The Hungry Brethren: Seattle’s Post-Election Feeding Frenzy
Fresh off a resounding election win, Seattle’s incoming Democratic administration is besieged by a desperate army of office-seekers, while power brokers maneuver to clear the path for the next gubernatorial bid.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
The Democrats have found that now that they have carried the election, their troubles are just beginning. Every prominent Democrat, from Mayor-Elect J. T. Ronald down, is besieged by office-seekers who are anxious to secure influential friends. The campaign committee discovers that the bills are still coming in. The contest for the plums is growing fierce among the hungry brethren, and if nothing occurs by March 31 to abate the strife, the struggle in the party will be sharper than between the Democrats and Republicans at election. The officers-elect virtuously promised on the day of their nomination to weed out all extra offices, but these promisers are now convinced that several hundred more clerkships are now needed. The streets are full of would-be deputy treasurers or clerks. Any number of men stand ready to collect licenses. For chief of police, half a dozen are in the field. But only one of these many men can get any one office.
“The contest for the plums is growing fierce among the hungry brethren, and if nothing occurs by March 31 to abate the strife, the struggle in the party will be sharper than between the Democrats and Republicans at election.”
The frantic scramble for patronage and local influence in 1892 captures the perennial tension of Seattle politics, where election victories are immediately followed by fierce factional infighting. Today's debates over mayoral appointments and administrative control continue this long local tradition of transforming political mandates into opportunities for institutional power.
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