King County Democrats Revolt: 'I Am King County's Candidate, Not Her Betrayer'

All things indicate that the Democrats of King County are loyal to their home, and will repudiate a platform which is grounded in hostility to them and their county. No King County man with a trace of loyalty to his county and his home can vote for candidates who stand upon a platform such as that presented by the Democrats of Washington. From the utterances of the leaders in the convention before and after the adoption of the anti-King County plank, it is easy to infer where they will stand on election day.

'When the platform of a political party does not bespeak your principles, what is it your duty to do? I would rather be right than be wrong with a successful Democratic party,' said L. C. Gilman.

'I propose to stand by the people among whom I live if this convention reads me out of the Democratic party. I am now ready, sink or swim, live or die, Democratic party or not, to stand by the people I love and among whom I live,' said J. T. Ronald.

'Your convention adopted a platform condemning the enterprise of my home and censuring her friends. I am King County's candidate, not her betrayer,' said James Hamilton Lewis.

These are brave sentences, one and all, and there can be little doubt that the men who spoke them will prove loyal to their home.

The spirit which marked the closing hours of the Democratic state convention indicates that the party enters upon the campaign in this state without the slightest hope of victory. After the convention had deliberately determined to throw the support of the Democrats of King County, the delegates went about the remainder of their task listlessly and indifferently, as men who know that they are going through a useless formality. In the very beginning of the work of making up the ticket the hopelessness which pervaded the convention was manifested. Thomas Carroll was nominated for Congress as a matter of course. But no other Democrat desired the other congressional nomination. It was offered first to Ronald and then to Warner, and both declined it. Finally the convention felt compelled to pass the nomination until somebody willing to accept it could be found. After a night's search a candidate was found, and the nomination was given with a sigh of relief to a comparatively obscure and unknown man who would never have been thought of as an available candidate if anybody else had been willing to accept the nomination. Congressional nominations do not thus go begging in any district wherein the result is doubtful in even the most remote degree. Other nominations were made in a manner almost equally spiritless. There was a slight contest for the governorship, owing to the desire of the King County delegates to keep the empty honor of a nomination from going to Balock or Shaw. All other nominations save two were made by acclamation and without the slightest trace of either heartiness or enthusiasm. It was more like an outlandish funeral than a state convention, and if the Democrats ever had the slightest hope of carrying Washington, the gathering at Olympia has dispelled it.