The commercial. (Union City, Tenn.) 190?-193?, 1904-08-05
DEMOCRACY GREATER.

per one loyhl 10 lGS organization
and principles. No newspaper is
justified in airing the personal and
private grievances or the selfish
ambition of its editor or some
one else with a sore toe. At the
same time we do not believe it to
be a journalistic duty to shield the
party in all its mistakes. The
plumbers may be overlooked, but
the policy of false aggression is
wrong and should be reprimanded.
1t may give temporary advan-
tage, but does not invite future
success. 1t is our honest opinion
that a division should have been
allowed in the district convention
which selected delegates to the
county convention to name a can
didate for Representative this year
whether or not it complied with
the technical rules governing on
that occasion. 1t is a matter of
fact that the aye and nay vote
were recorded plainly and an
nounced as cast, yet only a portion
of the crowd voted and a division
would not have broken any law or
established a new precedent, but
would have settled absolutely and
without any question the status of
that convention. While all this is
true there is no doubt in our minds
that the majority of the Demo
cratic voters in the courthouse
that day, and very decided one
at that, favored the selection of
Fry delegates to the county con-
vention. There has also been a
great deal of discussion about the
district convention at Rives. Some
of the best citizens in Rives and
country say that the Fry delega-
ton was named by a majority of
those participating in the conven-
ton, while others whose word is
just as good contradict it. We
have no personal knowledge of
that convention, but leaving out
Number Four entirely, with Num-
Der Thirteen voting in favor of
Fry the result would have been the
same. Taking these things into
consideration, and the fact that a
Mcdowell delegate was refused an
appeal from the decision of the
chair in the county convention,
concedlng them to be mistakes, we
do not find reasonable excuse for
leaving the convention and its
Both in the district
conventions and in the county con-
vention the Fry sentiment was
supported by majority vote, if it
was an aye and nay vote, and we
are as confident as we ever were
about anything that a standing
vote would have more than en-
phasized this majority, hence we
see no excuse under the sun for
leaving the nominee of that con-
vention and lining up with hos
tile faction. The Commercial has
declined to entertain some of the
claims made by Mr.. Moore and
others for the reason that we pre-
ferred making our own statements
about these matters. We prefer
as a Democratic paper to do all we
can to assist the party in its bat
Ties. If others wear their party
fealty loosely, matters not how
many, we are not gong to desert
the ship. If an officer of the law
makes mistake and prevents an
independent candidate from occu-
plying political platform the
Democratic party should not by
any means be held responsible for
such an error. But we understand
that it was no mistake-that the
officer was fulfilling his duty in
other speakers from the
platform during the time allotted
to the Congressional candidates.
After that we are told that the
officer offered privilege of the
platform to anyone who wished
to speak. If this was a mistake
the officer and not the Democrat
was responsible for it. Men, where
is your Democracy, where is your
IN the nartv of the