The Tacoma Republicans Who Refused to Knife John McGraw

TACOMA, Oct. 26. [Special.]—The county Republican committee, which refused on Monday to rescind the resolutions originally conceived for the purpose of secretly knifing Seattle and the Hon. John H. McGraw, is being called to account by Republican voters who do not take sides with the enemies of Seattle and of Mr. McGraw. They say it is none of their business if Mr. McGraw has proved that he is an abler business man than certain Tacomans. That he is a good business man, they say, is all the more reason why they should vote for him for governor.

The Harrison Republican Club, composed of Republicans of the city and county, has sent the following reply to F. W. Taylor, chairman of the Republican County Committee:

'Your communication of October 23 has been received and considered by the club. A reply thereto, which you evidently quite properly expect, has been deferred in pursuance of your request until the full county committee acted upon the objectionable resolutions. That action, we are informed, was taken yesterday, and the county committee declined to rescind the action of the executive committee. Since, in your own words, 'the only body that has authority to speak in behalf of the Republican party' has by official action emphatically and positively placed the Republican organization of Pierce county in an attitude of direct hostility to the Republican party of this state, we have no doubt that you and all other true Republicans can no longer think that our action is 'based upon a misunderstanding of facts,' but must sympathize cordially and heartily with the object and policy of the Harrison Republican Club.

We appreciate your efforts to bring to their sober senses those who seem to think that a political organization is put together on the principle of a mule team, 'to go as how, pull or stop, as the driver may will,' but since unfortunately those efforts have met with complete failure, we hardly feel called upon to prove false to our manhood and attach ourselves to this balky mule team, about whose ears the whip so persistently yet fruitlessly cracks in the attempt of the driver to force it to pull over into the Democratic camp.

You are quite right in saying that the consistent and studied neglect of the national and state ticket by county nominees and speakers 'will engender strife and trouble for years to come and should be ground in the nether stone of public contempt.' But what is the remedy? The county committee by resolution has bound candidates and speakers to oppose the Republican state ticket. Some candidates and many members of the committee lose no opportunity to voice this opposition. What effect can this unprecedented action have upon the Republicans of this state other than to call upon Pierce county the contempt and indignation of the whole state? What can your committee do to prove this contempt unmerited, bound hand and foot as you are by this monstrous, treasonable resolution? What, then, is the remedy? It is the Harrison Republican Club.

The character and number of our membership has been unparalleled in the organization of a Republican club in this city, and the success our stalwart adherence to the Republican party and the Republican candidates is meeting will prove to the Republicans of this state that there still remain in Pierce county hundreds of true Republicans who cannot be driven by the whip of the mule driver into a traitorous assault upon Republican nominees. We cannot support any Republican candidate who is not true to the whole ticket, nor can we support any legislative candidate pledged to support a Democrat for the United States Senate. We are thoroughly consistent Republicans. Can you say as much for the county committee?'

The club also sent letters to Republican legislative nominees demanding to know whether they would support a Democrat for the United States Senate.