The Caucasian. (Shreveport, La.) 1900-192?, 1907-10-17
ON TRIAL.


The contest for the political control of
the Commonwealth has been between
forces which have purposes III the con-
duct of government that are diametri-
cally opposite To be specific. it is now
reduced to a conflict between those who
desire an administration of affairs which
will reflect the conscience and the intel
ligence of the State and those who, i'll
the past, were known AMI are now re-
cognized as the "spoi-hunting politi-
cian."
To secure the success of good. clean
government, and the election of men
who would honorably conduct all its de-
partments, has been the reason for our
constitutional suffrage limitations, OUT
drastic registration and election laws
and finally and more important, our pri
mary election statutes. which provide for
the popular selection of aniidates for
Office, instead of the former and crooked
convention plan
w Hi NilSSC AdIlS stuI1l1ttSU, dlu tuCy
are self-evident any voter of reasonable
intelligence can sum the situation as it
now obtains in the pending political con-
test in Louisiana
If it was not to do away with New
Orleans bosses; to destroy their Unfit
ence and their power in local ami State
politics, why the necessity for all these
constitutional and statutory enactments
looking to an elevated suffrage, fair
and free choice of candidates, and the
choosing of officials famed for cfarac-
ter. intelligence and personal worth?
Surely it is wasted effort to DO all
that which has been done, to secure clean
methods and clean men in Louisiana
politics, and then to apply the means to
those desirable ends in selecting and
electing Mr.. Sanders the Governor. as
the representative i'll character and in
purpose of the seventeen New Orleans
Bosses and all the pditicai vilcness their
beng indisputab!y implies!
Good men, thank Col but few, tell us
"but all that is politics
just as if politics was something
distinct in characteristics from a citi-
zen's honorable civic duty.
And these same good men, will come
complacently on the morrow after the
election of disgraceful methods and dis
srra~af,1 ,,,o,, -, ,>r1;%;ce ,,,d .,,,,or nth
the loudest for laws. TO destroy these
ends.
Are not these men aware of the fact
that laws, and they are ample, are the
means by which these bad things in gov
crnment can be corrected.
You must do the rest.
You have struggled for years against
the retention of the negro in politics
Who resisted your efforts to eliminate
that undesirable class of citizens?
Your seventeen New Orleans Bosses
pronounced against the constitutional
amendment in 1896 which wouli have
eliminated that voter, and they aideu in
its defeat!
And so with every law, with the con-
stitutional provision we now have, and
with all Our efforts for fair dealing in
elections AMI for men in office for other
purposes than for graft aud for spoils.
The seventeen Ward Bosses aid the
Sanders style of politicians one sand all
have resisted all these measures as long
as resistance was safe.
This being the case, what can you. the
good citizen, expect in case that Sanders
and his henchmen should succeed?
You have hal ample experience in the
sort of government you will have, and it |
will be supplemented by huge sinking
fund wrung from the already too heavily
burdencd taxpayer under the specious
plea of paying the State debt but
really for the purpose of a banking capi- |
tai to favorite campaign stipendiaries,
and in the end corruption fund which |
will debauch political morals, to the en1
that good government would be impos-
sible.
Sanders must go.