Barton County democrat. [volume] (Great Bend, Kan.) 1885-1915, 1902-09-26
SICK OF HENDERSON.
Iowa Editor Says the Speaker
Would Have Been Beaten.
Says Opposition includes the Very
. Flower of Republican Party in
His District-Predicts Vic
tory for Boies.


A special telegram to the Chicago
Chronicle from Waverly, Ia, under
date Of September II, says that e. w.
Miller, editor of the Democrat of that
place, who was chairman of the dem
ocratic congressional convention
which nominated Horace Boies, is of
the opinion that if Speaker Henderson
had remained in the field he would have
been beaten at the polls.
at is true that Mr.. Henderson received
plurality of more than IL coo two years ago.,
said Mr. Miller, but no one familiar with
past conditions here will accept that as an
index of his strength at the present time
Tor as an indication of the relative
strength of the two great parties either
then or now
''In 1900 the democrats. dfsgrurtled and
divided, perhaps more than in any other
district of the state, really permitted the
election to go by default, while the Hen
derson forces put forth much energy as
if their candidate was in actual danger of
defeat-a rule that they have worked by,
it may be said in passing, ever since MI
Henderson first became the republican can
didate in this district is years ago.
Criterion I'm Cumming Election.
1.-The result last year, when Gov. Cum
minis received less than 5000 majority.
would better serve to indicate the repub-
llcdn majority IN the OlStTlct, Out even
these figures are too high. Gov. Cummins.
it should be remembered, was the idol of
his own party and had hosts of democratic
admirers besides, while his opponent, Phil
lips, obscure man and haphaZard
nominee, whose whole campaign consisted
of a demonstration of his unfitness for the
position to which he feebly aspired. Add
to this the fact that the democratic state
convention had broken up in disorder with
out even having adopted a declaration of
principles, save to emphasize the 16 to
idea, which was never popular in this dis
trict, and it may readily be seen that the
democrats were in the lowest depths OF
despair and discomfort.
1T is safe to assume that over thousand
ordinarily stanch democrats voted for
Cummins, while as many more refrained
from voting at all. Make the deductions
from the republican majority cont aimed in
these facts and you have but about S,000 as
the majority that Former Gov. Boies will
have to overcome to achieve success. Is
the grand old man equal to this accomplish
ment? 1 say yes, most emphatica
Voters Sick of Henderson.
I'm the first place, the rank ard file of his
own party were and are heartily sick of
Henderson. They have had Henderson for
breakfast and dinner and supper, year in
and year out, till they feel like the partici-
pants in quail-eating contest. This feel
ing of nausea has been growing for some
years and has now assumed an acute form.
In word, there is revolt, and though more
aggravated in some places than others no
part of his district is free from it.
THE opposition to Mr.. Henderson in his
own party is not lacking in effective lead
erShip. 1t consists of the very flower of
the republican party in this district. Mr..
Henderson gave ample acknowledgements of
this fact when he ordered the snap con-
vention at which his last nomina ton was
made, which was called four months in ad-
vance of the ordinary time of holding such
conventions in this district. This unseemly
haste was to head off Senator COPYRIGHT,
the suggestion of whose candidacy hadlmet
with the heartieSt approval everywhere.
Unstable on Great Issues.
Nor are these republican opponents of
Col. Henderson lacking in effective argu-
.ments to prove that he never has represent
ed and does not now properly represent the
people of his district. They show by his
record that he has been unstable on all
sgreat questions of national import; that he
was first for free silver and then against IT !;
that he was first against Cuba libre and
then for it; that he was first against the re-
tention of the Philippines and then for it.
1T must not be inferred of course, that
these and other shifts have been made to
meet the changing sentiment In his district.
Quite the contrary. He has Topped around
without regard to what may have been the
opinion of his constituents, having supreme
confidence that they would get into the
band wagon and hurrah regardless of the
direction in which he proposed to guide it.
''Incomprehensib1e as it may seem. the
blind allegiance he demanded of his sup
porters has heretofore been given almost
without protest but there is limit to the
gullbility even of an Iowa republican, and
this limit was apparently reached when
Mr.. Henderson began to berate and sheer
at those republicans who were simple
enough to assume that the tariff reform
and antitrust plank that the astute Mr..
Cummins slipped into the republican plat
form at Cedar Rapids last year meant what
it said.
Call Him Tariff Trust Tool.
THAT afforded his enemies the opening
they had long been looking for and they
were not slow to take advantage of it,
They stand upon the platform, they say.
He does not. Therefore they oppose him
consistently and without the sacrifice of
party principle on their part. Moreover,
against him by claiming that his opposi-
ton to the platform is confession that he
is tool of the tariff protected trusts,
through whose favor he was elected.
Another thing Mr.. Henderson had to
contend with is a horde of disappointed Of
flee seekers. The offices of the district
seem generally to have gone to the wrong
men. Time was when Mr.. Henderson, like
the hero of song that did service on the
vaudeville stage last year. could turn down
an office seeker so politely that the sting
of defeat was easily alloyed, but of late he
has lost this knack entirely. As a conse-
Quence, the disappointed ones, generally
men of influence and standing in their re-
spective communities, are all knocking
instead of holding the Henderson bag as
they have done in times past.
Still another thing that worried Mr..
Henderson is the prohibitionists, who have
an active and brilliant candidate in the
field in the person of Rev. Mr.. Earl. OF
Waterloo.
BOies Strong In the Race.
''Mr. Boies is still Iowa s foremost states
man-earnest. honest, fearless and fair;
without guile, without conceit and without
ambition save to serve his party and his
country in the way that his Judgment and
conscience may direct. With such condi-
lions as I have described Mr.. Boies sue
cess is not a remote possibility. 1t is q
strong probability: indeed almost an as