Life — November 19, 1903 — page 4: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

‘\ White there is Life there's Hope.” Vou, Xit NOV. 19, 1903. No. 1099, 19 West Taiety-Finst St. NEw Yore. @ year in ade e the Postel copies, onths fro No contribution mpanied by Ut be returned untess stamped and addressed The itlustrations in Live. are copyrighted, not to be reproduced. f notification should b any change of addre: sent by sub- Ts election in Ni York did not gc Lire. expected. Marphy, the new many thrashed all his opponents, in- cluding Me- Laughlin, andisa much bigger man than he was on the morn- ing of No- vember third, Miles of explanations have been printed about it all. We will not repeat them. The election Was not bought. You can’t buy sixty thousand votes. Perhaps Mr. Grout should have been discredited because he took Murphy's nomination, but certainly he wasn't. The voters got what they preferred, if not what they wanted ; there is no doubt about that. Let us not repine unduly about what has happened. The Fusion campaign was as well managed as the Fusion leaders could manage it, and, all things considered, it is not apparent that they made avoidable mistakes. A Fusion team is hard to drive at best. We know now that Dr. Low could not be reelected this year, but we do not know that any other Fusion candidate could have done any better. There is that an inde- pendent Democrat would have had the support of Mr. Platt, and there boss, no reason to believe are many reasons to believe that he’ wouldn't. The Citizens’ Union was en, but it was by no means an- nihilated, and it will live to fight another day, though whether it will try Fusion again is not so clear. THe outlook for the next two years is not so desperately black. Mr. McClellan is a decent man with a reputation for decency to sustain, and a reputation for vigor and ability to acquire. He has a hungry army behind him, which has been used to loot, and will want to loot again. We don’t think he will be able to restrain it. But he will probably do his best, and Mr. Jerome will help him by striving vigorously to have the laws enforced. Mr. Grout will probably ran the Comptroller’s office just as honestly and ably in the two years to come as in the two years now ending. Moreover, the coming two years are not going to be “boom” years. The chances for pillage will not be quite so good as they were in the closing years of Croker. McClellan will want tomake a name for himself,and he has a great opportunity. Even Murphy, who is now considered able, may want to better both his own reputation and Tammany’s. And two years is a short time,—too short, it may be, for the old ystem of tribute to get well under way. There is more danger that Tam- many will be too good than too bold in its reprisals. But, anyway, the fight for good government will go on in New York. Itis becoming a habit, just as pillage is a habit with Tam- many, A new standard of administra- tion has been established. McClellan must measure up, not to Van Wyck, but to Low. That isa great gain. The difficult problem of combining with the Republican machine without being absorbed by it has not yet been solved, but in spite of present appearances, it remains true that there are more people in New York who want good government than who want bad, and, somehow, part of the time, at least they are going to get it. CPO NTERESTING deductions are made 3 to the bearing of the late elec- tions on Presidential aspirations. Sena- tor Gorman, by assailing the President for having dined with Booker Wash- ington, injected the race issue in the “Maryland campaign, and won hand- somely, may run issue. A deduction is that Gorman for President on the race The truth is that his dalliance with the race issue has disposed of any chance that may have existed that he would be the Democratic candi- date, In New York State it is understood that David B. Hill went down with his friend, the venerable McLaughlin in Brooklyn, Whereas Murphy's vie- tory is interpreted to be favorable to the selection of Mr. Cleveland as a man who could carry New York. In the great Republican sweep in Ohio is read the rejection of Bryan and all his works, because his ally, Tom Johnson, was the leading Democratic figure in the Ohio campaign. The result, being a great victory for Sena- tor Hanna, would undoubtedly make ‘that statesman Mr. Roosevelt's chief Presidential rival if Mr. Hanna would have itso. But, it seems, he won't. "PHE Colombia statesmen over- reached themselves in rejecting the offer of the United States for the right to buy and complete the Panama Canal. It was a liberal offer, but the Bogota legislators thought they could do better, Now Was expected, Panama has seceded from Colombia and proposes to sell the canal rights on her own account. We have no sympathy at all for the Colombians. Whenever Panama feels steady enough on Ifer legs to give a good title, Uncle Sam will doubtless buy it. But it is highly important that our Government should set a careful example of deco- rons neu y while Panama and Colombia are settling their dispute. We thought Mr, Hay would see to that, but the disposition of the Administra- tion seems to be to strike while the iron is hot. We don’t need the canal so badly as to warrant us in snatching ata sitefor it. We are bound to keep order on the nentral strip where the ilroad crosses the isthmus, and that sall. But that will probably be enough. If Colombia can’t land troops on the isthmus and fight Panama there, it is hard to see how she can get at her at all. comicbooks.com