Los Angeles herald., 1905-10-29
HOWPARTR|DGEAN AND.
SCHM|7z WAGE
FIERCE WAR
Forces Of Corruption
and Graft Rally
Four Years of Unbridled
License
Outraged Decency Rebels at
a Continuation
Abe Ruef, the Warwick, and the Un-
speakabIe Rottenness He Fathers.
BoodIing Made an UnassaiIable
Science-No LidWanted, but
a Check-up Demanded
Outraged Decency Rebels at
a Continuation
BY WILLIAM HAMILTON CLINE

Why is Mayor schmitz the greatest
carpenter that ever was?"
Because he put A Ruef Ga roof over
San Francisco
That's the joke that they spring on
you in the big city up north when you
start to talk politics with them.
Then they hasten to add that this
roof or Ruef is not lid by any means
that Frisco not only. has no lid, but
that it has no bottom either. 1t is a
huge cylinder, and you 'can go as far
as you like either up or down. Pref
erably down; it is easier and the gait
is faster; the ways are better creased g
San Francisco is IL city utterly with
out limit to it's vice 1t has been so for
four years now and it is debating
within itself as to whether or not it
shall continue so, or shall accept a
measure of decency.
1t will never become strait-laced it
isn't that sort of a place: it wants that
kind of life no more than.does the horde
of FOUNDERS who graVitate there frorl
every quarter of the globe. The very
best men in the city would hold up their
hands and protest against battened-
down matches and tightly screwed lid;
this Paris of America" because that is
what the town is famous for.
Went Too Far
But there is a certain proportion of
its people who believe that the entire
throwing away of the lii was too much.
The covering should be kept tilted
away back, but it's hinges should not
be utterly detached. 1t should stand
propped open by so slight a support that
too strenuous pushing will let it drop
only for an instant. possibly. but even
an instants closure has an effect on
checking those beneath and confining
them to a certain prescribed boundary.
Hence they would affix the extinguisher
by a DamoClesan thread, ready, like a
candle snuffer of old. to drop when the
flame smokes too noisomely to bear.
And battle royal is now waging in
Frisco TO decide whether the very
hinges themselves shall be torn off and
the city be abandoned entirely to the
vultures and vampires of vice. or
whether the snuffer threat shall
be the status
1t is too early yet to tell which will
win; so far, the tide has shown a turn
and whereas the cohorts of unre
strained graft Righteousness and
evil started out confidently able to
handle the situation, they have now
reached the explanation" stage while
the decent elements, amalgamated in
an unholy alliance as discordant as the
Visigoths and the sages of Greece would
have been, have the upper hand.
San Francisco hopes that the allied
forces will succeed; they stand for the
real San Francisco idea-a measure of
openness. but not a Haunting of vice
even in the face of Gods own elect.
The Leaders
Leading these cohorts are, on the side
of relative decency. a young man, John
S. Partridge, of excellent repute; on
the other Abe Ruef. who, by Eugene
e. Schmitz, twice elected mayor, has
been made his Warwick, his Richelieu-
Abe Ruef, whom all San Francisco ex-
ecrates, and yet on whom none may lay
hand for a single illegal act.
And these two are fighting the battle
of civic decency-say, rather, bettA-
ment, for Frisco won't stand for de-
cency all at once-in the metropolis of
the coast
It's a beautiful fight. I've seen many
q hot political contest, and have partici-
pated in scores of them. but never have
I beheld one wherein the ardor on each
side was fiercer the recriminations
were stronger, the allegations were mas
tier, and the words uttered were
palmer. They name a spade a spade
up in Frisco just now, and a rascal
isn't called anything else. For libel
laws they care not whit and for per-
sonalities they make the Cleveland
Blaine canvass odorous of rosewater
and sweet saVors.
Oh, it's a jolly vile fight, and Wig
orous one. and slathers of money they
are spending on it, too. 1t won't last
much longer, but it grows with every
passing hour, and if battle and murder
and sudden death do not crop out be-
fore the count is made I've missed my
guess and am no prophet.
And when it is won?
If Partridge succeeds-and that's
the way it looks nowhere will be a
sweeping out in the huge, ugly city
hall, that will be a wonder, and for n
couple of years it is almost certain
that there will be an honest govern
ment, even If it doesn't chain down
things to the level that some would
like.
And if Schmitz wins, there will be a
carnival of graft that will make what
has gone before as weak as was Law
sons yawp compared to what the in
surance Investigations revealed.