The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1908-07-07


WASHINGTON, June 24.-The ticket
is afeld. 1t reads Taft and Sherman
The great tribunal of the people, as,
sembled at Chicago, has named the
names. The Republican legions are
wheeling into line. The campaign is
starting. And Washington, always the
hotbed of politics, thrills thereat and
begins to take fresh notice.
Delegates and onlookers, politicians
and mere voters have been pouring
into Washington of recent days, telling
the stories and incidents of the great
convention, telling how it was done in
the open and how it was done in the
secret conferences. Some have return
ed to gather literature for the oncom-
ing campaign and to grid up their po-
litical loins for the fray. Others stop
ped IN route home, simply because it
was convenient to do so.
The Congressional contigent have re-
turned most triumphant. Speaker Can
non s friends say that he and those
who worked with him from the Union
League Club headquarters by the Lake
side named the running-mate and made
the platform. That makes them feel
well. 1t means that they will take hold
in the campaign with more earnestness
and enthusiasm. The Congressional
contingent think very highly Of Jim >
Sherman, the running-mate. They
would 90 through fire and water for
him. They regard him as one of their
number, and would like to put him in
the chair of the presiding officer of the
United States Senate. Furthermore, he
is undoubtedly one of the best, if not
the best, of presiding officers among
men in public life
To be sure. he could not do very much
in the Senate-where he would have
neither voice nor vote except in ease
the Senate was tied-but he would keep
the Senate straight at its work and
would be a master hand in untying the
parliamentary knots into which the
Senate has habit of getting itself.
The incoming political travellers dwell
with much enthusiasm on the way
Speaker Cannon jumped into the fight
over the platform and then into the
fight over the Vice Presidential nomi-
nee and "'did' the administration
politicians to a snish He had intended,
as a Presidential candidate himself. to
remain down at Danville, Illinois, few
hours away. But he just could not keep
out of the fights. His friends were APP
pealing to him to come on and help
them, and he did OF course, the plat
form fight was finished first The great
struggle was over an anti-injunction
plank. The Macedonia cry over that
feature went up early. All the East;
in fact, most of the East that is this
side of the Mississippi river, Joined
with the Speaker TO keep the anti-in-
junction plank out of the platform al
together. The Speaker had fought
many a battle on the anti-injunetion
issue in Congress. President Samuel
Gompers. who is his arch foeman, was
the leading advocate of an anti-injunc-
ton plank. The Speaker would have
fought the plank if for no other reason
than that President Gompers wanted it.
ANTIINJUNCTION PLANK.
\ very mild plank had been drawn,
but the Speaker objected to that. lie
said it would please nobody and would
DO nobody any good. \ shrewd dele
gate in the convention declared that
you can t play on either side of the
fence when you are straddling it. -
That was what the Speaker thought. He
argued through the long night of We'd
nesday and Thursday that if you put in
the plank, however mild it may be, you
make the business men mad. If you
put in mild plank it win not satisfy
the labor people, whom it IS intended
TO paeify and whose votes it is hoped
TO catch.
President Roosevelt and Secretary
Taft did not interpret it that way They
were actively al work all that time over
the telegraph and telephone wires, try
ing to line up members of the Resolu-
tions Committee for the plank as it had
been written at the White House. Those
two DISTINGUISHED RpnnhIicans di7 most
heroic work in behalf of their anti-in-
junction compromise Manager Frank
Hitchcock, their agent in Chicago. was
visiting members Of the resolutions. or
platform, committee and urging them
to stand by the administration. An in
stance of the determination with which
Mr., Hitchcock worked is shown in the
case Of the member Of the resolutions
committee from Alaska. George Shay, |
from Nome