The Baltimore County union, the Towson news., 1909-10-16
AN OPEN LETTER TO THE SUN.

To the Editor of the Baltimore Sun In your
issue of October you advised the people of this
county to continue in power the same political
nonnced. @ That is to y say. % YOU 1 advised I'd these
people to vote for Henry P. Mann, recognized
for many years as the servant and the accredited
properly Of Erred" Talbot, who made" ma Mr..
Mann, as he has made" many others who proved
similarly useful to him.
flourish or shall it cease" ana uyun his i>sue
you intimate that the ring candidate, Mann,
stands for virtue, and presumably Asa Bird
Gardiner, James H. Keeney, or Or all Of us
Neither Mr.. Keeney nor Mr. Gardiner whose
ability and high character are known TO their
neighbors, can be affected by such a statement
And as for myself, l am content to rely upon my
record as citizen and an Official of this county
as the shortest reply to such attacks. /. there
fore, address you neither in defense of myself
nor of others. / desire to suggest, however,
that you should not lend your influence to throt-
to rid themselves of the degrading and perni-
cious influence of the Talbot ring, which has
been fastened on them like vampire for a
generation. 1t has debauched their politics and
reduced their county government to political
machine, by which the taxpayers are systemati-
cally robbed to enrich its members and perpetu-
ate their power.
Mr.. Mann is neither better nor worse, dare
say, than the ring of which he is part. He is
known for better or worse to his neighbors. but
many of them will be much surprised and pos
sibly gratifed to hear of him as reformer. He
became commissioner in 1903, and being satis-
factory to Talbot. is still in the Land of MIX
and Honey" Prior to 1903 he was Superinten-
dent of the County Fire Alarm where the hours
are short and the pay respectable.
He went into the Board as practical politi.
clan, and when he went there he found the lid
on and the county ''wide open.' and for many
years he appeared neither to see nor hear the
signs of open. notorious and unchecked lawless-
ness, and 1t was only after long and able cam
paign by the Baltimore News and The Towson
News. in which conditions of unspeakable hor-
ror fostered for %% many ny years by the ring were sr
clamor of the respectable residents of the
county. and yet after six years In the Board we
nd Sill the same conditions @ % Of , open and un
today it is only Mr.. Mann's friends who disre-
gard law, decency and order, whilst then it was
suit of the so-called reform of the conditions
which this Talbot ring itself created has been
to furnish Talbot with another very effective
For when the outcry at ring conditions be-
came so loud that something had to be done.
Talbot, with his usual political Judgment, did
to say, that whilst before the publicity of ring
conditions started the ring reform every body
was allowed to utterly ignore the liquor and
the ring cal do so with impunity. The condi-
tions have not changed. Dives still run wide
open on the Sabbath day in Baltimore county
and gambling is still done here, but all those
who thus disregard the law are slaves of the
ring. This may be reform, but call 1t the sale
OF vice IOr pOItlcal prOnC.
There are few SO ignorant as not to know that
it is childish to talk of law. order and decency
in this county. SO long as Talbott's ring controls
the County Commissioners, and through them
the Police Force.
This Police Force. which should preserve law
and order, is mere political machine, and while
it has some good men on it, it is. generally speak
ing. an expensive farce the main object of which
is to assist at ring primaries and in the general
election in the election of ring candidates.
Indeed, it was Mr.. Mann, whom you hold up as
the Moses who is to lead his people from Their
wilderness of vice. etc.. who carried the primary
the Erossest and most unbIushing fraud on the
part of his friends. whether with his knowledge
l, of course, cannot say, but these friends were
old ring. In that election the Police Force
which am taxed to support. and which is con
trOlled by the Commissioners of whom Mann il
the president was used in the most open and
vent them from voting for me, and to induce
them to vote for Mann. The Judge of Election
ballots marked for Mann for those voted for me
Such methods are not, however, entirely un
known to Mr.. Mann. for | recall an occasion
contest which attended and / saw a number Of
residents of Baltimore who appeared to be pa
tiently waiting to vote in the county when
asked him what they were doing there, and ht
replied: well, you know how it is in politics.
think, therefore, that you may leave Mr.. Mann
in the hands of his friends with the assurance
that even If the ring is defeated the county will
suffer no material loss but it will be rid of al
| incubus which has burdened its people. retarded
its growth, wasted its money and hindered it
| development for so many years that chang
| will be very grateful. And / can truthfully SAL
that believe If the people of this county elec
Asa Bird Gardiner and James H. Keeney a
their Commissioners it will be the best thin
| they have done for many a day, and if l. too an
found not unworthy of their confidence. ! as
gentlemen or either of them for the improve
ment of the intolerable conditions which nov
exist in this county. AUGUST WEIs.