Murphy Forever: A Rival Editor Skewers Olympia's Perpetual Councilman
Days before the First Ward election, the Tribune turns its sarcasm on Councilman John Miller Murphy — newspaper editor, theater proprietor, professed temperance man, and, by this account, a fixture in the council chamber and at the bar he once voted to close.
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.
Councilman John Miller Murphy is again a candidate for city councilman from the First Ward, and will probably remain so until the end of time. Mr. Murphy can hardly be spared from the city council chamber. He has been there so long and understands the interests of John Miller Murphy — which appear to be the interests of the city — so well, that it is hardly possible for the city to do without him. There has been some talk of petitioning the city council to divide the First ward so that Mr. Murphy may never, never be disturbed. Murphy is always for economy — when it does not affect Murphy.
Heretofore the city ordinances have been published three times in the newspapers so that the people could learn and better understand what was going on, but as soon as Mr. Murphy's newspaper did not get the contract, and another newspaper had secured it, which he did not like, the astute financier urged that the ordinances be published but once. This was after the contract had been awarded to said newspaper at a lower figure than ever before. Murphy pretends that he does not want the office, but the citizens of the First ward will probably force it on him. He is always at the meetings looking after Murphy's interests, and as for promises to his constituents, he is as full of them as an egg is full of meat. He always keeps his promises, too, in such a hearty, whole-souled manner that the voters of the First ward have great admiration for the man.
Mr. Murphy is a prohibitionist of the first water. He looks it. He is in favor of the enforcement of law and voted in the council nearly a year ago to close up the saloons on Sunday. He also voted for a city ordinance to that effect. Since then he has been practicing at the bar — or bars — in order to explain the reason for voting that way.
It would be too tedious to repeat all the great triumphs of Councilman Murphy for the interests of Olympia — and Murphy; but that he is a goodly person appears to be the opinion of the First ward voters. Why defeat such a man, who is the pride of the state capital, who edits the oldest newspaper in the state and a "first class theater," and who is, perhaps, the greatest local statesman this magnificent territory and state has ever produced. Endowed as he is with such virtue, cunning and industry — for Murphy, let us prepare for brass bands, coal oil torches and hip-hip-hurrahs to celebrate his triumphant election next Tuesday over Citizen Chas. R. Talcott. More power to ye, Misther Murphy.
“Murphy is always for economy — when it does not affect Murphy.”
John Miller Murphy edited the Olympian and ran the city's theater while sitting on the council that handed out the printing contract — and this rival paper gleefully called it out. The charge that a politician is 'always for economy — when it does not affect Murphy' could be lifted straight from a modern comment thread about entrenched local incumbents, media ownership and self-dealing.
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