History of Nebraska - Chapters 29-30



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CHAPTER XXIX 
POLITICAL HISTORY 1882-1890 -- THE PERIOD OF MAINLY UNSUCCESSFUL ATTEMPTS 
TO PROCURE REFORM LEGISLATION CULMINATING IN THE POPULIST REVOLUTION -- 
FIRST RAILROAD COMMISSION -- THREE CENT PASSENGER RATE

   AN anti-prohibition convention was held at Omaha, September 11, 1882. 
James Creighton of Omaha was president of the convention and C. A. Baldwin 
of Omaha, Peter Carberg of Lincoln, James Donnelly of Ashland, Gus Kirkow 
of Fremont, James E. North of Columbus, constituted the committee on 
resolutions. Letters were read from General Charles F. Manderson and J. 
Sterling Morton expressing sympathy with the objects of the convention. A 
set of the old time, perfunctory resolutions were adopted, including a 
declaration that, "We will not support any man for any office who will not 
satisfactorily pledge himself to oppose any and all attempts to force upon 
the people a prohibitory law."

   A greenback convention was held in Lincoln, September 7, 1882. Levi 
Todd of Cass county was chairman. The platform declared that class 
legislation had exempted from taxation a large amount of the wealth of the 
county in the hands of the rich; denounced national banks, including the 
well worn complaint that they drew double interest under the law; demanded 
that the government should issue all money, and that it should all be 
legal tender; that freight tariffs should be regulated by law; denounced 
the appropriation of public lands to private corporations; declared that 
all important offices should be filled by direct vote of the people; for 
equal pay for equal labor for both sexes; condemned the action of the last 
legislature for preventing the people from expressing themselves on the 
temperance question. L. C. Pace was chosen chairman of the central 
committee. A committee of thirty-five was appointed to meet at Hastings 
September 27th. This committee conferred with the antimonopolist state 
convention, and the two parties united on a ticket and a platform. E. P. 
Ingersoll of Johnson county, president of the State Farmers' Alliance, was 
nominated for governor; D. B. Reynolds of Hamilton, for lieutenant-
governor; Thomas J. Kirtley of Franklin, for secretary of state; Phelps D. 
Sturdevant of Fillmore, for state treasurer; John Beatty of Wheeler, for 
auditor; John Barnd of Buffalo, for attorney-general; J. J. Points of 
Douglas, superintendent of public instruction; Charles H. Madeley of 
Adams, commissioner of public lands and buildings; Thomas Bell of Otoe, 
regent. Dr. S. V. Moore of York county, and Moses K. Turner of Platte, 
were nominated for members of Congress in the second and third districts 
respectively. Jay Burrows and Edward Rosewater were members of the 
resoltuions committee.

   The Omaha Bee of September 29th was defiant against the corporation 
control of the republican party.

   The republican state convention for 1882 was held at Omaha, September 
20th. Nathan K. Griggs of Gage county was temporary and permanent chairman 
and Charles H. Gere was chairman of the committee on resolutions. The 
platform indulged only in glittering generalities, covering nothing 
specifically. On the first ballot to nominate a governor, James W. Dawes 
of Saline county received 121 votes; George W. E. Dorsey, 108; Samuel J. 
Alexander, 88; John B. Dinsmore, 48; Henry T. Clark, 22; W. J. Irwin, 18; 
Champion S. Chase, 9; Milton J. Hull, 5. Dawes was

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nominated in a break-up on the third ballot, and Charles H. Gere for 
regent of the University. George W. E. Dorsey was chosen chairman of the 
state committee. There was an open break at this time against Senator Van 
Wyck by the regulars, including the State Journal. The prohibition 
convention met at Lincoln, September 13, 1882. Ex-Senator Thomas W. Tipton 
was a member of the committee on resolutions. They declared in favor of 
the submission of a prohibition amendment and against voting for any 
candidate of either party who did not favor it. The democratic state 
convention for 1882 was held at Omaha, September 14th. J. Sterling Morton 
was nominated for governor; Jesse F. Warner for lieutenant-governor; 
Charles J. Bowlby, secretary of state; Phelps D. Sturdevant, treasurer; 
James C. Crawford, attorney-general; Henry Grebe, commissioner of public 
lands and buildings; C. A. Speice, superintendent of public instruction; 
John M. Burks, regent of the State University. The platform denounced the 
issue of free passes to public officers and demanded legislation against 
it, and denounced railroad interference with political conventions.

   The republican ticket was successful again as a matter of course. Dawes 
received 43,495 votes against 28,562 for J. Sterling Morton, although the 
latter ran about 2,000 votes ahead of the general ticket. Ingersoll, the 
antimonopoly candidate, received 16,991 votes, and Phelps D. Sturdevant, 
candidate for treasurer on the democratic and antimonopoly tickets, was 
elected, receiving 46,132 votes against 42,021 for Loren Clark, his 
republican opponent. It seems probable that a generally successful 
combination of progressives, such as that of 1894, might have been made, 
though perhaps the Omaha Bee's aggressive opposition to Clark caused his 
defeat. Successful insurgency then would have hastened reform and avoided 
the revolutionary radicalism caused by inconsistent delay. The woman 
suffrage amendment was defeated by a large majority, the vote being 25,756 
for and 50,693 against. In the first congressional district, Archibald J. 
Weaver, republican, received 17,022 votes; John I. Redick, democrat, 12,
690; ----- Gilbert, antimonopolist, 3,707. In the second district, James 
Laird, republican, received 12,983; S. V. Moore, antimonopolist, 10,012; 
Harman, democrat, 3,060. In the third district, Edward K. Valentine, 
republican, 11,284; Moses K. Turner, antimonopolist, 7,342; William H. 
Munger, democrat, 9,932.

   The tenth legislature convened in the eighteenth session and the eighth 
regular session, January 2, 1883, and finally adjourned February 26th, the 
forty-second day. Alfred N. Agee, lieutenant-governor, was president of 
the senate, and Alexander H. Conner of Buffalo county was temporary 
president. George M. Humphrey of Pawnee county was speaker of the house of 
representatives. The senate comprised fifteen republicans, eleven 
democrats, five antimonoplists, one greenback, one republican-
antimonopolist. The house comprised fifty-two republicans, twenty-nine 
democrats, eleven antimonopolists, four republican-antimonopolists, one 
independent republican, two independents, one greenback-antimonopolist. 
This remarkable variation illustrated a somewhat blind rebellion against 
the old party allegiance which was to assume effective form seven years 
later.

   On the first joint ballot for United States senator Charles F. 
Manderson received 6 votes; Alvin Saunders, 14; Alexander H. Conner, 6; J. 
Sterling Morton, 16; Joseph H. Millard, 13; John M. Thayer, 11; John C. 
Cowin, 10; J. H. Stickel, 9; Charles H. Brown, 7; James W. Savage, 5; 
James E. Boyd, 5. Cowin and Millard each commanded one of the two 
republican votes of Douglas county. Charles F. Manderson was elected on 
the seventeenth ballot, receiving 75 votes against 17 cast for James E. 
Boyd, democrat; 14 for J. Sterling Morton, democrat, 5 for Charles H. 
Brown, democrat; 20 for J. H. Stickel, antimonopolist. Stickel of Thayer 
county -- received all antimonopoly, greenback, and independent votes 
except five. The democrats who ought then to have been making hay, as the 
antimonopoly or progressive sun was just beginning to shine, by developing 
a consistent and persistent progressive policy, blind to the signs of the 
times,

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gave their principal support to two strong, but ultra-conservative or 
reactionary men -- J. Sterling Morton and James E. Boyd; and so permitted 
or forced the over-radical and unstable populists a few years later to 
reap the ripened progressive harvest which they themselves might have 
garnered. On the republican side Douglas county had the call from the 
first. In the seventeen successive assaults its four strongest aspirants 
killed off one another so that the weakest took the prize. In sixteen 
ballots Cowin, Millard, Saunders, and Thayer held remarkably uniform and 
nearly equal support, Millard slightly leading and Cowin slightly at the 
rear. Eight was Manderson's favorite figure and highest, until increased 
to ten on the next to the last ballot. In point of deportment, at least, 
he was the fittest among the republican rivals and at least their peer in 
ability. As to the political principles and social temperament, he was 
precisely antipodal to the rising spirit of democracy which already 
presented an almost formidable front and an ominous menace to the dominant 
bourbonism of both of the old parties. While Stickel was not the equal of 
his principal opponents in ability, he was either more conscientious or 
more socially sympathetic, or both, than any of them. Strong leaders are 
more often prompted by and led into progressive social movements than they 
are initiators of them.

