Los Angeles herald., 1905-08-06

Notwithstanding the fact that everS
morning daily in Los Angeles had two
or three pages about the water cues.
tion within the past week, the San
Francisco Chronicle had not tele-
graphic line about the biggest project
which has ever been advanced upon
the Pacific coast. That journal did
manage to get in few lines about the
matter editorially, however, to the
effect that Los Angeles was getting
ready to provide water facilities for
a population of two millions and to
bond the city for $23,OOO.0O0 for that
purpose.
When the editor wrote that para
graph he was simply paralyzed. 1t is
comparatively a short time since Los
Angeles was looked upon as, and In
deed It was little less than, mere
Cow county," and the city of that
name was a small 'dobe pueblo. In
1872 the congressional district of Los
Angeles, which now has a district of
her own, and which is fully entitled
to half another, formed a portion of
the Fourth district, which ran up to
the San Francisco line and took in
Santa Clara county, running down to
the Mexican line on the south, thus
giving 1t a straight length of six hum
dred miles, and more than that length
diagonally, from Santa Clara, on the
bay, to Yuma, on the Colorado. The
probability is extreme that, in the next
apportionment founded upon the CEN
sus of 1910, the region now known as
Los Angeles county will be entitled to
three members of the house of repre-
sentatives.
Was a Big District
Even as late as 1886 the Los Angeles
district ran away north of San Fran
cisco and took in Alpine county. The
campaigner who had to get over 1t in
that year, from Yuma to Alpine, had
to keep hopping from a car to stage
coach and in some cases into steam
boat, and was sometimes lucky If he
could repose himself on billiard table
when his political labors were over for
the day.
made the campaign that year my
self as the Democratic candidate, and
can vividly recall having secured
bench for my slumbers, and having
hardly got into my first nap when
deputy sheriff arrived with an insane
woman, whom he was taking to the
State Insane asylum, when I was per-
force, obliged to yield to the exigent
'place aux DANES" which is nowhere
so heartily observed as in California,
and HE me to the billiard table.
In the last thirty years or so there
have been two congressional elections
in the district of which Los Angeles
was a part, which had notably interest
ing features, and which were INTEREST
ing besides, from the personnel Of the
contestants. The first was that OF 1877.
The candidates were Sherman o.
Houghton, who is today well known
citizen of Los Angeles, that might make
a rafting campaign tomorrow were he
called upon, and who was the Republ-
can nominee and Colonel e. ]. G.
Kewen, who ,uplifted the Democratic
standard. The district was at that
time said to be heavily Democratic, and
Kewen was thought to have a walk
over. Some of his enthusiastic parti-
zans even went so far as to put his
majority at 5000.
He Was Yankee
Mr.. Houghton was a representative
Yankee, cool-headed, argumentative,
perfectly poised, sure to make a point
where skill and self-possession and a
considerable element of force were
likely to count. He hailed from the
extreme north end of the district, and
canvassed every portion of it with in
dustry and sagacity. He shrewdly
avoided a joint debate, and kept peg
ging away up till the eve of election
day, with true New England persever-
snce. By the way, Tom Reed, the
car Of the house, read law with
Houghton in San Jose, and entered
into the practice Of the law from his
office.
There were various reasons why
Kewen was thought by most people
to be sure winner. In the first place,
he was a typical southerner and an
argonaut. He and his brother Achilles
the latter noted duellist-were the
very pink of chivalry and high in the
confidence of the Gwin-Terry element
of the Democracy. He was a fine
lawyer, with most ingratiating man
ners and magnetic ways. He was re-
garded as one of the greatest stump
speakers of the state, and, by many
was in the same galaxy as Baker
Edgerton and Tom Fitch.
Those who were fond of glowing and