Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1893-1920, 1908-07-08

Especial washington correspondence OF
The Argus.)
The preliminary forecasts of political
conventions are apt to be Improbable
AS rule, they are based upon the per-
sonal prejudices, ambitions or hopes OF
those who give them out. For example,
here I'm Chicago three weeks ago if You
read the newspaper forecasts you
would think that Taft was certainly
doomed to defeat and that the trium-
plant allies, either by a Roosevelt
stampede or some mysterious or darkly
suggested coup, would crush him into
the dust. The whole world knows the
result. The allies, impotent to stay the
course Of the convention, were made ri
diculous by the complete collapse of all
their predictions and pretensions.
The same situation existed with ref
erence to the preliminaries of the Den
yer convention. 1t happened that the
subcommittee having in charge the ar
rangements for that convention was
made up of men most of whom are at
heart hostile to Mr.. Bryan. 1t was
drawn from national committee
which was chosen to elect Judge Par
ker and had for it's chairman Roger Sui
Ivan of Illinois, whose personal antag-
onism to Bryan is a matter of general
notoriety. Being on. the field, the men,
bers of this committee were able to in
fuence newspaper correspondents to
the extent that most ridiculous state
ments were circulated throughout the
entire country. In their endeavors to
accomplish this end the members of
the committee were ably seconded by
Governor Johnson's press bureau.
Much stress was laid upon the selec-
ton Of temporary chairman, who. is
supposed to sound "the keynote" of
the campaign. Personally / am in
clined to regard this is as a trivial
matter. With an unknown candidate
an Introduction Of this sort might be a
matter of some Importance. But most
Democrats will think that Bryan is his
own keynote For more than twelve
years he has been going up and down
the land preaching those things in
which he believes, and the notion that
an obscure lawyer from central ILL
nois was to be selected to explain in adj
vance what will be the meaning of q
Democratic campaign in which Mr..
Bryan is the candidate verges some
what upon the ridiculous. A struggle
or a test of strength over an issue of
this sort might be entertaining as a
contest between rival political factions,
but its bearing upon the campaign
would be about as weighty as the fly
upon the locomotive wheel.
Consider, for example, the Burrows
Keynote speech at Chicago. When
the Michigan senator was chosen to
deliver this Grafton wild cries of
treachery and treason went up from
the Taft forces, but nobody, even
among the few who heard Burrows.
remembers what he had to say. The
only lingering recollection of the Bur
rows outbreak was the skill with
which he invited a Roosevelt STAN
pede at a time when stampeding was
obviously impossible.
The Contests at Denver.
There were only two really serious
contests before the national commit
tee and the convention at Denver No
tice Of contest WAS given from the
District of Columbia. involving six
votes. This is time honored prec
edent, for not in the last sixteen years
have the doughty Democrats of that
District. who have no electoral votes
failed to send contrasting delegations to
Democratic conventions. As one Of