeches were always out Of the
ordinary. You people," he would
say, don't know what good Gov
ernor is. Don't you want to know? !?
don't believe you do, for if you did,
you would elect me Governor. ! have
been running for this job for long
time, and l am almost constrained to
believe that at last you have come to
your senses, and are about to elect as
Governor the one man who can ad-
minister the laws made for your bene-
fit, as can no other ever elected to the
Office of Governor"
| Whitman has an idea, and It is SIN
cere, that unless some day he becomes
Governor Of South Carolina the state
will go to ruin. He has no faith in the
other candidates, and no argument can
convince him that he is not predestin-
ed to be the Governor of people, only
about one out of 10000 of whom has
ever cast vote for him.
| Whitman conducts a small grocery
store here, and when Colonel Jones
ruled him out of the primary he made
speciality Of selling kerosene oil, and
announced himself in the public prints
as an opponent OF the Standard Oil
Company. In order to get his supply
of the fluid, he hit upon an original
idea. The owners of the cotton fac
tories hereabouts all run stores In con-
nection with their plants, using as a
medium of exchange aluminium checks
which are taken at the store in place
of money. OF course these checks are
not good at the dispensary, and the
factorymen often find themselves un-
able to get their drams for the simple
-raasnn that tho disppnsnrV is n stata