   Inasmuch as the east and west wings of the capitol were completed, the 
legislature authorized the board of public lands and buildings to take 
bids for razing and removing the old capitol from the grounds. The 
construction of the main part of the new capitol, according to plans 
already submitted by William H. Wilcox, at a cost not exceeding $450,000, 
was authorized. The State Historical Society was recognized "as a state 
institution" and $500 was appropriated for its maintenance. The counties 
of Brown, Cherry, Custer, Hayes, Wheeler, Sioux, and Loup were 
constituted. All voted in 1884, except Hayes, which followed in 1885. The 
old Ponca reserve -- between the Niobrara and Missouri rivers west to the 
extension of the line between range 8 and range 9, west -- was added to 
Knox county, the act to take effect when the president should declare the 
Indian title extinguished and the voters of the county should accept the 
addition. An act was passed authorizing counties to adopt township 
organization by a majority vote. The number of judicial districts was 
increased from six -- the number fixed by the constitution and not to be 
changed before 1880 -- to ten. The old third district, comprising Douglas, 
Sarpy, Washington, and Burt counties, was not changed. Five hundred 
dollars was appropriated toward erecting the monument to Abraham Lincoln 
at Springfield, Illinois, in place of the appropriation of 1869, which had 
not been drawn against because the monument was not yet completed. The sum 
of $13,640.50 was appropriated to reimburse the Nebraska City National 
bank on account of a judgment "unjustly collected" by the state for a sum 
of money received by Acting Governor William H. James in behalf of the 
state and converted to his own use. Here the legislature arbitrarily and 
doubtless improperly overruled the court; now a common complaint is heard 
against the courts for overruling the legislatures, state and national. A 
grant of three thousand dollars was made to John W. Pearman for "military 
services," presumably in campaigning against Indians as a major in the 
Second regiment, Nebraska cavalry, in 1862. The appropriation was to be 
paid from a balance of $7,077.55 remaining of the amount paid to the state 
by the United States for expenses incurred in repelling Indian 
hostilities. The sum of $6,824.14 was appropriated toward the expense of 
prosecuting "I. P. Olive and others for murder, and William Lee for 
assault with intent to murder, and Tip Larue, John Kinney, and Henry 
Hargraves for murder." Joint resolutions were passed to amend section 4, 
article 3, of the constitution so as to fix the salary of each member of 
the legislature at $300 for the full term of two years in place of $3 a 
day, and increasing the length of the session from forty to sixty days; 
also to amend section 1, article 5, so as to provide for an elective board 
of railway commissioners; asking members of Congress from Nebraska to 
procure the passage of bills abolishing all

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tolls on railroad bridges across the Missouri river, so that products 
might reach consumers as cheaply as possible; demanding such action by 
heads of departments or legislation by Congress as would compel railroad 
companies to take out patents on land grants so that they might be taxed; 
demanding settlement of the "Kneeval's Land Claims" against patentee 
settlers. The claims arose through a grant to the St. Joseph & Denver 
railroad company and many had been rejected. Congress was urged to repeal 
the duty on barbed wire for fencing and the material from which it was 
made. The request passed the house by a vote of 65 to 2 -- and the two 
were farmers. The vote in the senate for free trade was 28 to 2. That 
these two farmers and the other two direct dependents upon farming in 
Nebraska should have voted to continue the enforced payment by the people 
of Nebraska of an enormous gratuity to the manufacturers of this necessity 
of Nebraska life, will now seem strange to almost all Nebraskans alike, 
who have come to resent the payment of such bounties to any manufacturer 
whatever.

   Governor Nance, in his message, made the statement that the railroad 
commission system had been adopted in about twenty states. He referred 
especially to the progress in regulation of railroads in the states of 
Illinois and Iowa. It appeared from the report of the commissioners of 
Illinois for 1881 that "the right to fix reasonable maximum rates for the 
transportation of freight and passengers by railroads, either by direct 
statutes or by officers created by law, is no longer seriously 
questioned." But these hints, even, were incongruous and premature.

   A bill to create a board of railroad commissioners passed the house by 
a vote of 62 to 31. The senate refused to take it from the general file by 
a vote of 12 to 12. The act provided that three of the executive officers 
of the state should be commissioners, but they should employ secretaries 
to do the actual work. The commissioners were authorized to fix maximum 
freight rates. Lyman H. Tower, a democrat and banker at Hastings, made a 
minority report which included all the now familiar archaisms against the 
constitutionality of the bill. Four bills prohibiting the use of free 
railroad passes were introduced in the senate and two in the house. Four 
of these six bills sought to confine the prohibition to officeholders. 
Five bills for the regulation of rates were introduced into the senate and 
fourteen into the house. One of these was aimed at sleeping car rates. In 
addition, a bill defining the liabilities of common carriers, three 
memorials to Congress affecting railroads, and one to Colorado and another 
to Kansas, seeking coöperation in procuring railroad reform, were 
introduced. All this heroic endeavor resulted in the passage of only three 
memorials to Congress.

   According to the message, the bids for the east wing of the capitol 
were submitted July 12, 1881, as follows: Butler and Krone, $98,490; 
Robert D. Silver, $86,400; W. H. B. Stout, $96,800. The total cost of the 
west wing was $83,178.81; of the east wing, $408,247.92 That the contract 
was let to Stout in July, 1881 -- though far from the lowest bidder, was a 
matter of course and is explicable only on the ground of corrupt political 
preference. The west wing was begun in 1879 and finished by the close of 
1881. The east wing was accepted by the board of public lands and 
buildings, December 1, 1882.

   The republican state convention for 1883 was held at Lincoln September 
26th. Church Howe was both temporary and permanent chairman. Manoah B. 
Reese was nominated for judge of the supreme court on the ninth ballot; 
Francis G. Hamer was his principal opponent. Hascall of Douglas county 
announced at the beginning of the balloting that Lake was not a candidate 
for renomination unless it should occur that the convention could not 
agree upon any of the candidates who had been presented. This string of 
Lake's pulled out mischief for Hamer. On the first ballot Reese had 83 
votes, Hamer 97, Edwin F. Warren, of Nebraska City, 79. The third ballot 
gave Hamer 121, Reese, 92, Warren, 80; the sixth, Hamer 142 1/2, Reese, 
103 1/2; Warren, 103. On the ninth ballot, it being apparent that Lake had 
absorbed Warren's strength, Hamer turned the delegates of his own county 
to Reese, whereupon a stampede

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followed and Reese's nomination was made unanimous. Milton J. Hull of Clay 
county and John T. Mallaieu of Buffalo, were nominated for regents of the 
University for the long term, and for the short term, Jesse M. Hiatt of 
Harlan county and Edward P. Holmes of Pierce, in place of Isaac Powers and 
L. B. Fifield, who had resigned.

   The platform favored a constitutional amendment providing for a 
railroad and telegraph commission without stating the method of choosing 
it; demanded that all railroad land grants not strictly earned be 
forfeited; declared that public lands must not be monopolized for cattle 
ranges, but left open for settlers; for a tariff so adjusted as to favor 
and protect domestic industries and encourage immigration of laborers to 
perform the services we need on our own soil, paying tribute to our own 
government, rather than the importation of products of labor that is 
tributary to a foreign and perhaps hostile government. This tariff plank 
probably stands unique among creations of its kind. George W. I,. Dorsey 
was continued as chairman of the state committee.

   The democratic convention for 1883 was held at Omaha August, 29th. 
James W. Savage was nominated for judge of the supreme court; James M. 
Woolworth of Douglas and E. R. Daniels of Madison, regents for the long 
term. The platform was characteristically J. Sterling Morton's. It 
declared that all tariff taxes except to support the government "ought to 
be utterly abolished"; approved the regulation of the sale of intoxicating 
drinks in the interest of good order, "but the prohibition of the 
manufacture and sale of such drinks within the state is contrary to the 
fundamental rights of the individual and to the fundamental principles of 
social and moral conduct." Such interference would be neutralized by 
interstate commerce sanctioned by the United States constitution. The 
platform declared further: "Democrats of Nebraska denounce all railroads 
within the state which elect or attempt to elect, influence or attempt to 
influence delegates to political conventions, members of the legislature 
and senators or members of Congress . . . We assert the right of the 
legislature to control the railroads but we deny the right of railroads to 
control the legislature. We demand the enactment of a law which shall, 
under severe penalties, forbid the issuance of passes or free 
transportation of any kind whatsoever by any railroad in Nebraska to any 
person holding either an elective or appointive office or any other 
official position under the constitution or laws." It commended 
Sturdevant, the democratic treasurer, for voting to let the capitol 
contract to the lowest instead of the highest bidder and condemned letting 
it to Stout, because his leased convict labor competed with free, honest 
labor. The bid of Robert D. Silver, a responsible builder, was $41,187.25 
under Stout's.

