Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1903-11-21
cullen SEES CHICAGO
And Draws a Few Interest
ing Comparisons.
COUPLE OF ERUPTIONS
JUST NOW OCCUPY ATTENTION OF
"WINDY CITYITEs."
People There Don't Dress as Well as in
Washington-Not Nearly So Good
Place to Live.
COUPLE OF ERUPTIONS

Special Correspondence of The Evening star.
CHICAGO. November 10. 1903.
| They are in the enjoyment OF two erup-
| tons here just now. One is a car strike
of the usual Chicagoesque type, which en-
braces the hurting of many missiles The
| other is thing not visible to the naked
| eye. But it has big volume of sound to
| the unprecedented ear. Its smothered roar Is
not unlike that of subterranean river. But
| it is a sure-enough roar.
| 1t is eruption of de gang against
young Carter Harrison, who only recently
| ceased being the son of his father. They
| tell you now in Chicago that Mr. Harrison
| couldn't be elected for dog-catcher, much
| less for mayor. They say, bitterly, that ne
| has ''trun the town" They are fair enough
| to say on top of this that Mr.. Harrison
| doesn't want to be elected mayor of Chi
| cago any more-that he desires to be either
| governor of Illinois or President of the
| United States
That" they say. as why he is giving
| us the double-cross-us, the people that
| made him. He thinks he doesn't need us
any more, and SO he is handing it out to
| us. He has gone over to the goo-goos
| and the silk stockings. But we'll get an
other crack at him-and then watch out!
| There are those who say that Mayor
| Harrison is beginning to train with the re-
| formers because he has been stung by
| the shameless articles that have been
written about Chicago and his administra-
| ton of it, That may well be, although 1t
| seems improbable.
Those Shameless articles have been
written about Philadelphia, too. and Phil
| adelphia doesn't appear to be hanging her
| head. The shameless shafts have been
| hurled at New York, and on January the
| first next Tammany is going to take over
! New York and run it in the same old
| Tammany way.
Innumerable Shameless javelns have
been cast at st. Louis and the only result
| worth speaking of is that the whole popu-
| lation of St. Louis. reformers and graft
ers, have got together to 'hurl back the
| vile insinuationS."
| Nor has young Mr.. Harrison ever ap-
peared to be what you might call touchy
politician. Yet, whatever the motive that
| actuates him, 1t is certain that he has
! picked up the reformers' schedule of mu-
| nicipal abuses and is beginning to check
| off corrections.
Harrison Knows Where He Stands.
| 1t may be that he has made a deliberate
and careful count of noses and knows
| perfectly where he stands in undertaking
| this new line of action. He may know
| that, in this course, he has two IN
| dorsers to one detractor. The people who
| like good government, so-called, are not
| takers. They are generally under cover
| with their opinions.
They neither bubble with praise nor fume
| with QlSdDprOVal. lNey cdlHliy await tiiO
voting hour, and allow the ballot to serve
| as their pronouncement. AS to measures
| and men, they do little or no shouting, but
a lot of thinking. Mr.. Harrison. than
| whom there is no better feeler of the pub
| lie pulse of Chicago, may have thorough
| understanding as to how his new line OF
| policy is going to be viewed by this ire
| mendous quiet vote. But his knock-
erS'' are everywhere.
You hear him everywhere dispraised as
| an migrate. His own tribe" can no longer
| speak of him without a gnashing of teeth
| They sneer at his steps against the graft
| ers pointing to the application of his in
| come since the death of his father.
There are those who, caring nothing for
| politics, but setting a heap OF store by the
| relationships of men, cast up to Mr.. Har-
rison by word of mouth as well as by way
| of print, his recent handling of some OF his
! friends. One of them, a downtown sa-
| loonkeeper, who is said to have contributed,
| in all, something like s150,O00 toward Mr..
| Harrison's various elections, recently mad
| his license taken away from him because
| handbook man was found to be doing
| business in the saloon.
The deprivation of his license costs the
saloon man S100, 900 a year. He has made
sworn affidavit that he never knew of the
| presence of the handbook man in his es-
| Establishment. And so on, and so on. All
| in all it is curious thing to observe how
| this former Idol has been cast to the
earth by the people who talk. Young Car
| ter Harrison used to be pointed to with
| by the people opposed to him politically, as
| a "Chicago product" If he has any actual
worshipers left now, they are those who
burn their incense in private.
When you have been away from Chicago
for a number of years the Chicago people
you meet have a way of saving: you
ought to see the town now.' And you go
out expecting to see a Chicago entirely diff
ferent from the grimy old place you once
knew. After you have looked at it for half
an hour you wonder what those Chicago
folks meant. 1t is the same old Chicago
a little murkier, little dirtier, little
ooZier il anything. They have some higher
buildings.
Some Corner landmarks Gone.
Some of the corner landmarks of ten
years ago are gone. Some of the boule-
wards have been stretched across the bare
plains into Indiana But it is the old Chi
cago, all the same On clear days the sun
still has to fight its way down 10 the town,
and when it arrives its light is as feeble
and wan as that cast by pine torch at
distance of forty feet.
The black mire still slashes over your
shoes and adheres with permanent stain
to the bottoms of your trousers. And ev-
erybody still wears that old air of rush
and hustle, which always did seem to be
more than half of a bluff The hustling of
the Chicagoans seems, somehow or an
other to be a sort of a generally under
stood scheme devised to impress strangers
The Chicagoan with an hour for lunch
runs to the lunch counter not because he Is
in any real hurry, but because 1t would ac-
tually seem he wants to let 1t be under
stood that he is so busy that his life de-
ponds upon his celebrity
And they talk about dollars and deals
and little else, in the same old way In Chi
cago You'll hear chaps with shiny-rimmed
hats and fringed trousers and seedy over
coats talking breezily about deals in which
they stand to make thousands and tens of
thousands of dollars-and they are hungrily
snealxing free lunch, without buying beer"
as they talk.
In one thing, however they all persist:
The sky Is higher in Chicago than it is
anywhere else over the world. In the Bit
terness with which they uphold their town
before all others, in the bravery with which
they double-dog- dare any outsider to knock
chip off their shoulders by saying word
of dispraise of Chicago they are more like
Californians than any other Americans.
The Chicagoans are the chosen people
They say it because they know it, and
they know it because they say it. And this
municipal pride is a pretty good thing. It
II: xl.14