A Petition Vanishes and the Fight to Carve Up Spokane County Turns Nasty

We see it intimated that a delegation left Spokane Falls with grip-sacks full of coin, with the fell purpose in view of buying up the legislature in the interest of the county dividers. This would be very laughable were it not a serious reflection on the honesty of those men elected by the people to frame laws for the territory. We are not of those who believe that every man has his price, nor that the color of coin can make a poor measure holy in the eyes of legislators. The charge of 'buying' men has become so common that the grave assertion is barnacled upon public bodies indiscriminately. Our legislature may not be made up of men one whit better than those chosen for the same office in other commonwealths, yet we do not for a moment believe that they possess an itching palm which would respond to the scratch of gold and link the support of the owners to measures that might otherwise fail of recognition through unworthiness. Cast upon such base insinuations, they tend to bring discredit upon a legislative body that should be respected until it is proven unworthy of respect.

At this late hour anything that may be said for or against the division of Spokane county can have little or no effect on the deliberations of the body of territorial lawmakers now holding session at Olympia, before whom the matter has been presented for adjudication. By this time the members have had ample opportunity to hear both sides of the case as presented by able delegates representing both factions. We see that a bill providing for the organization of the county of Sprague has been submitted and ordered printed.

The only effect that further controversy can have is to keep alive a feeling of rancor that has apparently grown up out of the proposition at first introduced by the people of the western part of the county, and afterwards seconded by those residing in the eastern section. It is not for the purpose of adding fuel to the flame that we now refer to the matter, but merely to reiterate a statement that has appeared in this paper, and which parties in certain quarters are attempting to make light of. Perhaps the old maxim that 'all is fair in love and war' applies to this case; at least it seems so, to see the efforts made by a neighboring village to carry their point.

It has been publicly asserted, without the prefix 'it is rumored' or 'it is thought,' that no petition was stolen at Spokane Falls, as the papers therein published had asserted — and our contemporary, Mr. Cowley, of the Chronicle, an honorable gentleman who would not lend himself to the maintenance of anything that had the tincture of fraud about it, has been soundly rated for publishing such a statement, and the fact of his having been a minister of the gospel has been made an object of ridicule. We consider these attacks, in their spirit and style, harsh and extremely unjust. The gentleman is a credit to the profession he has chosen, as he was undoubtedly to the cloth. He said a petition containing over 300 names had been surreptitiously taken from an office in this place, and though the statement may be denied by every man from Cheney to Hades, it is none the less the fact, as many men will make affidavit to if necessary — men whose words, without the backing of an oath, would pass current for gold.

We regret the loss of the petition, not alone on account of its value as a factor in bringing about that which our people are so anxious may come to pass, but because of the dark window of chicanery that the affair throws around the opposition to the measure. We find no fault with our neighbors in their efforts to stave off a change in the borders of this county which is inevitable. It is but the natural consequence following the springing of the project. We have no charges to make against their mode of procedure. Their hands may, or may not, be clean. No proofs of perfidy or corruption have been shown us beyond this one instance, and it is hardly fair to yoke this disreputable act upon the shoulders of an entire community. And yet it looks as though the deed is winked at by the efforts to make it appear that the petition was never purloined. This rather frail manner of treating the subject may hoodwink a few, but those few are men who would not believe the truth if it was presented to them by an angel.