The Washington times., 1911-09-04
A WORD TO SENATOR LEE ON
REGULARITY.

won sixty four.
| Money, organization, prestige, and
the powerful Baltimore machine were
on Germans side. With these against
him Lee made such run that every
body now comedies that an honest vote
and honest count would in all prob
ability have nominated him.
Senator Lee is not entitled to first
credit for the splendid showing. The
intelligent, independent, progressive
people of Maryland did the business.
From several counties and from var
ious parts of Baltimore city have come
detailed, specific, damning charges of
corruption and intimidation employed
by the German people.
More money was used for German,
according to the best information OBJ
tainable, than Isaac Stephenson spent
in getting his nomination for the Sen
ate in Wisconsin in 1908. Wisconsin
is about twice as big State as Mary
land, SO it would appear that more
than twice as much coin was used, per
capita, to nominate German as was
used to nominate Stephenson.
Yet the State of Wisconsin was so
scandalized by the venality in Stephen
sons campaign that its legislature
adopted a resolution that the nomi-
nation was corrupt, and asked the
United States Senate to investigate it.
And the Senate was so scandalized
that it has ordered that investigation.
In the face of such a showing, shall
the German nomination be accepted as
legitimate, and shall the decent Demo
Gratis who were robbed of victory be
urged now to get together, look cheer
full, discourage an investigation, and
support the beneficiary of these scan
dalous methods?
Nobody doubts the rottenness of the
German fight for this nomination. If
Senator Lee now lines up for German
and calls upon the Lee following to
unite for the ticket, what will be the
effect?
DESPERATELY PRESSED, FAC
ING PROBABLE DEFEAT, THE
GORMAN FORCES WILL EMPLOY
THE SAME METHODS IN THE
NOVEMBER ELECTION THAT THEY
USED IN THE PRIMARY CAM
PAIGN.
MONEY AND INTIMIDATION
WILL BE THEIR STRONG CARDS.
Senator Lee cannot doubt this. He
and his lieutenants, as well as the
thousands of their followers, know
how they were beaten.
THEY KNOW THAT THE COR
MAN CROWD, HAVING SPENT
SOMETHING LIKE $l50,OO0 FOR
THE NOMINATION, WILL STOP AT
NOTHING TO PROTECT THAT IN
VESTMENT.
Maryland will see the most vicious
campaign and the most corrupt elec
tion it has known in many, many
years.
If Senator Lee gives his Endorsement
to German with full knowledge of the
methods that nominated German, he
will accept those methods as his own.
More than that, he will become in
effect party to and indorser of the
corruption and rottenness that every
body knows will be injected into the
coming campaign.
Blair Lee cannot afford to put him
self in such a position.
If a man had robbed your house,
Senator Lee, and an hour later you
saw him breaking into your neighbor's
house, would you telephone to the
neighbor, advising him that a pleasant
gentleman was calling on him, and Civ
ing the burglar a certificate of moral
character?
That is the position in which you
will put yourself, Senator Lee, if you
give German a generous Endorsement
and call on the party to get together
and support him.
Not for the sake of the ancient and
played-out fetish of party regularity;
not with the hope that it will make
your enemies hate you less than they
now do; not with the deluded notion
that you will look like good loser"
can you afford to indorse q man who
has just taken a nomination from you
by foul means, and is already laying
his plans to extort an election from
the people by like means.
To play the part of good loser"
is all very well; to be an accessory
before the fact of an impending out
rage on the State, is quite another
thing.
Party regularity is not going to
hold the people of Maryland in line
for the sort of thing that was done
last week. 1t is not going to induce
majority of them to indorse it in
November. 1t is not important enough
to warrant Blair Lee in indorsing it