The Lake County times. [volume] (Hammond, Ind.) 1906-1933, 1907-04-20
"Thls Campaign of Yours and MIR.
Burbank's Must Be Costing an
Awful Lot OF Money"

first l had been inclined to give him
his way But the more l considered
the matter, the stronger seemed to be
come the force of the objections-it
takes far bigger man than was Bur
bank at that stage of his growth not
to be cheapened by "steeple-chasing
for votes" also, the coming of the
candidate causes jealousy and heart
burning over matters of precedence
reception and entertainment among
the local celebrities, and so he often
leaves the party lukewarm where he
found 1t enthusiastic. Further, it
uses up local campaign money that
ought to be spent in hiring workers
at the polls, which is the polite phrase
for vote-buying as "retaining-fee'' ia
the polite phrase for bribe
decided against the tour and for
the highly expensive but always ad-
mirable and profitable pilgrimage
plan
Burbanks own home was at Riv-
ington, and l should have had him
visited there, had 1t not been on a
single-track branch railway which
could not handle without danger and
discomfort the scores of thousands we
were planning to carry to and from
him daily. So, 1t was given out that
he purposed as far as possible to
withdraw from the strife Of the cam
paign and to await the results in the
digni6ed calm In which he wished the
voters to determine it. He took
after Woodruff had carefully selected
it-a retired" house I'm the coun-
try"
And 1t was in the open country. A
farm garden adjoined it on the one
side, a wheat field on the other, a
large orchard to the rear The broad
meadow in front gave plenty OF room
for delegations visiting the standard
bearer of the party of patriotism" IN
his rural seclusion" to hear his
simple, spontaneous words Of well
come. But for all the remote aspect
OF the place, it was only FIVE minutes
drive and ten minutes walk from q
station through which four big rail-
ings was changed into telegraph Of
fee from which accounts of the en-
thusiasm of the delegations and of his
speeches could be sent to the whole
country. On his desk in his little
study stood private-wire telephone
that, without danger of leakage.
would put him in direct communica-
ton either with my study at Fredonia
or with Doc Woodruff's privatest pri.
vate room in the party national head
quarters at Chicago. Thus, our
statesman, though he seemed to be
aloof, was in the very thick of the
fray; and the tens of thousands of his
fellow citizens, though they seemed
to come almost on their own invita-
ton inspired by uncomfortable en-
thusiasm for the great statesman,
were In fact free excursionists-and a
very troublesome, critical, expensive
lot they were But-the public was
impressed. 1t sits in its seat in the
theater of action and believes that the
play is real. and ignores and forgets
the fact that there is a behind-the
scenes.
The party distributed from various
centers tons OF literature" And in
addition to meetings arranged by
state and local committees, a series OF
huge demonstrations was held in the
cities of every doubtful state. Besides
the party's regular speakers. we
hired as many independent" orators
as we could. But all these other
branches of the public side of the
campaign were subsidiary to the
work at the retreat" It might be
called the headquarters of the rank
and file OF the party-those millions
OF principle" voters and workers
who were for Babcock because he was
the standard-bearer of their party.