The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1907-03-23
.CONEY IN CENTER
Big Fight Brewing Among
g. A. II. Members.
Shall Commander p. III. COney
Have Another Term.
POINTS TO HIS RECORD
Secured Much Legislation Favor
able to Old Soldiers.
Reelection Stepping Stone to
National COmmandership.

There promises to be a big fight for
the job of department commander of
the Kansas Grand Army of the Repub-
lie when the state encampment meets
in Topeka on the eth day of next May.
The fight, according to present indica-
ions, VIII be between Capt. Patrick H.
Coney' the present department COM
mander, who wants a third term and
Col r. A. Campbell of Hutchinson, the
present senior vice commander of the
Kansas department. G. A r.
Capt. Coney doesn't come right out
and say he is a candidate for the Of
nee, put nearly everybody else says so
Tor him. Coney wants the place a third
time as stepping stone to the office of
national commander, which he will
make another effort to capture at the
coming national encampment 1t is an
unheard of thing in the Kansas de-
partment to give a man three terms as
department commander, but that very
1act would make it an especially Valu-
able feather in Coney's cap when he
marches out to effect the capture of
the national communicating
Capt. Coney would make his fight for
third term on his record while in
office. He claims that he has run the
office of the department with especial
vigor, and that he has accomplished an
exceptional amount of good things for
the old soldiers of Kansas. He saws
that through his personal efforts. the
last legislature enacted seven bills of
great peneht to the veterans of the civil
war. Nine bills, according to Cant.
Coney, were personally prepared by
MIN, and only two of these failed of en-
aetment. The two which were killed
related 10 the erection of a $780, 900
soldiers monument in the state house
grounds, and the other was the amend
ment to the taxation bill exemptine
from taxation the homesteads of sol
diers and soldiers widows up to fine
amount of $1,000.
The bills which Department Com
mander Coney says he personally pre-
pared and conducted through the
mazes of legislative procedure are as
l, Appropriation for Grand Army
museum.
2. Old soldier preference law.
8: Authorlzing use of city funds for
observance of Memorial day.
A. Requiring display of United
states flag On school houses
O.. Making Lincoln's birthday a
s. Preventing the dissertation of
Memorial day.
Z: Burial of soldiers. their wives
and widows.
Captain Coney also claims personal
credit for having the antipass law so
amended that members of the Grand
Army may get half rates, and for the
passage of bill authorizing the ad-
OF the civil war soldiers copied
Colonel Campbell VIII Fight.
Against all this array of legislative
triumpl1s, the friends of Campbell will
advance the argument that three times
is too much for any one man to hold
the office of department commander
no matter how effective a commander
he may be. 1t has. as a matter of
fact, been the custom of late to give
only one term to each commander, for
the reason that the old soldiers felt
that their time is short, and that the
honor should be passed around as
much as possible.
Moreover Col. Campbell claims that