   Judge Savage, with the support of the democrats and antimonopolists and 
of the Omaha Bee, received 47,795 votes against 52,305 cast for Reese. The 
republican regents were elected by far larger majorities.

   The first republican convention of 1884, held at Lincoln May 1st, was 
called to order by George W. E. Dorsey, chairman of the state committee, 
and Edward K. Valentine of Cuming county was temporary chairman and Ray 
Nye of Dodge, temporary secretary. The temporary organization was made 
permanent. John M. Thurston of Douglas county; Nathan S. Harwood, 
Lancaster; John Jensen, Villmore; George A. Brooks, Knox, were elected 
delegates at large to the national convention -- Thurston by acclamation. 
George W. Post of York county was chairman of the platform committee. The 
resolutions declared for a tariff so adjusted as to encourage home 
industries without being burdensome to the people and denounced attempts 
of the democratic house of representatives to make indiscriminate 
reductions. The resolutions were characteristically lacking in specific 
statement and state questions were ignored. A motion to declare a 
preference for James G. Blaine as a candidate for president was tabled by 
a vote of 220 to 207. The Omaha Republican was the only prominent 
newspaper in the state that stood for Blaine instructions.

   The democratic convention for choosing delegates to the national 
convention of 1884

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was held at Lincoln May 22d. John McManigal of Lancaster county called the 
convention to order, but, in the great confusion which arose in choosing 
between Miles Zentmeyer of Colfax county and Beach I. Hinman of Lincoln 
county, for temporary chairman of the convention, McManigal lost control 
and Andrew J. Poppleton of Omaha was obliged to mount a chair in the midst 
of the assembly and restore order. Zentmeyer represented the Miller-Boyd 
faction and Hinman the Morton faction. McManigal decided that Zentmeyer 
was elected by the first vote, taken viva voce. Hinman was elected by a 
vote of 182 to 96. Poppleton was chairman of the committee on resolutions 
which demanded vigorous frugality in every department of the government, a 
tariff limited to the production of necessary revenues and to bear upon 
articles of luxury and prevent unequal burdens upon labor; and they 
declared that a fundamental change in the policy of federal administration 
was imperative. If united, the party would reëlect Samuel J.. Tilden and 
Thomas A. Hendricks. The platform ignored state issues. The four delegates 
at large were elected by the following vote: James E. Boyd, 259; J. 
Sterling Morton, 241 W. H. Munger, 179; Tobias Castor, 141. James E. North 
received 103 votes and George W. Johnston, 114. Delegates from the first 
district elected George P. Marvin and John A. Creighton as delegates to 
the national convention; second district, Robert A. Batty, A. J. 
Rittenhouse; third district, Patrick Fahy, John G. Higgins. There was 
sharp division between the two factions, Morton's home delegates -- from 
Otoe county -- refusing to vote for Boyd and Boyd returning the 
compliment. The majority of the delegates were hostile to Morton, as they 
were again in 1888, when they shut him out from his usual place as a 
member of the platform committee in the national convention.

   The republican state convention was held at Omaha August 27th, with 
Charles H. Gere chairman. There was opposition, amounting to "revolt," to 
the renomination of Dawes for governor, but it was easily overcome before 
the convention met -- illustrating incidentally the prime advantage for 
boss rule of the convention over its successor, the primary election plan. 
The platform declared that "we recognize as a prime necessity for the 
unification of our party in Nebraska . . . a statute regulating our 
railroads according to a fixed principle"; and it pointed with 
satisfaction to "efforts of our party" during the last meeting of the 
legislature to accomplish this result. This, however, was typical bourbon 
procrastination which, like French bourbonism before, waited until the 
inevitable reform came through the shock of inevitable political 
revolution. The platform commended the efforts of senators and 
representatives in Congress from Nebraska to secure immediate issue of 
patents to lands earned by railroads in the state under the national land 
grants, with the intent that they should be subject to taxation. There was 
no declaration about money.

   The democratic state convention was held at Omaha September 11th, James 
E. Boyd, chairman. The convention united with the antimonopolist party in 
the distribution of the offices, candidates for secretary of state, 
attorney-general, treasurer, and two presidential electors being conceded 
to the democrats and the rest to their partners. J. Sterling Morton was 
for the third time nominated for governor. This unequal yoking together of 
factions, to each other so notoriously unbelievers, returned to plague 
Morton when he assailed democratic and populist fusion "on principle" in 
1894.

   Dawes received 72,835 votes; Morton, 57,634; James G. Miller, 
prohibition, 3,075. The republican candidates for the offices of district 
attorney were elected in all of the ten judicial districts. Among all the 
monopolies the republican party monopoly was still supreme. The 
legislative amendment to the constitution was approved by a vote of 51,959 
to 17,766. The executive amendment -- for establishing a railroad 
commission -- was defeated by a vote of 22,297 to 44,488. The contrast 
between the treatment of these two amendments illustrates the still 
backward state of interest and intelligence touching the railroad 
question. The proposition for a railroad commission was at least equally 
as important as that to extend the session of the legislature. Both 
amendments lacked a constitutional majority. The

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republican candidates for presidential electors received 76,9t2 votes; the 
democratic candidates, 51,391; prohibition, 2,889.

   The progressive forces united in all of the three congressional 
districts and by nominating progressive men gained a moral victory. In the 
first district Weaver, republican, held his place only by the slender 
margin of 22,644 votes over 21,669 for Charles H. Brown of Omaha. In the 
second district James Laird's prestige was crippled and the standard 
majority alarmingly reduced by John H. Stickel's great vote of 17,650 to 
21,182 for Laird; and in the third district George W. E. Dorsey was maimed 
for life by the vote of 20,671 cast for William Neville of North Platte, 
to 25,985 for himself.

   The eleventh legislature convened in the ninth regular session January 
6, 1885. It finally adjourned March 5th, the forty-third day of the 
session. Lieutenant-Governor Shedd was president of the senate and Church 
Howe temporary president. The senate comprised twenty-five republicans and 
eight democrats; the house of representatives, seventy-nine republicans, 
twenty democrats, and one independent -- William A. Poynter, afterward 
governor of the state. Allen W. Field of Lancaster county was speaker of 
this body. The governor's message disclosed that the indebtedness of the 
state was $499,267.35 -- $449,267.35 in the form of funding bonds due 
April 1, 1897, and $50,000 in grasshopper relief bonds due March 1, 1885. 
It appears from the message that the number of students at the State 
University during the last term was 282 -- at the newly established 
college of medicine, 54; that a contract had been let to W. H. B. Stout 
for the erection of the main building of the capitol for the consideration 
of $439,187.25; that a draft for $500, representing the appropriation by 
the last legislature toward the Lincoln monument fund, had been sent to 
Springfield; that in September, 1883, $11,746.67 was received on account 
of the five per cent sale of federal lands in Nebraska; in June, 1884, $17,
495.95, five percent of the proceeds of the sale of the Pawnee 
reservation; in November, 1884, $485 on account of expenses incurred in 
suppressing Indian hostilities. In September, 1882, $6,275.89 had been 
received from Pawnee sales, making a total of $23,770.42. A bill passed 
both houses of the legislature of 1883 appropriating a half of the sum of 
$6,275.89 to Thomas P. Kennard, as a fee for collecting the same under an 
alleged agreement with Governor Furnas; but it failed to become a law 
because the officers of the two houses neglected to sign it.

