New-York tribune., 1921-02-18
League Officers
Face Recall LIN
North Dakota
Inability TO Adjust Financial
Affairs Likely TO Result
i'm Bitter Election Fight
on Nonpartisan Chiefs
May Unseat Governor
Desperate Ebert To BE
Made to Save the So
Called Farmers Program
speo,a, Dsssatca 10 The Tribune

Special Dissdtch TO The Tribune
MINNEAPOLIS, Feb. 17.--Eiforts at
,non-politieal adjustment OF the affairs
of the State Bank of North Dakota
have failed completely. 1t was an
nounced in Minneapolis to-nighr. Mean,
time, indications are that the state
soom will be plunged into the most
bitter battle of the long -drawn-out po-
litical strife between the iNonpartisan
League and its opponents in a recall
election affecting ali state officers
The situation has shaped itself into
e finish fight between the league and
It's enemies, in which the people of the
state will referee. There is every pros
pect the result of the battle will be
complete defeat of the Nonpartisan
League organization, brought about
through exposure of its leadership.
Anticipating this condition, league
supporters will make q desperate effort
to save the so-called farmers program,
comprising elaborate public ownership
undertakings. contending the program
has never had fair trial and that it
has been betrayed by the men who
pledged the rank and file that it would
be carried out divorced from politics.
Face Three Courses
l. The Nonpartisan League admins
trative organization has choice of three
desperate courses. One is to stand for
a recall election with every prospect
that its majority in the .Supreme Court
will be wiped out and Attorney Gen
eral William Lernke and Governor
Frazier unseated. The second, to avoid
the recall election, is for every mem
Der of the Industrial Commission to
resign. The other is to sanction pass
age of legislation introduced to-day
taking finances of the state out of the
hands of the league, limiting expendi-
lures for the state mill and elevator
| planned to cost approximately $4,000.
| 600, to s2,0O0,000 One bill provides
also for the depositing of public money
in private banks. This would take ali
state money from the Bank of North
Dakota and automatically force its
| liquidation.
| Situation Up to State
I independents charged the situation
in the state was clearly up to league
administrative heads of state affairs
whose methods of political banking
they say, have resulted in situation
where forced collections by the State
Bank of North Dakota, ordered by the
Industrial Commission will result.in the
closing of between $50 and 200 banks
holding between s8,0OO.000 and $40,
100000 in redeposits of the state bank
and unable to meet these obligations
because of the financial stringcncy.
They held this sufficient evidence OF
mismanagement by the league politi
cal industrial commission to warrant
J. demands for its resignation, and fail
4 ing in that to institute recall pro
ceedings directed at all league state
4 officials.
Meantime Arthur Lesueur, formel
Nonpartisan Lacquer, st. Paul attor
ney, in an open letter sent to all th'
newspapers of North Dakota to-day
disregarding leaders of all factions
appealed to the people of the state t.
end the fight by taking all the stat,
/ industries out of politics.