The Political Machine Topples in Walla Walla
Voters hand a crushing defeat to the local political machine, rejecting entrenched interests and the influence of gambling money.
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 Burford-Smails machine is defunct. The machine should learn from yesterday's election that it pays even politicians to be decent; the people won't stand everything. The supporters of Jerry Brown and Frank S. Dement lost no money on bets, while many of the supporters of Hunt and Kees are poorer but wiser men. Every gambler voted for Hunt, and Mayor Hunt's own precinct rebuked his alliance with the machine. With the single exception of Steptoe precinct, all the best residence districts of the city voted for Dement. The machine organ is chagrined because its cheap campaign trick of issuing a statement signed ostensibly by 'Friends of Organized Labor' was exposed and circumvented. The president of the Trades Council voluntarily refuted the idea that the council was taking any part in municipal politics, an action that was a credit to the body he represents.
“The machine should learn from yesterday's election that it pays even politicians to be decent. The people won't stand everything.”
This 1903 election post-mortem captures a classic American struggle between a local 'machine' and a grassroots reform movement. Walla Walla’s political climate today may look different, but the tension between institutional power, influence peddling, and the voters' demand for accountability remains a defining feature of the city's civic life.
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