The Richmond Virginian. (Richmond, Va.) 1910-1920, 1910-08-17
ALASKA AS INDEX OF SENTIMENT.

ALASKA AS INDEX OF SENTIMENT.
The result of an election in Alaska would
not, at first blush seem particularly german as
a topic of national interest. 1t happens, how
ever that the recent voting in the territory has
distinct relation to matter which has for
months been agitating the public mind. Thus
far does the question of Richard Achilles
Balinger extend, and it is in Alaska,
where the interests of the Secretary S
former clients so largely at stake, that there
Is obtainable perhaps the clearest expression of
opinion upon controversy that has been waged
largely upon sentiment and belief as opposed to
fact and circumstance Even in Alaska Rich
ard Achilles was the real controversy, even in
the elections next fall he will figure in the States
as one of the more sharply defined issues. If
emphatic public opinion be ever an index of the
truth, Ballinger himself is an infnitessimal if
vicious, personality. He was, however the
small but very sore boil at which started the in
tlammation affecting the party in power; the first
evidence of the lack of confidence in the Presi-
dent and the administration, which has since
grown to a point where confidence is no more
than a popular "Reminiscences. Ballinger, like
a fly on stereoptican, is exaggerated but exact.
The overwhelming election in Alaska of
Delegate Wickersham is, therefore, a point of
interest TO the entire country. Wlckersham was
opposed by all the interests which Ballinger~ has
served. He was fought by all the power of
wealth which has been seeking the right to ex-
plot the mineral bearing lands of the govern
ment in the Territory. The Guggenheims were
against him to a man. Every ''reactionary" in
terest was enlisted against his cause. Yet he
won, handsomely. In his victory is evidenced
the belief of the people of Alaska in the charges
which he brought in Washington, to the effect
that the Guggenheim and kindred interests have
been exerting in Alaska a corrupting influence
in which We're enlisted the government employees,
the courts, the territorial administration from
top 10 bottom. Wickershams charges in fact,
put specifically the astounding disclosures which
men like Rex Beach and Jack London had before
put into the fiction of the far Northwest. He
charged. moreover, that the effort to put the
government of the Territory in the hands of a
Westinghouse commission was with the
design not only of denying self-government to
the people who have developed new land under
the Arctic circle, but with the further intention
Of putting the resources of the land under the
control Of the mining colossi who have already
seized for themselves great portion of the West
ern Empire
Sensational as the Wickersham charges of
modern piracy sounded in Washington, the issue
of the election by which he is returned shows
that the disclosures of almost unbelievable graft
and corruption had the appearance of sensation
lalism simply because they related to a new land
and were told to one whose greater age has
counselled more discretion, and villiany soft and
circuitous, instead of brutal and direct
On account of the technical nature and con-
ficting character Of the testimony, BalIinger
and his relation to the Cunninghams, the Gug-
genheims, and the Department of the Interior
must be finally judged by what the people be-
lieve of him; what those think who know him.
his methods and his deeds best, is well shown
in this first instance OF where the issue he has
raised has come to the test of the ballot
The death of President Mont, of Chile which
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