The Morning Astorian

CHAMBERLAIN, SOLE!

The democratic political procession in the present campaign is composed of one lone individual. George E. Chamberlain sole representative, leader and candidate. He is the whole show. His followers have thrown every office on the state roster to the winds, in the one, supreme purpose of electing, or rather re-electing, George E. Chamberlain as governor, WHY? Because, of their entire ensemble, he is the only one of standing in the Oregon democracy! Because, by the sheer force of a single blunder made four years ago, he won to the governorship, as the one alternative left, in the midst of a partizan crisis in the republican ranks! Because his followers, blinded by that chance success, are still blind to the fact that he is not needed, nor wanted; that there is a republican up before the people who is his equal in manliness, in wisdom, in civic virtue, and every attribute of strength and worth, and his master in many details and elements that are demanded of such timber! Because, the democrats, in their reckless purpose to make him his own successor, have not dared to give him the backing of a set of colleague-candidates on their ticket, lest the unction, and primal force of HIS candidacy shall be lost in the merits of the men by whom he would be surrounded! Because, forsooth, he is the only thing they have to offer: the only hazard they have, to cast: the single reliance, in their minority ranks; the sum, substance, and sign, of their favor and their strength; the last bid they can make for political recognition and life, in Oregon.

They have over-shot their political acumen, for once. James Withycombe and the long list of clean and capable candidates on the state republican ticket, are there to show just what the splendid majority of that party is for in Oregon. To demonstrate that the republicans of Oregon can cure their own ills and mistakes. To regulate, direct, and measure, the limitations of the Oregon democracy at will; and to preserve, intact, the prestige and enduring regime of the dominant party here, for the good of all concerned.