Seattle Daily Post Intelligencer

DAILY POST-INTELLIGENCER

The campaign in this territory is assuming large proportions, and the personal participation of the two candidates in Copartbod, Mt. Vernon is steadily on the sound, and Mr. Bradin is campaigning in the southwestern portion, in that the domain of Interom may be regarded as having legs transferred to the western side of the Cumberland.

The situation in the eastern portion of the Territory, according to all accounts, should be extremely encouraging to Republicans. The campaign has been a brilliant one, and the old Republican enthusiasm has been aroused in every direction. It is plain that the Democrats are on the run, and the only question now is as to the size of the Republican majority in the eastern counties.

On the sound, however, the battle is still to be fought. The work which has thus far been done has been preliminary to the final struggle, and the main battle will be fought within the coming two weeks. Thus far the advantage is unquestionably with the Republicans in this portion of the Territory also, and it only remains to close up the ranks and push forward to the victory which is apparently so near.

On many points the platforms presented by the two parties are in material agreement. Both demand the forfeiture of unearned lands granted to aid the construction of railroads. Both demand the repeal of the gross earnings tax law. Both demand the annexation of North Idaho to Washington Territory. Both demand the admission of Washington as a state.

There are, however, points of difference and it is these points which will determine the position of many independent voters. The powers of a delegate to Congress are very limited, indeed, but the expression of the will of the people of a Territory commands respect. It was upon a question of platforms alone that the battle of two years ago was fought and won for forfeiture, and the present campaign, like the last, will prove to be largely a battle of platforms. The points of difference should, then, be carefully considered.

There are many questions of absorbing interest upon which the Democratic platform is utterly silent. The liquor question is one of these, and the woman suffrage question is another. The Republican platform, on the contrary, contains clear and unequivocal expressions of opinion on both. It endorses woman suffrage and pledges the party to the idea of local option in dealing with the liquor traffic.

There is another important point of difference. The Republican platform contains an unequivocal expression in favor of the continued protection of the products upon which the prosperity of Washington Territory depends. It denounces the Democratic party for its support of the Morrison tariff bill and the efforts of its leaders to secure the placing of coal and lumber on the free list. The disastrous effect which the removal of the duty on coal and lumber would have upon the industries of Washington Territory need scarcely be told. Any man possessed of even the slightest intelligence can see how great a disaster to the Territory the passage of the Morrison bill would be. With cheap labor and greater ease of production, British Columbia coal and British Columbia lumber would drive the domestic coal and lumber from the markets of the Pacific Coast. Our great mills would lie idle, our mines would be unworked, and the development of our vast resources, so encouragingly begun, would come to an abrupt termination.

On this question the Democratic platform is as silent as the lips of an Egyptian mummy. It is necessary that the people of this Territory place themselves on record against the proposed removal of the duty on coal and lumber, and they can do it only by ratifying the Republican platform at the ballot box.

Both parties demand the passage and strict enforcement of laws which shall effectually prevent the introduction of Chinese laborers into the United States. The Republican platform goes further, however, and expresses the abhorrence of the party for lawlessness in every shape and form. It declares that lawlessness and violence tend to prejudice the case of the people of the Pacific Coast in the eyes of the people of the East, and to prevent, rather than to hasten, the passage of an effectual exclusion law. It declares that, not good citizenship alone, but the good of the cause as well, demand that the agitation against Chinese immigration be a lawful and peaceable one. On these points the Democratic platform is silent, and this silence is peculiarly significant when considered in connection with the events which have taken place in the Territory within the past year.

Further than this, the Democratic platform denounces the measures which the officers of the law found to be necessary for the preservation of order and the suppression of lawlessness. One is the platform of earnest and unremitting, but peaceful and lawful, agitation. The other is the platform of lawlessness, violence, treason and rebellion. The Democratic party stretched its hand as far as it dared toward treason and anarchy.

On these points of difference, then, the Republican party is willing to go before the people; on these it is willing that the case shall be judged; on these it is willing to submit its candidate and its cause to the deliberate judgment of an intelligent, thoughtful, law-abiding community.