Gloucester County Democrat. (Woodbury, N.J.) 1878-1932, 1905-10-12

| the name of the poor man The primary
1 makes necessary a headquarters, clerks,
i stationery, postage, advertising, railroad
/ journeys and other legitimate expenses.
| The late primary in Virginia cost the sue
| cessful candidate for senator upward of
| have got to the senate under such condi-
| tons? How would Wade Hampton ever
| have got there?
| Mr.. Swanson's expenses amounted to
above SOCIAL legitimate, all warranted
| by the law Mr.. Wizards output was
much larger. When Zeb Vance was first
| elected governor of North Carolina 1t is
| doubtful if he could have footed such a
bill, even in Confederate paper money,
and it is certain that Luke Blackburn
was nominated and elected governor OF
| Kentucky on $100.
Where does the poor man come in? OF
course, all our statesmen, national and
| local, are friends of the poor man. 1t is
| doubtful if a search warrant would dis
cover an enemy of the poor man among
all the statesmen and politicians OF Amer
| lea, though the United States army, in
| Guiding the marines, were detailed as a
posse coTnitatus to execute the process.
| Neither has a rich man any friends-he
doesn't need them.
Under the old representative system the
poor man got along very well. The repre-
sentatives of his party met in convention,
scrutinized his claims and dealt with him
accordingly. That is the way Andrew
Johnson and James A. Garfield, both poor
men, got to be president. It put George
g. Vest and John G. Carlisle in the Unit
ed States Senate-that old system of rep
resentative party government.
But what chance does a poor man have
in a primary that requires an expensive
organization and more expensive cam
vass? Not the slightest, other things be-
ing equal. Had the old system maintains
ed it is doubtful if Senator Martins ex-
penses in Virginia would have amounted
to $1,000, and Mr.. Swanson might have
successfully contested the nomination for
governor for $780, as did old Luke Black
burn in 1879.
The excuse for the primary is that a
poor man stands no chance in a conven-
ton because conventions are not honest.
Depend on it that party that cannot
hold an honest convention will never con-
duct an honest primary election
The Democrats have just held an honest
primary in Virginia, and they could with
infinitely less trouble and far less expense
have held an honest convention.
Evidently the gravamen of the Posts
charge against the primary system is
the cost. The trouble with the Post is
that it knows by sworn statements
how much it cost Senator Martin, Gov
ernor Swanson and others to secure
nominations in primaries nominations
being equivalent to election = but it
does not know how much it has cost
other men to be nominated and elected
governor and senator by the old con-
vention system. Does anybody suppose
that one-half of the senators now hold
ing seats in that august body got there
bysexpending less than Martin did? If
so, the Post is a simple Simon. Senator
Warner of Missouri was elected at
cost of S16.50 but how much did it
cost the beloved Tom Niedringhaus,
who baggad the senatorial nomination
in the Republican caucus and who was
defeated by bolt engineered by Re-
publicans who loved him notf How
much does the Post suppose that bolt
cost the men who managed it? No
doubt the cost of that performance
would cause Senator Martins $1,000
to look like 80 cents. Does the Post
not know that Tom Niedringhaus got
claim that be had expended vast sums
to elect a Republican legislature in
Missouri? 1t surely cannot have for
gotten that unsayory chapter of recent
politics. True, it turned ont oil inyesti-
cation that most of the money kexpend-
ed by Tom in corruptly electing Re
publican legislature was furnished by
others and that his nomination was Sc
cured by false pretenses, but that
doesn't matter The money was spent
like water. Whether it was furnished
by Niedringhaus or somebody else. the
result was the same-the corrupt cleo
ton of Republican legislature ana
the nomination of Tom achieved by
false representations. Then Colonel
Richard G. Kerens. an old Republican
war horse, who had been paying the
Republican freight for years in Mis-
souri,. got both his dander and his back
up and knocked Toms trotters from
under him.