The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1907-02-04
AS WILL WHITE SEES IT
His Significant Editorial on Pending
Legislation.

me following editorial by William
alien White appeared in the Emporia
Gazette Saturday:
| IAN IMPORTANT CRISIS.
The Kansas legislature adjourned
yesterday upon the eve of some most
important legislation. The antipass
bill in the house had been recommend
ed by the committee of the whole. The
tWo-cent fare bill had been recon-
amended by the senate railroad COM
| rnittee, the house had just shown itself
| to be in favor of the direct primary
bilE which does away with all con-
| ventfonS in the nomination of Kansas
candidates of all parties. Thursday
| afternoon when it was apparent that
these things were in the air, the at
torneys for the Kansas railroads who
into the Copeland hotel where the
politics of the state is conducted, and
tried to stampede the legislators there
The railroad lawyers and the railroad
politicians worked that night until far
after midnight.
THE best they could do was to ask
Tor an adjournment and get it in the
hope that over Sunday few members
VINO voted right may be persuaded IN
one way or another to desert the cause
of good government and turn Kansas
ever to the railroads for another two
years, and mortgage the Republican
party to Democracy and defeat
Yesterday Interstate Commerce Com
missioner Lane publicly charged the
the politics of this country. The charge
that they do run national and state
politics, nominating senators and con-
greSsmen, and controlling representa-
tiveS is not the fabric of a dream. 1t
is a fearful fact to which the people
must arouse themselves before it is too
late. The spectacle in the Copeland
Thursday night proves that the rail-
roads are trying to run Kansas, and
that the present legislature in turning
toward new ideas in craftsmanship is
wrestling the state from railroad con-
troll. The railroads are alarmed, and
the people should be advised that
crisis faces this state. The thing that
alarms the railroad attorneys in Tope-
ka is not the anti-pass bill, nor the
two-cent fare, but the primary bill.
The passage by the present legisla ture
of direct primary law, taking away
all conventions, will cripple the rail-
roads more than any other one thing
this legislature can do. For at conven-
lions trades are made and tricks are
turned when the people are not looking,
and the trades and tricks turned in the
conventions, the com binations made by
politicians are the levers by which the
railroads run this state.
Take away conventions giving every
man a vote the equal of every other man
for all candidates for office from town
ship trustee to United States senator. and
political equality is established. 1t does
not prevail now. The politicians form an |
aristocracy; they ride around on passes; !
they get fat offices, and they are wined |
and dined by the railroads and the rank |
and file of the party has little voice in |
party affairs To abolish that system by |
abolishing the convention system, will put !
the railroads out of power in Kansas, and |
they know it. They know that unless |
they get by hook or crook twenty votes !
IN the Kansas house of representatives |
between now and Tuesday their day in ,
Kansas politics is done.
THE voters of Kansas must watch their
The railroads Of Kansas
can afford to spend half million dollars
to defeat that one bill 1t is the seed of
their trouble. They can not hope to de-
feat it outright. But they can get bill
hat means nothing. So long as any can !
1date for any important office in Kansas
s nominated by a convention and not by
he people the railroads will hold control.
rhe duty of The honest men in the Kan
'as house who are in the majority. is to
INSIST on roll calls and have the roll calls
published and scattered broadcast. The
people have a right to know how their
representatives. are voting. The issue is |
1ital. 1t is to be test vote between pop
liar government or railroad government ,
n Kansas