Arizona republican., 1920-08-24
Where the People
 May Have a Hearing
The Preferred Tieket
Dear Mir. Editor:

After reading your editorials three hundred and sixty-five days each year for ten years, I am, for the first time, impelled by force of an inner urge to ''come back at you.''
 Your first editorial in this August 23) mornings paper is the cause of the effervescence and the ''come back"
 In the first place, MT. Editor, I will say that no one could pay you higher compliment as an editor than by telling you that all of your editorials are read by me every day in the year. Occa- sionally I do not agree, but there has never been one that involved so many vital things as this one wherein I think you "are badly off.
 Very, very briefly. permit me to tell you why I think so,
 First, you say a marked list was sent out with instructions or orders to vote the ones marked. This is untrue, as there was no suggestion that any vote the marked ones. Please read again.
 Second, you say that church people have no right to suggest to their friends which candidates are most ac- ceptable. In heavens name, who is to suggest? From the time of Socrates and from the time when the tribes were numbered' and voted to the days of Boss Tweed, somebody has been telling the good people who to vote for and why. Sometimes the why was an argument and sometimes it was a threat. If there is any class of citizens in all the earth who indulge in the pastime of telling people how to vote, it is the editor. Pick up any paper any day and see. Are not the candi- dates and the friends of the candidates telling us who to vote for and why? You certainly do not mean to exclude the church people from this high priv ilege and let alone some others who are telling us, about whom the less said the better.
 Third, even if there had been a sug- gestion to the ministers of the state as to the best candidate, I feel per- fectly secure in saying that nine out of ten will welcome the suggestion. For ten years church people all over the state have written letters and have asked me personally to tell them who seemed to be the best candidate. Min isters and church people do note the whole mess straight if they can get any light on the situation that will guide them in making a selection. Il think I know the one hundred and fifty-two pastors of the Protestant churches of Arizona as well as any other man in the state and I am per fectly willing to take my chances with them as to whether they are .insulted' by the marked list
 Tn fact. MT. Editor, I am surprised and disappointed to find that you have fallen into the same old bunk that has always been whined out from the poli- ticians the ward boss, the saloons. the gamblers, the evil dooers of all stripes, whenever church people happen to wake up for brief moment and dare breathe a suggestion as to what kind of men should be selected to fill the important offices. "To hell with the church vote" has been the attitude too long. They sheer and leer and then slop around with some disgusting pa layer that they think will get by. They have been getting by about long enough.
 Fourth, you say that the s.x" appears before the names of those who '.are notoriously immoral and of proven in efficiency" We may have made mis- takes. Editors have even made mis- takes in the remote past. They may make them again. We may not have had enough data in the beginning, yet we find that every candidate has plenty of friends who will swear that his morals are just as clean as those of his opponent. Unfortunately, too many men are maligned by the gossips. We have no proof that any of the marked men are notoriously immoral, but will say that we are remarking one Or two and may change our opinion just as often as we have reason to do so. We will be very inconsistent po- itically. The consistent man in poll tics is a menace. Theodore Roosevelt will back us in this. We will insist that the majority of the candidates marked are not nOrOrlOuSiy lHlItoIdi- If they are, we had betted clean the entire bunch off the slate and begin over again.
 Fifth, you say that "the candidates against whom discrimination is made are members of a church which the pastors disapprove. in one case a Nor mon; in others, Catholic"
 Personally. we have occasionally been called liberal by some of our friends. We have often disapproved of narrow sectarian thinking in some of our friends, but we are glad to admit the charge of being narrow when 1t comes to a Mormon leader being put over the seventy thousand school chil- dren of our state. We say this with no personal thought of Mir. Peterson. So far as we know he is clean, efficient gentleman. It is far more serious than the personal or the religious element. Mir. Peterson stands for all that Nor monism teaches in the Book of Doc urine and Covenant" He is back or the vicious county unit plan. He IS ready to carry out the policy of the Mormon church in connection with teaching Mormonism in connection with the public schools. He represents one of the most sinister and compactly organized political machines of his- tory. We accept the challenge of the Mormon church to get control Of our state school system and propose to fight it through to victory.
 Sixth, many more points might be easily made in answering your edl-