Keep Your Eye on Veatch: A Colville Republican Pitched Against the Spokane Machine
With the next U.S. senator likely to hail from Spokane, a Fairfield paper argues the Third District's congressman should come from somewhere else — and boosts A. E. Veatch of Colville as no friend of 'the big fish.'
It is so probable that the next senator chosen from Washington will give his postoffice address as Spokane, Spokane county, that it may be considered a certainty.
Political fairness, then, would be maintained if the congressman from the Third district should be chosen from some other locality.
As A. E. Veatch, of Colville, is in every way worthy the support of all Republicans, whether in or out of the city of Spokane, why not unite on him with such an endorsement in the primaries and in the November election that his hands would be strengthened in the coming struggles in congress between selfish interests and the rights of the whole people? We suggest to every Republican voter who reads the Standard that he consider well the merits of all the candidates and not be in too great a hurry to pledge himself — but to keep your eye on Veatch. His record is good. He is no friend of the big fish in their efforts to swallow the small fry. Remember that. — Fairfield Standard.
“He is no friend of the big fish in their efforts to swallow the small fry.”
The 1910 fight over whether Spokane would monopolize the state's congressional seats is an early version of the rural-versus-urban representation battles that still shape Eastern Washington politics. Then as now, 'the big fish' was the shorthand for concentrated power.
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