The Newspaper Feud That Rocked 1880s Seattle

There have been two elections in this city this year—one held in July, and the other in November. In both elections the two newspapers of this city, and their publishers, took active part. In the case of the city election, party issues were not drawn. The citizens in mass, to the number of a handsome majority, assembled in perhaps the largest convention ever held in Washington Territory. A ticket was placed in the field by a two-thirds vote, and it was supposed at the time that, everything having been conducted so honorably, and the expression of choice being so positive, no opposition would be encountered. The Intelligencer and its publishers did this; the Post and its publishers did not. They bolted. An opposition ticket was put in the field, and after an unscrupulous advocacy of it by our contemporary, was slaughtered by the people at the polls. A little later began the struggle just ended. The publishers of the Intelligencer are Republicans. The publishers of the Post claim to be the same. By the use of arguments and means not necessary here to name, one of the Post men succeeded in getting into the County Convention and afterwards into the Territorial. He and his paper enjoyed all the benefits of the Convention, and gave none in return. As in the city affair, they pandered to the enemy, and finally bolted. In their endeavor to injure their former associates they got down into the dirt, which they braved up, and tried in vain to soil their more steadfast and respectable neighbors. The whole transaction was so vile, so like treason and venality, that it sickened the community, who, when occasion offered, spewed them out like a bad mess.