   The republican state convention for 1885 was held in Lincoln October 
14th. Lorenzo Crounse pressed the election of John M. Thayer for temporary 
chairman of the convention; but Thayer insisted that he did not desire the 
office, and Monroe L. Hayward of Otoe county was chosen over him by a vote 
of 318 to 143. Hayward was retained as permanent chairman. Amasa Cobb was 
renominated for judge of the supreme court without opposition and Charles 
H. Gere of Lancaster and Leavitt Burnham of Douglas, were nominated for 
regents of the University by acclamation. James L. Caldwell of Lancaster 
was chairman of the committee on resolutions, which were devoted to 
national questions, except the single declaration that if the act of the 
last legislature creating a railroad commission with advisory powers for 
regulation should be found inadequate, then the party stood pledged to 
sufficiently amend it. A resolution for a prohibition amendment which was 
innocently introduced was "rejected by an overwhelming vote." A resolution 
declaring that the tariff on imports ought to be reduced, temerariously 
introduced by Dominic G. Courtney, "was voted down enthusiastically," in 
the State Journal's parlance.

   The democratic convention was held in Lincoln October 15th. In the 
struggle between the Morton and Miller factions, now become chronic and 
acute, Albert W. Crites of Cass county and of the Miller clan, was elected 
chairman over Alfred W. Hazlett of Gage, by a vote of 230 to 148. Thomas 
O'Day of Antelope county introduced a resolution declaring that every 
democrat had a right to apply for an office and the state committee had no 
right to dictate or control federal appointments. This was intended as a 
knock-out for

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Morton, who was chairman of the state committee and who had been accused 
of using his official influence in procuring offices for his friends. But 
Morton executed a great coup by himself seconding the resolution.

   The republican state convention for 1886 was held at Lincoln September 
29th. James Laird of Adams county was temporary chairman and Archibald J. 
Weaver of Richardson, permanent chairman. On the informal ballot for 
governor, John M. Thayer received 306 votes; H. T. Clarke, 123; J. B. 
Dinsmore, 37; Leander Gerrard, 27; John H. MacColl, 47; Thomas Appleget, 
13. After this ballot John M. Thurston withdrew the name of Clarke, and 
Thayer was nominated by acclamation. There had been a general movement in 
favor of Thayer's nomination, partially due to the sympathy and the 
friendship of the old soldier element and in part due to the partiality of 
the corporations for Thayer, who was known to be at least innocuous.

   The platform avoided state issues and was a studied and specious 
condemnation of the democratic national administration. A minority report 
by Charles H. Van Wyck, condemning the state railroad commission and 
demanding its abolition, was rejected by a majority of over a hundred and 
fifty. A resolution condemning the commission, offered by Edward 
Rosewater, was safely referred to the committee of which Charles H. Gere 
was chairman. The then usual plank in praise of Irish home rule, 
Gladstone, and Parnell was inserted in the platform. A resolution favoring 
the submission to the people of an amendment to the constitution 
prohibiting the manufacture, sale, or importation of spirituous, malt, or 
vinous liquors was adopted, after a very hot debate, by a vote of 341 to 
189.

   The democratic convention was held at Hastings October 7th. It was 
called to order by James E. North, chairman of the state committee. 
General Milton M. Montgomery of Lancaster county was temporary chairman 
and Frank Martin of Richardson, permanent chairman. The convention was 
completely in the hands of the Boyd-Miller faction. G. E. Pritchett of 
Douglas county was chairman of the committee on resolutions which 
denounced prohibition and sumptuary laws; insisted that the next 
legislature should pass laws abolishing the present oppressive freight 
rates and unjust discrimination, and that Congress should give the 
interstate commerce commission such power as to "relieve the people of the 
agricultural states from the thralldom of railroad monopoly." The 
expression of sympathy for Gladstone, Parnell, and the Irish people in the 
struggle for home rule which was to be inserted in many subsequent 
platforms of both parties was begun in this one. James E. North, of 
Columbus, was nominated for governor by acclamation. There was a factional 
fight in the convention over the manner of choosing a state committee and 
a mild obeisance to the Cleveland admonition against offensive 
partisanship in a letter sent by Stephen H. Calhoun. He had been appointed 
collector of internal revenue, and so, out of respect to the president's 
views, he had refrained from attending the convention.

   The twelfth legislature met in the tenth regular session January 4, 
1887, and finally adjourned March 31st, the sixty-second day of the 
session. The senate comprised twenty-five republicans and eight democrats; 
the house, seventy-one republicans, twenty-eight democrats, and one 
independent. George D. Meiklejohn of Nance county was elected temporary 
president of the senate and N. V. Harlan of York was speaker of the house.

   Governor Dawes stated in his message that the $50,000 relief bonds 
which matured March 1, 1885, had been paid from the sinking fund, leaving 
a state indebtedness of $449,267.35 in the form of twenty-year eight per 
cent bonds maturing April 1, 1897, and incurred before the restriction of 
the indebtedness to $100,000 in the constitution of 1875. One hundred 
thousand dollars of the original amount of these bonds had been paid. The 
assessed value of the state in 1885 was $133,418,699.83, an increase of $9,
802,812.98 since 1884. In 1886 it had increased to $143.932,570.51. The 
rate of taxation for state purposes for 1885 was seven and twenty-nine 
fortieths mills and in 1886 seven and five-eighths mills on each dollar of 
valuation. A census was provided for in the act of Febru-

Page 611

ary 9, 1885, which appropriated the sum of $50,000 therefor. The work had 
been done under the superintendency of George B. Lane, the total cost 
being $39,774.35, of which the federal government paid $34,759.12 for 
prompt and accurate reports, leaving $5,015.23 as the actual cost to the 
state. There is irony in the statement of the governor that, "The original 
returns of enumeration and other original reports have been deposited for 
safe keeping in the office of the secretary of state as required by law." 
These reports were subsequently burned by carelessness or otherwise, so 
that there is no record of their important data available except 
fragmentary statements in the newspapers.

   The legislature authorized a recount of the vote on the legislative 
amendment to the constitution which resulted in counting it in. The 
counties of Arthur, Grant, McPherson, and Thomas were constituted. The act 
providing a charter for metropolitan cities, meaning Omaha, flouted the 
important principle of home rule by giving to the governor the appointment 
of four members of the fire and police board, the mayor being the fifth 
member, ex officio. The "Nebraska Industrial Home" was authorized, the 
government to be under trustees of the "Woman's Associate Charities of the 
State of Nebraska," and $15,000 was appropriated for the site and 
buildings. A "Bureau of Labor, Census and Industrial Statistics" was 
established, the commissioner to receive a salary of $1,500 a year. "An 
Asylum for the Incurable Insane of Nebraska" was established at Hastings 
on condition that not less than 160 acres of land should be donated for 
the purpose; and $75,000 was appropriated for buildings. "The Nebraska 
State Board of Pharmacy" was established to consist of the attorney-
general, Secretary of state, auditor, treasurer, and commissioner of 
public lands and buildings. The Office of the state inspector of oils was 
established, carrying a salary of $2,000.

   The act of 1885 fixing classified passenger rates at three cents, three 
and one-half cents, and four cents per mile was amended by establishing a 
general rate of three cents a mile. This was an important manifestation of 
a vital public opinion touching railroad legislation. An act was passed 
abolishing the board of railroad commissioners and establishing a "board 
of transportation." The Hatch bill, a law of Congress which appropriated 
$15,000 a year for carrying on experiment stations, was accepted on behalf 
of the State University; and the organization of the university battalion 
was styled "University Cadets."

   The republican state convention for 1887 was held at Lincoln October 
5th. Luther W. Osborn of Washington county was temporary chairman and 
George D. Meiklejohn of Nance county, permanent chairman. Judge Oliver P. 
Mason; in his characteristic vein, presented Samuel Maxwell for judge of 
the supreme court and he was nominated on the first ballot. Dr. B. B. 
Davis of Red Willow county and Dr. George Roberts of Knox, were nominated 
for regents of the University. H. C. Andrews of Buffalo county was 
chairman of the committee on resolutions. The platform expressed 
confidence in the existing board of transportation, but favored an 
elective commission. It declared that it was grossly unjust that Nebraska 
should pay higher rates of transportation than Iowa, Minnesota, and 
Dakota. There were no other declarations on state questions. The usual 
approval of the struggle for Irish home rule was expressed and Omaha was 
favored for the next republican national convention. A resolution 
introduced by Oliver P. Mason declaring that if the state supreme court 
should decide that the legislature had not conferred upon the board of 
transportation power to fix maximum freight charges the governor ought to 
call a special session for the purpose of doing so was debated fiercely 
until daylight when it was defeated by a vote of 280 to 244. A prohibition 
submission resolution was rejected also.

