Decorah public opinion. (Decorah, Winneshiek County [Iowa]) 1895-1928, 1911-04-19
WHAT THE SOLONS DID
Brief Resume of the Important
Measures Passed by Re-
cent Session.
SKETCH OF SENATOR KENYON.
General Assembly
Enacts Important Laws and Kills
Many Freak Measures. A
business Session.

|
The last issue of Public Opinion
could simply announce the fact that
the Iowa legislature, on the after
noon of our publication day and the
last hour of the session, ended the
long deadlock and elected Judge
w. S. Kenyon OF Fort Dodge United
States Senator, to succeed the late
Senator j. P. Dolliver of the same
| city. 1t had seemed throughout the
session that it would be impossible
to break the deadlock although re-
rehted efforts had been made to do
SO, but to the standpatters belongs
the credit of placing personal de-
sires in the background and the
good of the party foremost, and to
the senator of an adjoining county,
Senator H. l.. Adams of Fayettel and
Allamakee counties, belongs the
credit for taking the step which
broke the deadlock and elected
Judge Kenyon. He had voted first
! for Lafayette Young and afterward
for Judge Deemer throughout the
entire session, but on the last day
and the last ballot, as he supposed,
his name being the first to be called,
he arose and stated that although
he had consistently voted against
Judge Kenyon on every ballot, yet
he believed that the people of the
state wanted the legislature to elect
a senator, and he did not want to
go home without aiding in doing so.
Then other senators and representa-
tives fell in line, and on the second
ballot on Wednesday Kenyon re-
ceived S5 votes, seven more than
the required majority.
We believe that this action will
nn,et with the approval of practic-
ally the entire state. Judge Ken
yon is. a man who has made a
splendid record. But forty-two
years of age, of unsullied character,
an orator and a lawyer of national
reputation, record clean and clear
and distinct, not allied with either
of the factions within the party,
his election ought to mark the end
of factionalism in Iowa. The words
'standpatter" and progressive"
ought to be forgotten.
w. s. Kenyon has had a phenom-
enal record in public life. In few
years he has attained prominence
ands the senatorship, an Office and
am honor for which others have
struggled a life time. 1t took Mr.
Cummins twenty years to break in
to the same body and they We're all
years of hard work. Mr.. Cummins
started out with the deliberate pur-
pose of getting a seat in the senate
Kenyon can not be said to have
sought the place. Others sought II
for him. He was induced to become
a candidate through the urgings Of
his friends.
/ Mr.. Kenyon was born in Illinois
in 1869 and came to Iowa with his
parents. His mother is still living
near FIT. Dodge. He attended col
lege at Grinnell and at Iowa City
where he was graduated from the
law department in 1890. In the
same year he began to practice law
in Ft. Dodge. He became protegt
of the late John F. Duncombe, at
torney for the Illinois Central, ant
was married to Miss Mary Dun
combe. He was elected county at
torney Of Webster county in 1881
and served until 1898; was reap
pointed county attorney in 1S9s
when Col. w. T. Chantland resigned
to enter the Spanish-American war
He was elected to the district Judge
ship and again took up practice O
law with his father-in-law Hon. J
f. Duncombe, Iowa counsel for thu
Illinois Central railroad, 1908. III,
was appointed counsel for the Hi
nois Central in Iowa at Attorne.
Duncombe's death, 1904. He wa
appointed general attorney for al
lines of the Illinois Central nortl
of the Ohio river, with headquarter
in Chicago. 1908, He was appointe'
: assistant attorney general OF tn
United States, 1910.
The campaign for senator ha
been made along conservative line
and he says he enters the ofiic
without any pledges made to any
one.
: About two hundred and fift
laws were passed by the session
The prcgress of the consideration Q