The Hood River glacier. (Hood River, Or.) 1889-1933, 1906-03-01
IS TRYING TO FORCE
E. |. SMITH INTO RACE

The Irrigon lrrigator has the fol.
lowing to say about the candidacy OF
+. l.. Smith, although Mr.. Smith
has said that he is not candidate
The primary law we are told was
placed upon the statute books for the
purpose of taking nominations out Of
the hands of rings and cliques, and
from the politicians themselves, and
placing the matter in the hands Of the
people-the voters.
Theoretically the idea is perfect,
and savors of Efysia. But as we ap-
proach our first election under this
law we find vast difference between
theory and actual conditions, and to.
day we see that for the Office of gov
ernor the only candidates are those
who went to work early aud came out
simply as office seekers, quite in the
old way. -.
Against the present candidates the
lrrigator has no word Of fault to find.
DR.. Withycomhe, Mr.. Johns and Mr..
Geer are all good men, and if one Of
them secures the nomination we will
be found standing shoulder to shoul-
der with the nominee aud working
zealously, enthusiastically and pa
triotically for his election.
But as a republican we are asking
this question: Can any one of these
men defeat, George Chamberlain? And
the answer comes back from republi-
cans all over the state that the nomi.
nation of Withycombe, Johns or Geer
means the election of Chamberlain.
There is one man in the state who
can defeat Chamberlain to certainty,
and that man is E. L. Smith of Hood
River, but he has never been candi-
date, is not now candidate, and has
recently declared that he will not be
candidate, believing that the office
should seek the man.
But, fellow republicans, do we want
"candidate?" AS we said at first,
theoretically the direct primary law
is supposed to take the nominations
out of the hands of candidates" and
place them in the hands of the people.
In other words the trainers Of that law
supposed that the people, the voters,
would press into service the best men
for the various offices, and particu-
larly for the great office of governor.
Shall we exercise this high peroga-
tive, or shall we sit supinely down
and see the nomination go to a ''can-
didate" and the office to democrat?
From Malheur on the east to Clat-
sop on the west; from KLAMATH to, the
Columbia-throughout every county
in the state comes demand for Mr..
Gpotfh 20 hfs,,,n1f IN no
hands of his friends, for our new law
will not allow us to nominate him or
any other man, for that or. any other
office, until he has filed an announce
ment that he will accept the nonina-
tion if given to him.
Our duty is plain; we must snow
Mr.. Smith under with requests that
he make such announcement. We
must lombard him in his Hood River
home.with kilograms, letters and petit
tions, and those of us who can must
go and see him and tell him the peo-
pie Of Oregon want him to be their
standard bearer in the coming cam
paign.
And he will accept. He is too loyal
a citizen, too staunch republican,
too much OF a man to refuse us if we
make it clear to him that he is the
choice of a large number of the peo-
pie Of his party.
We must do this at once. You who
are reading this article should not
waste a moment, but write or wire to
him at once, and tell Mr.. Smith that
you want. him to be the next governor
of Oregon. And if few Thousand of
us do our duty there is no doubt OF
the result.
Will we do it? We have all agreed
to give, the direct primary law a fair
trial, and here is our opportunity
to take advantage of that law and
elect governor Of our own. >
One last word: Write to Hon. b..
L. Smith, Hoo River, Oregon, today,
NOW, aud tell him you want him to
become the republican candidate for
governor of the state of Oregon