   The democratic convention was held at Omaha October 11th. Miles 
Zentmeyer of Colfax county was temporary and permanent chairman. Thomas 
O'Day of Antelope county was nominated for judge of the supreme court and 
Fred L. Harris of Valley and J. M. Slicker of Hitchcock, regents of the 
University. The platform approved Cleveland's ad-

Page 612

ministration; made a somewhat hazy declaration in favor of tariff reform; 
called for stringent legislation against railroad discrimination, 
demanding that "higher rates for freight and passengers must not be 
tolerated in Nebraska than are charged in other states similarly 
situated." As in the republican platform, there was a sympathetic 
declaration for Gladstone, Parnell, and Irish home rule. The last prison 
contract bill passed by the legislature was condemned, as also Governor 
Thayer for signing it. The platform was drafted by O'Day of the committee 
and George E. Pritchett of Omaha. The republican ticket was successful at 
the election. Maxwell received 86,725 votes; O'Day, 56,548; Joseph W. 
Edgerton, labor candidate, 2,653; E. S. Abbott, prohibitionist, 7,359. 
Republican candidates in the twelve judicial districts were all successful 
except two in the third -- George W. Doane and Eleazer Wakeley, democrats, 
being elected.

   The republican state convention for 1888 was held at Lincoln August 
23d. Judge Aaron Wall of Sherman county was elected temporary chairman, 
receiving 395 votes against 273 cast for A. E. Cady of Howard county. The 
temporary organization was made permanent. Governor Thayer was renominated 
without opposition, and a resolution favoring the submission of a 
prohibition amendment to the constitution was carried by a vote of 378 to 
197. Lucius D. Richards of Dodge county succeeded Meiklejohn as chairman 
of the state committee. The declarations of the platform were almost all 
devoted to national questions, among them a denunciation of capital 
organized in trusts -- but it professed to approve the acts of the railway 
commission and promised to carry out the correction of all evils. The 
repeated approval of the railroad commission by republicans was self-
stultifying because the general want of public confidence which was soon 
to result in its abolition wag all along apparent. The democratic national 
administration was denounced "for its effort to destroy the bimetallic 
system of currency and restore the single gold standard for the sole 
benefit of importers and money lenders."

   The democratic convention was held at Lincoln August 29th. Matt Miller 
of Butler county was temporary and permanent chairman. John A. McShane was 
nominated for governor by acclamation and was pressed into acceptance much 
against his own wishes. A large element of the convention preferred that 
he should become a candidate for Congress again. Andrew J. Sawyer of 
Lancaster county was chairman of the committee on resolutions. The 
platform declared that the state was overrun by a band of Pinkerton 
detectives who intimidated peaceful citizens; that republicans were 
responsible for this abuse and laws preventing it were demanded. The Mills 
tariff bill was approved, and Laird and Dorsey, members of Congress, were 
denounced for voting against free lumber and free salt. The regular 
Parnell and Gladstone plank was inserted. In the Herald's phrase, "The 
anti-prohibition plank elicited a roar of approval that made several 
republican auditors perceptibly shiver." The platform demanded reform of 
railroad rates; attacked the republican creature known as a "trust"; 
favored an elective railroad commission and arbitration of labor disputes. 
In the campaign the Omaha Herald made the most of the temporary lapse of 
the republicans to prohibition. It declared that "there are twenty-five 
thousand people in Nebraska driven here by the prohibition which threw a 
pall over the prosperity of Iowa. There are five thousand of these people 
in Omaha alone." These were of the thriftiest and most law-abiding class. 
"In the hope of catching the prohibition vote the republicans of Nebraska 
have consented to the exact course which was the initial step in Iowa. . . 
They think there is no danger that a sumptuary law will result, but there 
is." The vote for republican candidates for presidential electors was 
about 108,000; for democratic candidates about 80,500. John M. Thayer, 
republican candidate for governor, received 103,983; John A. McShane, 
democrat. 85,420; George E. Bigelow, prohibitionist, 9,511; and David 
Butler, labor candidate, 3,941.

   The thirteenth legislature met in the eleventh regular session January 
1, 1889, and

Page 613

finally adjourned March 30th, the sixty-seventh day. The senate contained 
twenty-seven republicans and six democrats. Politics was nominally clean-
cut in this legislature, there being no hybrid factions; but it was the 
result of a calm which preceded the storm soon to break. A diminishing 
number of democrats was ominous of the real alignment of 1890. George D. 
Meiklejohn, lieutenant-governor, was president of the senate, and Church 
Howe, temporary president. The house contained seventy-nine republicans, 
twenty democrats, and one union laborite. John C. Watson of Otoe county 
was speaker.

   Governor Thayer, in his message, alluded to the opposition, expressed 
by Attorney-General Leese in his report, to the passage of the pending 
bill in Congress to extend the time for the payment of the debt of the 
Union Pacific railroad to the United States. The only fair method was to 
declare the company insolvent and sell the road, and the state of Nebraska 
should control it. The governor of course opposed this view in a long 
argument. He recommended the adoption of a constitutional amendment for an 
elective railroad commission, declaring that rates in Nebraska must be no 
higher than in Kansas, Iowa, and other states, and that the commission 
should have full power over the question of rates. He had appointed two 
democrats and two republicans as members of the Omaha fire and police 
commission, A great line and cry had been raised against them by bad 
elements and the city, council but they had given the city the best force 
and police government it had ever had. The supreme court had sustained the 
law. The counties of Box Butte, Grant, Perkins, Rock, and Thomas had been 
organized during the last two years. Banner, Deuel, Scott's Bluff, and 
Kimball would complete their organization by January 15th. The reactionary 
spirit of this legislature as well as the ominous fact that there was a 
strong minority in it determined upon effective railroad legislation, is 
illustrated by the tone of a resolution offered by Senator Isaac M. 
Raymond and its fate at the hands of the senate.

   Laws were passed constituting Hooker and Thurston counties; changing 
the liquor license law so as to give the board of fire and police 
commissioners of cities of the metropolitan class and an excise board in 
cities of the first class -- more than 25,000 and less than 80,000 -- 
power to grant licenses instead of "corporate authorities" under the old 
law; interpolating section 20, chapter 50, making the possession of 
liquors without license a presumption that they are kept to be sold 
against the law; and section 21 providing that at a hearing the magistrate 
might order the destruction of the liquors. Section 22 provided that after 
the defendant should be acquitted on a hearing the liquor should be 
returned to him, but if found guilty he should pay a fine and costs and a 
reasonable attorney's fee. Other laws were to compel trains to stop at 
crossings; for a bounty of one-cent a pound for sugar manufactured in the 
state from beets, sorghum, or other sugar canes or plants grown within the 
state; taxing sleeping and dining cars used within the state but not owned 
by corporations within the state; appropriating $5,000 for beautifying the 
capitol grounds, to be expended under a landscape gardener; constituting 
the first Monday in September a holiday known as "Labor Day." Three 
amendments to the constitution were submitted; one providing for the 
prohibition of the manufacture and sale of intoxicating liquor, another to 
increase the number of judges of the supreme court from three to five, and 
the third fixing the salary of the judges at $3,500 and of district judges 
at $3,000. Senate File 9, submitting an amendment providing for an 
elective board of railroad commissioners, and Senate File 238, for an 
appointed board, were merged, the merger -- S. F. 238 -- providing for 
three commissioners to be appointed by the governor and confirmed by the 
senate, for a term of two years. It passed the senate by a vote of 28 to 
1, but it got no farther than the second reading in the house, where it 
was indefinitely postponed with all senate files on the last day of the 
session.

   The prohibition amendment was as follows: "The manufacture, sale and 
keeping for sale of intoxicating liquors as a beverage are forever 
prohibited in this state, and the legislature shall provide by law for the 
enforcement

Page 614

of this provision." It passed the senate by a vote of 21 to 11, and the 
house by 60 to 38. Thus democrats were solidly on the negative side and 
republicans were seriously divided -- which portended defeat. Cady offered 
an additional proposition as follows: "The manufacture and sale and 
keeping for sale of intoxicating liquors as a beverage shall be licensed 
and regulated by law." This was carried by a vote of 58 to 40; and in the 
senate by 23 to 10; substantially the same members who had voted for the 
original proposition sustaining it. Whichever part of the dual amendment 
might be adopted would be section 27, article I of the constitution.

