Great Falls daily tribune., 1920-06-06
THE BATTLE AT CHICAGO


opens Monday. The captains are all there and
the clash of their verbal weapons of assault and
defense fills the atmosphere. 1t will very likely
to be the last of the week before the issue OF the
battle is decided, though the announcement OF
the leaders is that Thursday or Friday will see
the balloting under way. The contested elec-
tions are now disposed of. There were a great
many of them, largely from the south, and Gov
ernor Lowden of Illinois got decidedly the best
of them, gaining some twenty Eight delegates
which had been claimed for Wood. This fact
very much displeased Senator Moses of New
Hampshire, who had charge of the Wood cam
paign for delegates in the south. He openly
charged that the steam roller which ran over the
Roosevelt forces in 1912 at Republican national
convention had not been scrapped as advertised,
but had been carefully preserved and fitted with
new attachments which increased it's efficiency
in flattening out all opponents of the old guard
stand-pat Republicans. He added somewhat
anopominously that this machine had wrecked
the Republican party in 1912, and that history is
apt to repeat ITSELF From that line of talk we
deduce the idea that Moses is wroth with the
children of Israel once more, and ready to threat
en- them with vengeance from high places for
We guess he will be, for he is dyed-in-the-wool
machine politician himself, no matter how loud
he roars about steam rollers.
The Lowden people are feeling pretty cocky,
and among the leading candidates the chance OF
the Illinois governor does seem brightest at this
moment. Wood is somewhat under cloud. An
excess of soap in his campaign fund has pro-
duced large amount of froth and suds that is
deceptive in its staying qualities. And all is not
well with Brother johnson, either. He complains
that someone has been tampering with his in
structed delegates, and he is not going to stand
for it. We hope that none of his Montana in
structed delegates are under suspicion. God
forbid But the California senator is evidently
disturbed in his mind and has fire in his eye.
From that fact, we argue that things are not
going as well for Johnson as he expected. He is
seasoned politician himself. There are no
tricks of the trade that he is not expert in. So
we feel sure that no cat-hops will be put over on
Hiram without a loud holler on his part. That
he has commenced to holler at this early day in
the Chicago convention history is lite dis
turbing to his admirers, because they argue that
there is reason for 1T.
We are given to understand that William Jen-
nings Bryan is at the Republican national con-
yention, trying to tell them what they should
put in their platform. This may seem little
nervy in Mr. Bryan, considering that he has been
the candidate of the Democrats SO often, and is
now an elected delegate leader of the majority
of the Nebraska delegation at San Francisco,
and ambitious to write the Democratic national
platform at that time. However, Mr. Bryan is
not there as a Republican or Democrat, it is
explained by his friends He is there as Pro-
hibitionst at the invitation of the leader of the
drys in that convention or outside of it. He
heard call from Macedonia to come over and
help them to put double-riveted cinch in the
platform of the Republicans in the way of in
dorsing the bone dry prohibition idea. There
are some weak brethren in the Republican party
who want to dodge the prohibition idea entirely.
They argue that it is a settled question with the
18th amendment and the Volstead enforcement
act. They believe in letting sleeping dogs lie
especially where the foreign element that is
cross about the loss Of it's beer have good many
votes. 1t is to prevent any such cowardly course
as this that the prohibition chairman sent for
Mr. Bryan to help him. We hardly think his
choice of helpers was diplomatic Mr. Bryan's
advice will be about popular in Republican
national convention as Ambassador Gerard was
at the court of Berlin just prior to his departure
for the United States 1t is fair to add that Mr..
Bryan says he is only at Chicago as a reporter.
ARE PRICES GOING DOWN?
There is big difference of opinion over this
subject so vital to many American citizens,
Judging expressions of opinion by the newspaper