The Spokane press. [volume] (Spokane, Wash.) 1902-1939, 1905-02-22
BY William Francis Guion.

II man were to come to Spokane
and burn and destroy ever manufac-
turing plant, every wholesale house
would you think?
If that man, claiming to be a friend
Of yours. declaring himself to be
working for your betterment, COM
mitted An act of anarchy by sweep
ing away your fortune. or remov-
ing your means of Northumberland
would you do to him?
If a man, merely to make capital
for his employer out of an idea he
knew to be wrong, succeeds in be-
fuddling the voters and the legislat-
i've representatives to the point of
forcing the passage of a law which
sweeps from existence the entire
wholesale and manufacturing inter-
ests of your city, giving them the
sole alternative of moving their
plants to other cities actually favor
ed by such a bill-what are you go
ing to do?
If you find yourself at the inter-
takenly take the path which you later
mud to be leading you over a preci-
pice. are you going to continue to
follow that path?
Or will you turn back, acknowledge
you were wrong, and take the other
path which leads to safety?
1t is in such predicament the bust
OF EnI
themselves through following up the
theory of one man that Spokane and
eastern Washington must have q
railroad commission.
The time for plain speaking has
arrived. 1t is suicidal to remain
quiet longer.
The demagogucs and the politicians
have had their day. Now it is up to
The manufacturer and the wholesaler
and the merchant of Spokane to speak
out and save themselves from utter
financial ruin.
These words are not too strong.
Some OF the brightest minds in Spo-
kane business circles will tell you
that the passage of the railroad COM
mission lava law born and nursed
in Spokane--will mean the utter an
inhalation of the Spokane jobbing
trade.
For many days II has been known
that Spokane business men were led
into trap. The man whose blunder-
ing demagogism has come near to
making a cenotaph OF Spokane COM
merce Is Nelson w. Durham.
The F'rankenstein OF Spokane busi-
ness interests Is composed of Nc
Brideism and Durhamism.
In Mcbride the people of Spokane
purchased a gold brick
That gold brick was sold to them
by Nelson w. Durham.
1t is not the intention. In this series
Of articles, to devote much attention
to Nelson w. Durham. Rather 1t Is
intended to show the disastrous re-
suits obtaining from the blunders Of
q man who has attempted to trans
form a theory into a conditions
man who, In the days to come, IL the
commission bill pass. will be the most
eNcrated individual in eastern Wash
hgton.
This man. who has been openly
Aooted and jeered in mass meetings
of taxpayers and business men; who
has been forced to undergo the hui
initiation of sitting among hundreds
Of business men TO listen to a former
subordinate. Mayor Frank Boyd, ac-
cuse him of everything which savors
Of commercial and editorial blackmail
this man, l say, evolved a theory.
Notwithstanding the fact that he
was, and Ia. no more fitted to assume
. sway over the commercial interests
OF the city than the newest graduate
of theological seminary; this man
assumed to dictate to the business
interests of Spokane what they should
DO to be saved from financial ruin
which, he asserted, was impending at
the hands of the railroads.
This man whose whole worldly ex-
pericnce consists of what he meets
in going from Monroe and Riverside
to Augusta avenue and from Augusta
avenue to Monroe and Riverside =
--aesA judgment is nlonHaa bv V'a-