   Charles F. Manderson was elected United States senator on the first 
separate ballot, receiving 76 votes in the house against 21 for John A. 
McShane and one for J. Sterling Morton; and 27 in the senate against 6 for 
McShane.

   The republican convention for 1889 was held at Hastings October 8th. J. 
W. Bixler of Lincoln county was temporary and permanent chairman. The 
question whether instructions of a county convention that its delegates 
should fill vacancies should overrule a proxy -- shutting out Patrick O. 
Hawes of Douglas -- raised pandemonium in which Bixler collapsed, Church 
Howe taking his place. T. L. Norval of Seward county was nominated for 
judge of the supreme court over Manoah B. Reese by a vote of 545 to 269. 
Charles H. Morrill of Polk and J. L. H. Knight of Custer, were nominated 
for regents of the University. Lucius D. Richards was retained as chairman 
of the state committee. The platform contained no reference to state 
issues and was composed of glittering generalities referring to 
corporations.

   The democratic convention was held at Omaha October 15th. Andrew J. 
Poppleton was temporary and permanent chairman. John H. Ames of Lancaster 
county was nominated for judge of the supreme court and W. S. McKenna of 
Adams and E. W. Hess of Platte, for regents. Dr. Luther J. Abbott of 
Fremont unjustly attacked Senator Manderson for drawing a pension and yet 
being able to get a nice insurance policy from a leading company. J. 
Sterling Morton was chairman of the platform committee and William J. 
Bryan was also a member of it. The resolutions denounced the protective 
policy of the republican party as hostile to the interests of a purely 
agricultural commonwealth; protested against appropriations to irrigate 
desert lands, there being already enough arable land to glut the home 
market for nearly all farm products; denounced the sugar bounty law of the 
last session of the legislature; declared that there should be no 
substitution of land or money for private corporations and declared that a 
well regulated license law was the best solution of the liquor question.

   A union labor convention endorsed John H. Ames, democratic candidate, 
for judge of the supreme court, and nominated William Blakely and Omer M. 
Kem for regents of the University.



Page 615

CHAPTER XXX 
THE POPULIST REVOLUTION -- THE STRANGLED STATE ELECTION CONTEST OF 1890-
1891 -- DEFEAT OF THE PROHIBITION AMENDMENT -- POLITICAL CONVENTIONS AND 
ELECTIONS, 1890 TO 1892 -- LEGISLATURES OF 1891 AND 1893 -- ELECTION OF 
WILLIAM V. ALLEN POPULIST, FOR UNITED STATES SENATOR -- IMPEACHMENT OF 
STATE OFFICERS

   THE populist revolution broke out with great force in 1890. The 
Alliance, a weekly paper published in Lincoln and the organ of the new 
movement, printed a manifesto signed by J. M. Thompson, secretary of the 
State Alliance, and also signed by the secretary of the State Assembly of 
the Knights of Labor, urging preliminary arrangements for the calling of a 
convention and for fixing the ratio of representation.

   On the 28th of June, 1890, John H. Powers, president, and J. M. 
Thompson, secretary, and Jay Burrows, chairman of the state executive 
committee, issued a statement that "originally a call was issued by the 
Alliance men of several counties for a distinctively Alliance convention. 
This not being thought in accordance with the constitution and it being 
feared that such a convention might disrupt the Alliance, its promoters 
thought it best to withdraw their call, and a declaration of principles 
and petition for the People's Independent convention was sent out." The 
new manifesto stated that "while the state Alliance is not a political 
party, its objects are political reform." It stated that the Alliance had 
70,000 members in Nebraska, and that 20,000 men had pledged themselves to 
support the ticket.

   The Alliance of July 12th pointed out that the Omaha Republican had 
suddenly flopped to prohibition; so that between that organ and the Bee, 
which was violently opposed to prohibition, voters might be caught coming 
and going. The railroads were straining every nerve to make prohibition 
the main issue to divert attention from themselves. In the same issue was 
published a set of typical resolutions adopted by the South Platte 
Alliance They demanded the immediate restoration of silver to its legal 
tender function and its free and unlimited coinage; government ownership 
of railroads to be operated at actual cost for the benefit of the people; 
endorsed the proposal of Senator Stanford to loan money on real estate at 
one per cent or two per cent per annum; declared that the government 
should issue paper money direct to the people; pledged themselves to 
support for any legislative or congressional office only members of their 
order and whose record showed them faithful to the cause of labor; 
demanded that transportation rates be immediately reduced to correspond 
with Iowa rates; favored the adoption of the Australian ballot and the 
prohibition amendment; and declared that under the existing license system 
farmers were taxed to support the cities. This last complaint was loudly 
repeated in the county option campaign of 1910; but it could not bear 
logical analysis.

   The people's independent congressional convention for the third 
district was made up of one delegate for every twenty members or major 
fraction of the Alliance, Knights of Labor assemblies, trades unions, and 
labor clubs, every organization or sub-organization of such classes being 
entitled to at least one delegate. The call for the Lancaster county 
convention specified the representation from

Page 616

every precinct, but it had been calculated on the strength of the 
farmers', trades, and labor organizations. The president and secretary of 
the Beulah Alliance stated that J. F. Dietz, an extensive dealer in 
lumber, had tried to stop Alliance agents at Clarks from buying it at 
wholesale rates and he appealed to the Nebraska Lumber Dealers' 
Association for protection. The independent convention of Fillmore county 
declared that license moneys should go to counties instead of cities or 
towns; that all property should be assessed at its full value and that the 
mortgage or note indebtedness should be subtracted from the assessed 
value. The Alliance of July 26th advised, as a matter of policy, against 
inserting a prohibition plank in the state platform; and thus early the 
imperious and doughty, but faithful editor -- Burrows -- was obliged to 
castigate Craddock for recreancy in making a row about unfair 
apportionment in the call for the convention, though he had joined Burrows 
in signing it.

   The people's independent state convention met at Lincoln July 29, 1890. 
It was called to order by John H. Powers of Hitchcock county, president of 
the State Farmers' Alliance. Allen Root of Douglas county was temporary 
and permanent chairman, and Charles M. Mayberry of Pawnee was temporary 
and permanent secretary of the convention. John H. Powers was nominated 
for governor; William H. Dech of Saunders, lieutenant-governor; Charles M. 
Mayberry, Pawnee, secretary of state; Jacob V. Wolfe, Lancaster, 
treasurer; Joseph W. Edgerton, Douglas, attorney-general; John Batie, 
Wheeler, auditor; W. F. Wright, Nemaha, commissioner of public lands and 
buildings; A. D'Allemand, Furnas, superintendent of public instruction. 
Charles H. Van Wyck was the principal competitor of Powers for the 
governorship, receiving 390 votes to 474 for Powers. At the close of the 
state convention Van Wyck was nominated unanimously for candidate for 
Congress in the first district, but he declined the secondary honor.

   The platform declared that our financial system should be reformed by 
the restoration of silver to its old time place in our currency and its 
free and unlimited coinage on an equality with gold, and by increasing 
money circulation until it reaches the sum of $50 per capita. All paper 
issues necessary to secure that amount should be made by the government 
alone and be full legal tender. Land monopolies should be stopped either 
by limitation of ownership or graduated taxation. Public ownership and 
operation of railroads and telegraphs and the reduction of freight rates 
in Nebraska to the Iowa level; reform of the tariff; eight hours a day for 
labor except in agriculture, and the Australian ballot were demanded. The 
temperance question was judiciously dodged in accordance with the 
admonition of the party organ, which held that it was not a practicable 
issue at that time.

   Prompted partly by fear of the populist uprising and partly by an 
independent reform spirit, a group of republicans assembled at the Capital 
Hotel in Lincoln on the 27th of March to consider ways and means of 
action. A committee, consisting of Daniel M. Nettleton of Clay county, 
Charles K. Keckley of York, William Leese (attorney-general) of Lancaster, 
J. R. Sutherland of Burt, and J. R. Ballard of Fillmore, reported an 
address which asseverated that "the time has come when an earnest protest 
should be made against the domination of corporate power in the republican 
party" and, in support of this bold avowal, that in the convention of 1889 
"the railroad managers, by the aid of 286 proxies, made good their threat 
and defeated Judge Reese for renomination as a judge of the supreme court, 
and the treasurer of the Burlington & Missouri railroad company and the 
railroad attorneys, division superintendents, roadmasters and section 
bosses, by passes and other means, induced many county delegations to 
violate the instructions of their county conventions in favor of Judge 
Reese"; that "a part of the earnings of the railroads are being used to 
subsidize the public press"; and that there were many more outrages of the 
sort well known to the people of the state. The address called a mass 
convention to meet in Lincoln on the 20th of May. The convention duly 
assembled and seventy republicans signed a test of good faith.

