The Birmingham age-herald., 1920-08-29
COX ID RUB SORE
 SPOT UNTIL THE
 BALLOTS ARE CAST
Current Gossip In Ohio In- dicates Republican Cam paign Fund Methods
 Are Very Brazen
By CLINTON w. GILBERT

New Haven, Conn.,. August 2s.--(spe. democratic shore dinner here yester- day. of the republican campaign fund, promised to rub that sore spot till election day.r
 He has more Information about the republican contributions and contrfbu tors. especially in Ohio. where his own business connections have enabled him to know something of what WAS being done by the republican collectors.
 He told his New Haven audience that the men who had written the large checks" for the republicans were the men who had asked him to send out the militia to bring strikes to the end they desired.
 Just what this information amounts to, how much of 1t is the mere gossip of the business circles of Columbus Clcl eland and Dayton. is not disclosed. The collecting of the republican fund in these towns has been done with a brass land. The collectors talked quits openly even to democrats about what they were doing and who was con- tributing. Names and amounts are common talk. Gossip is plentiful. Cor porations are said to have contributed and charged their gifts to advertising and other accounts, it being forbidden under the Ohio law for corporations to make campaign gifts.
 USE CLERKS NAMES
 Wealthy men are said to have made large gifts in the names of their clerks S1,000 being contributed in each name. 1t is impossible to tell how much truth there Is In all this gossip, but the methods pursued by H. NJ Blair, as- sistant to the treasurer were those of a money drive. They have inevitably started talk.
 And. now that the governor has made public the list of cities and their quotas and the contents of the official bulle- 1 tin, nothing but a thorough investiga- | ton will quiet the rumors.
 | The governors hope. like that of Johnson and Borah in the primary cam paign. is to provoke an investigation,
 and in this way to keep his issue of ex-
 cessive campaign funds alive. He will
 undoubtedly refer to this subject from
 time to time until an investigation has been made.
 | If an investigation is ordered, hs
 trusts to the blunders likely to be made
 in such method of fund collection as was followed with It's "get-the- money; {;
 step-on-it'' maxim for developing some incident damaging to his opponenti When Senator Borah produced the hi vestigation of the primary campaign funds, he could not have foreseen she l Missouri disclosures. The Missouri &s- lpendtures of the Lowden managers wA }
 a silly blunder. Nothing was to A'
 gained by doing what they did in MiA souri, Yet their little mistake cosV Lowden the nomination and probably the
 election to the presidency In such n drive as the republican treasurer authot- | zed conducted by enthusiastic anna teurs, how much more likely. Governor Cox's friends think. that mistakes would | be made than in the expenditures of the
 seasoned politicians who managed the
 Lowden campaign.
 WON'T STAND SCRUTINY Governor Cox believes that this fund won't stand scrutiny, and, for his pur- poses 1t is not necessary that any cor rupt or improper purpose should exist. | It is enough that there should be mis- takes which will give rise to suspicion l Here Is something that almost did hap pen The scene is Ohio The writer hav | ing been in that state for some time, knows more about the situation there than elsewhere. One of the biggest cor porations in an ohio city proposed at n directors meeting to make contribu- | tion to the republican fund. The cor poration Is not in politics. It has notl- | ing to gain from republican victory It was giving merely because the energetic manager of the drive there. who is re- tCoptinued on Page EighOf