The Billings gazette., 1903-11-13
THEIR MOTIVES ARE GIVEN
Reason Certain Men Have for Trying
to Inject Ohio Senator
Into Contest.

correspondent of the Minneapolis |
Journal, sends his paper a particularly
interesting letter in which he deals
with the talk of Senator Hanna's pro-
posed candidacy for the republican
presidential nomination in opposition
to Roosevelt He gives the facts and
also tells few things, perhaps, not
generally known to those who are Tar
removed from the eastern centers OF
political activity. Those who still think
that the eminent Ohioan may yet be
sprung on the con1 sntion next year
would do we'll to read Mr.. Jermane's
letter and thoroughly digest it.
Heresds what he says:
"The situation as to the proposed
candidacy of Senator Hanna for the
republican presidential nomination is
simplified when it is recalled that Mr..
Hanna ran on a platform this year
that strongly pledged him and the
Ohio party to Roosevelt's nomination.
The facts connected with the shaping
up of the Ohio platform ought still to
be fresh in the public mind. Early
last spring, when the convention pre-
liminaries were being arranged, it de-
veloped that Hanna was opposed-lt
was said for impersonal reasons-to
committing the Ohio republicans to
Roosevelts nomination. At once Sen
ator Foraker came out for Roosevelt,
and there was great interest in what
the convention would do. Failure to
indorse the president would weaken
his cause and encourage the Wall
street opposition; Endorsement would
clear the atmosphere and give the
president a decided advantage. After
it had become apparent that Hanna,
while protesting friendship for the
president, was against Endorsement,
the president, being then in the tar
west on his tour, sent telegram 10
him. saying in effect that failure to
indorse would mean that Ohio was
unfriendly. To this telegram Hanna
promptly replied, saying that there
should be Endorsement; and there was,
of the strongest sort. 1t was on the
platform containing this Endorsement
that Hanna has just won his wonderful
victory. These facts dispose OF the
Hanna presidential candidacy very
easily. That candidacy, by the way,
is merely the expression of the views
of certain disgruntled ones in the east,
who are still grasping at straws. 1t is
entirely safe to say that Senator Han
ma is not a party to it, and WILL not
be. He knows good deal better than
these pretended friends OF his what
the chances would be, in convention
and before the people, and is too sane
and far-sighted to be used in such
a. connection.
Last winter these same eastern in
terests which oppose Roosevelt made
a strenuous effort to gain Hanna's
consent to become candidate
Finally, the matetr having gone so fal
as to attract wide attention, Hanna
made his declaration of support o.
Roosevelt, to which he referred sew
eral DAYS ago in making his second
declaration. Disappointed, the enc
mics of the president-conhned, al
most exclusively to the trust interests
of Wall street-turned to Senator
Fairbanks, whom they tried to prevail
on to enter the race. They failee
here, also, since which time they have
been uuiescent. They have beer
stirred to temporary activity by th'
results of the Cuban election, but ono
more Senator Hanna comes forwart
and says that he will not be candi
date against Roosevelt
"These enemies of the president, b.
the way, are the ones who were S
bitterly hostile to him when the wa
governor of New York, because OF Gel
tain positions he took with referenc
to pubic service corporations III lno
state They did not want him renom
mated for governor, and so the
schemed to sidetrack him in the vic'
presidential chair. This plan ais
failed, for reasons which nobody, {
course. could foresee in 1900, and no
these same ones are again arraye
against him, and for year and MOI
have been laboring like hired men
prevail on somebody to contest tn
nomination with him next year. 1t
8 this same Wall street crowd, by tn
way. which so strongly opposed tt
reelection of Mayor Low. They don
want ANYBODY in office who is not the