Page 617

   The resolutions adopted by the convention viewed "with alarm the 
intense discontent among republican voters of the state, chiefly due to 
the mischievous and demoralizing interference of corporations," and 
demanded that they should go out of politics; denounced railroad passes 
distributed for political purposes as a species of bribery and demanded 
their prohibition under severe penalties; demanded the enactment of a 
maximum railroad rate bill, inasmuch as the state board of transportation 
had failed to exercise the authority vested in it; the national convention 
of 1888 having pledged the republican party to a reduction of import 
duties, "as republicans we request our delegates in congress to oppose the 
McKinley bill in its present form." The last resolution provided for a 
committee of fifteen to draft an address and to urge the republican state 
committee to fix the date of the state convention not later than July 8th 
and from which proxies should be excluded. The call for the convention 
yielded to the anti-proxy demand, but conserved its dignity by fixing the 
date of the convention at July 23d, thus disregarding the letter but 
yielding to the spirit of the specific demand for an early convention. Mr. 
Richards, chairman of the state committee, was also to be the convention's 
nominee for governor. In the meantime the insurgent committee of fifteen 
had attended a meeting of the regular state committee where differences 
were formally adjusted.

   On the 24th of May Governor Thayer created great consternation in the 
republican party and general disapproval by issuing a call for an extra 
session of the legislature to convene on the 5th of June. The objects of 
the session were to pass a maximum railroad rate law and abolish the board 
of transportation, to adopt the Australian ballot, and to consider and 
give expression in favor of an increase in the volume of currency and of 
the free coinage of silver. It was rather vociferously alleged in some 
quarters that this surprising coup was due to Church Howe's cunning and 
his influence over the governor exercised with some ulterior personal 
motive. But the blame -- for the move was generally condemned -- was 
probably placed at Howe's door because, on general principles, that was at 
least an appropriate or natural place for it. The governor had shown 
symptoms of senility before he was fixed upon for his office, and it is 
not improbable that this condition was an important, if not the governing 
test of eligibility applied by the astute party managers. The prevalent 
political disquietude excited in him a childlike desire to make a master 
stroke; and it would be a natural impulse or part of the game to keep his 
project a secret until it was suddenly sprung. As a sensation-monger the 
call must have fully met the governor's fondest expectations; but a prompt 
and positive outburst of public disapproval, and especially from men and 
interests whom he could not disregard, obscured his brilliant rocket in 
its upward flight and forced from him a recall before the end of a week 
which brought it down truly like a stick. The miscarriage did not, 
however, change the governor's status; for the public saw that he had 
merely slipped his leading strings. The question was derisively asked by 
the opposition why the legislature, which so lately had conspicuously 
refused to enact the proposed laws in a regular session, could be expected 
to pass them in a special session. The governor chose to assign as reasons 
for his act of revocation, which was issued May 31st, that many members 
had become disqualified and that several vacancies had actually occurred 
which, according to the statute, would have to be filled by special 
elections before a special session could be lawfully held. The Omaha 
Republican insisted that the party could not properly be blamed for the 
governor's "exhibition of puerility," and more than hinted that he had not 
given the real reasons for the recall which ought not to have been issued. 
The Bee feared that the governor had made a very serious mistake; but it 
commended his wisdom in rectifying the mistake, alleging that public 
sentiment was "overwhelmingly opposed to an extra session." It declared 
that "the jubilation exhibited by the leading democratic organ over the 
prospect of a costly legislative fizzle and its frantic effort to 
counteract the sentiment in favor of revocation was in itself a very 
tangible reason for the governor's action." This journal did

Page 618

not oppose the proposal of the call that the legislature should urge 
Congress to provide more money and for free coinage of silver or for the 
enactment of a maximum freight rate law, but it contended that, confronted 
with full local and national tickets and three amendments to the 
constitution, voters ought not to be further puzzled by a new imported 
ballot.

   The republican state convention was held at Lincoln July 23d. Lucius D. 
Richards of Dodge county was nominated for governor on the third formal 
ballot, receiving 447 votes against 219 for John H. MacColl of Dawson 
county, and 143 for Dr. Samuel D. Mercer of Douglas. On the informal 
ballot John M. Thayer received 139 votes; Manoah B. Reese, 29; Thomas J. 
Majors, 41; Samuel D. Mercer, 47. Charles E. Magoon of Lancaster county 
was chairman of the committee on resolutions. The railroad plank in 
demanding a reduction of freight and passenger rates to correspond with 
rates now prevailing in adjacent states in the Mississippi valley, thereby 
virtually repudiating its innocuous commission policy, indicated an 
awakening to real conditions in the old party. But it preserved its 
fatuous bourbonism in the tabling, by a vote of 486 to 330, of a 
resolution declaring that the state board of transportation had ignored 
the just demands of the people for relief from extortion and demanding 
their censure. The old party did step forward to demand the Australian 
ballot and the abolition of free passes by proper legislation. On the 
money question it inclined its ear to a rapidly growing popular sentiment 
in the state rather than to sound, long-run financial principles by 
demanding that efforts to fully remonetize silver should be continued 
until it was put upon a perfect equality with gold as a money metal. The 
tariff plank was inane. A vitalized offering by Edward Rosewater, which 
demanded a free list, including lumber, sugar, wool, woolen goods in 
common use, salt, coal, and iron was, according to the report of the State 
Journal, "overwhelmingly rejected." A resolution favoring the prohibition 
amendment, the submission of which the preceding convention had favored, 
was sidetracked in the committee. In the complication of issues it may not 
be dogmatically asserted that this timid hesitancy was fatal to the 
fortunes of Mr. Richards in the election; but it is probably true. Though, 
according to opposing newspapers, including the Bee, he was "a railroad 
man," he was of larger parts than the average governor of Nebraska.

   The democratic convention was held at Omaha August 14th, and William G. 
Hastings of Saline county was its temporary and permanent chairman. James 
E. Boyd was nominated for governor on the first ballot, receiving 440 
votes to 109 for John E. Shervin of Dodge county, a strong "Morton man." 
The platform was mainly devoted to national questions. It declared for 
free coinage of silver on its former footing with gold; against sumptuary 
legislation -- but inconsistently approved high license; taunted the 
republicans for dodging the prohibition issue in its late convention after 
having brought about its submission; declared for the election of United 
States senators by the people and for the Australian ballot; and denounced 
the maintenance of a state militia and demanded its abolition.

   The campaign was signalized and, needless to say, enlivened by the 
nomination of William J. Bryan for member of Congress in the first 
district. The congressional convention was held at Lincoln July 30th and 
Mr. Bryan was nominated on the first formal ballot, receiving 137 votes to 
21 for M. V. Gannon of Douglas county. Mr. Bryan's platform declared for 
the "free coinage of silver on equal terms with gold," and for the 
election of United States senators by the people. Gilbert L. Laws was 
elbowed out of the nomination for the long term in the second district, 
owing largely if not mainly to the persistent opposition of the Omaha Bee, 
which was an ardent supporter of Harlan of York. The Bee strenuously 
appealed to Nebraska farmers to keep out of the independent movement, 
which it declared was only a conspiracy of ambitious politicians against 
the old party. In its issue of October 20, 1890, it published an 
impassioned letter from General Van Wyck, addressed to George W. Blake, 
chairman, and C. H. Pirtle, secretary of the people's independent state 
commit-

Page 619

tee. They had sent out a letter saying that "it having been evident that 
Mr. Van Wyck has turned squarely against the independent movement, we 
recommend that he be not invited to address independent meetings nor given 
any opportunity to use his unfriendly influence." In his reply, General 
Van Wyck attacked Burrows as a malicious dictator and charged that a 
shameful gerrymander had been made in the southwest counties in the 
interest of Powers and the rest of the cabal. He also pointed out that he 
himself was the first to declare for independent action by the Alliance 
and that Burrows was driven into it only after the people had held county 
and congressional conventions. In its next issue the Bee defends and 
applauds Van Wyck. Owing to the "state of his health, the demands of 
official duties and the condition of his private affairs" Senator Paddock 
was unable to personally participate in the campaign, but confined his 
activities to correspondence. His pronunciamento was especially 
untimely -- characteristically slipshod and evasive.

