Albuquerque evening citizen. [volume] (Albuquerque, N.M.) 1905-1907, 1905-10-24
LETTER ANSWER D


Alexander F. McAlister. county recorder and clerk
of board of supervisors, Navajo county. Holbrook, Ariz.
is due a letter from The Citizen; for not only did he write
this paper a letter. signed with the name he bears in Art
zona, and enclosed in an envelope carrying that name
and the Office titles which at present accompany it, but
he was evidently so well pleased with this epistolary Ell
fort of his genius, that he published the same letter in
the Winslow Mail, as an open letter to The Citizen.
There was a single. solitary difference in the two let
tiers, and that difference lay in the signature. The letter
which came through the mail was signed plain, every day
"McAllister,' while the copy published in the Mail was
signed Ajax" There were two Homeric heroes of that
name. They were Ajax, the son of lebanon and BRAY.
est of the Greeks before Troy next to Achilles and the
son of Oleus, the lesser Ajax, dexterous and brutal
Greek hero in the Trojan war" 1t was not necessary for
the county recorder and clerk of board of supervisors"
to inform the pubic as to which of these ancients he is
related by descent or similarity. His work speaks for it.
self.
OF course. The Citizen cannot determine whether
the letter was written for the Mail and McAlister was so
pleased with it that he had it typewriter and sent TO
The Citizen, or whether it was written for The Citizen
and McAuister was so pleased with it he got Ajax to
have it published. Nor does it matter materially. Ihe
result is the same, the evident satisfaction of McAllister
with this banting of his brain. But the purpose of the
letter is manifest. McAlister found it necessary to VOID
his venom, and he selected The Citizen and the Messrs.
Bird and Ling of Arizona and Rodey of New Mexico as
the objects Of his ire.
Probably the best remembered story of the AJAX OF
olden time, is that one perpetuated in a picture,
and named Ajax Defying the Lightning. Inc
mighty man of war got mad at something and went out
into a storm. bare-headed, shook his fist at the light
ming and dared 1t to strike him. Perhaps, II was TINS IN
cident which led McAnister to assume the name. The
thunders rolled and the lightning flashed, but Great Jove
paid no attention to the ~foolhardy Greek. So Messrs.
Ling, Bird and. Rodey may pay no attention to McAlhs-
ter; but If they shall conclude to strike, may the Lord
have mercy on him. There will be nothing left but the
name and the office.
OF The Citizen McAllister says You and the rest
of your territorial press have followed in the same lines.
"A New Mormon State" Mormon Hierarchy" and of
fceholders League" etc. This was the hue and cry you
raised in the campaign against statehood for Arizona.
You had not the generosity to let us work out our own
salvation nor the courage to say, Let the people of Ari-
zona declare at the polls their sentiments as to their ad-
mission as a separate state" You raise the bugaboo OF
etc.
Every statement in this charge is an absolute and
unmitigated falsehood, as every reader of The Citizen
well knows. This paper never raised hue and cry
against statehood for Arizona and not one line can be
produced from its utterances which can be so interpreted
We have advocated the submission of the question to
the people of Arizona at the polls, and have condemned
the Phoenix movement because it proposes to have the
bill for joint admission killed in congress, thus prevent
ing it's submission TO the people. Neither have we rails
ed the bugaboo of Mormon predominance, as a perusal
of our pages viii fail to show anything whatever which
can be so construed. The fact is that The Citizen has
had but litte to say concerning the statehood controver
sy in Arizfta, limiting itself almost exclusively to copy
ing some VI the utterances of the Arizona papers on the
subject; and even this has been done quite sparingly.
If McAllister is not a reader of The Citizen, accord
ing to what law of God or man does he presume to tell
the public what The Citizen has said and done? II he is
a reader of The Citizen, then is he one of those careful
penurious people who read a paper which some one else
has paid for; because it has been several years since the
name of Sandy McAllister appeared on The Citizen list