   The virgin campaign of the populists disclosed a fresh phase of 
American political temperament. It was a composite of Hugo's pictures of 
the French Revolution and a western religious revival. The popular emotion 
more nearly approached obsession than it had theretofore seemed possible 
for the American temperament to permit it to do. The public meetings, 
while less sanguinary, were in temper reminders of those of the great 
Revolution. "These unequal events, seriously threatening all benefits at 
once, outburst of mad progress, boundless and unintelligible improvement." 
There was among them a French, rather than an American comradery. "They no 
longer said gentleman and lady, but citizen and citizeness." The sudden 
attitude of scornful irreverence toward the old "God and Morality" party, 
till then held sacred, was startling. "They danced in ruined cloisters 
with church lamps on the altar . . . ; they tilled the public gardens; 
they ploughed up the gardens of the Tuileries . . . Playing cards too were 
in a state of revolution. Kings were replaced by genii; Queens by the 
Goddess of Liberty; Knaves by Equality personified; and aces by characters 
representing law." To express and stimulate their spirit the French 
populists had "liberty caps"; the American, a "liberty building." Their 
great political gatherings had the air and ardor of old-time camp 
meetings. Their favorite orators spoke with religious unction, sometimes 
supplemented by the laying on of hands. At a Wymore mass meeting in 
September there were ten hundred and fifteen teams in line "by actual 
count," and nine thousand people; at Hastings the same week, sixteen 
hundred teams and twelve thousand people. A demonstration in Lincoln, the 
enemy's country, in crowds and pageantry rivaled a circus parade and in 
enthusiasm a Bryan homecoming. Though the temper of the movement was 
overheated and the public speeches were more or less irrational and 
visionary, yet, as a whole and in general, it was not ill-tempered; it 
knew what it wanted and went to the mark; and within twenty years its 
demands -- except as to the money policy -- were substantially complied 
with so far as the forms of law could grant them. Relative to conditions, 
the populist revolution was as fruitful as its French prototype.

   The Bee's efforts in the campaign were devoted more to defeating the 
prohibition amendment than to any other question. The elections were all 
but a clean sweep against the republicans, democrats and populists 
dividing the results of the victory. Boyd, democratic candidate for 
governor, received 71,331 votes; Powers, people's independent, 70,187; 
Richards, republican, 68,878; B. L. Paine, prohibitionist, 3,676. The rest 
of the republican state ticket was successful by small majorities, ranging 
from 3,000 to 4,000. The republican candidates were defeated in every 
congressional district. The vote in the first district was, Bryan, 
democrat, 32,376; William J. Connell, republican, 25,663; Allen Root, 
people's independent, 13,066; E. H. Chapman, prohibitionist, 1,670. In the 
second district William A. McKeighan, democrat and independent, 36,104; N. 
V. Harlan, republican, 21,776; and L. B. Palmer, prohibitionist, 1,220. In 
the third district, Omer M. Kem, 31,831; George W. E. Dorsey, republican, 
25,440; William H.

Page 620

Thompson, democrat, 22,353; W. L. Pierce, prohibitionist, 961.

   It was generally charged and believed that the vote of Douglas county 
was corruptly swollen to insure the defeat of the prohibition amendment. 
Comparison of votes cast at the election of 1890 with those for two years 
preceding and two years following seems to sustain the belief. In 1888 the 
total vote cast for state officers was 202,855, of which Douglas county 
cast 10.6 per cent. In 1889 the total vote was 169,733, Douglas county 
casting 7.5 per cent. In 1890 the total vote was 214,072, of which Douglas 
cast 12.2 per cent. In 1891 the total vote was 156,080; Douglas county, 
11.8 per cent. In 1892 the total vote was 197,473; Douglas county, 11.2 
per cent. The total vote cast in 1890 was 8.4 per cent in excess of the 
total vote in 1892. The vote cast in Douglas county in 1890 was 17.5 per 
cent in excess of the vote of the county in 1892. The vote on the 
prohibition amendment for the whole state was 82,292 for and 111,728 
against. The vote of Douglas county was 1,555 for and 23,918 against.

   The fourteenth legislature convened in the twelfth regular session on 
the 6th of January, 1891, and finally adjourned April 4th, the seventy-
first day. The senate comprised eighteen independents, eight democrats, 
and seven republicans, the independents having a majority of three. In the 
house there were fifty-four independents, twenty-five democrats, and 
twenty-one republicans, yielding the independents a clear majority of 
eight. Samuel M. Elder, independent, of Clay county, was elected speaker, 
receiving 54 votes to 25 cast for Frank E. White, democrat, of Cass 
county, and 20 for J. O. Cramb, republican, of Jefferson county. The 
independents took all the offices of both houses for themselves.

   On the request of the joint convention for the opinion of the attorney-
general as to the legal power of the convention to proceed to open, 
publish, and canvass the election returns, that officer expressed the 
belief that it would be better for the legislature to submit to the order 
of the supreme court until a better remedy could be obtained; that the 
court has stated as law that the first duty of the legislature is to open, 
publish, and canvass the returns; and that the speaker is the presiding 
officer. To the query of Senator Stevens as to whether the supreme court 
had decided that the speaker of the house is the presiding officer at this 
time, the attorney general replied: "I understand that it is the judgment 
of the Supreme Court that no other officer is recognized -- that the 
speaker of the House is the presiding officer." Whereupon the convention 
took a recess until half past two o'clock in the afternoon. On 
reassembling the secretary of the senate read a communication from the 
attorney-general in which he said that his former statement that the 
supreme court had decided that the speaker of the house should preside at 
the joint session was based upon misinformation and that the court had not 
passed upon that question. Whereupon the returns of the election were 
brought by the secretary of state and delivered to the speaker. The 
lieutenant-governor insisting upon presiding over the proceedings, Senator 
Stevens offered a formal protest declaring that the assumption of the 
lieutenant-governor was in violation of section 67, chapter 26, of the 
compiled statutes of Nebraska for 1887. The speaker then canvassed the 
returns from the several counties and after delivering them to the 
secretary, declared as follows: :

   By virtue of my position as speaker of the House of Representatives of 
the state of Nebraska and in accordance with a resolution of this joint 
convention I have opened the returns of the general election held on the 
4th day of November, 1890, within and for the state of Nebraska and to me 
directed and now publish and declare that James E. Boyd for governor; T. 
J. Majors for lieutenant governor; John C. Allen, for secretary of state; 
T. H. Benton for auditor of public accounts; J. E. Hill for treasurer; G. 
H. Hastings for attorney general; A. R. Humphrey for commissioner of 
public lands and buildings; A. K. Goudy for superintendent of public 
instruction; W. J. Bryan for congressman from the first district; W. A. 
McKeighan for congressman from the second district; O. M. Kerri for 
congressman from the third district, all having received the highest 
number of votes cast were duly elected.

   On the 26th of January the senate passed a resolution, by a vote of 23 
to 8, recognizing

Page 621

James E. Boyd as governor and asking for the appointment of a committee of 
two to wait upon him and ascertain whether he had a message to deliver and 
to appoint a time to hear it and asking that the house appoint a similar 
committee.

   On the 28th the house, by a vote of 52 to 42, tabled a resolution to 
appoint a committee to act with the senate committee, on the ground that 
Boyd was not rightfully governor; but, after further consideration, on the 
4th of February it agreed to such an arrangement by a vote of 55 to 42, 
and February 6th was fixed upon for the function. An arrangement to hear 
the outgoing governor's customary farewell message was easily made, 
because, at the time, he was content to be called ex-governor, while there 
was stout rebellion against recognizing Boyd.

   The attempt of the supreme court to coerce or interfere with the action 
of a coördinate body in commanding the legislature to canvass the votes 
was probably usurpation, as Shrader's resolution characterized it. The 
persistent attempt of Meiklejohn to preside over the joint convention 
united specious bravado, with usurpation which due courage and ability on 
the part of the speaker might have prevented and properly rebuked. The 
result of this unwarrantable interference on the part of the court and 
president of the senate did a great injustice to the independent 
contestants, as there was certainly good ground for a very general belief 
that an investigation of the election in Douglas county would have seated 
them.

   It is at least doubtful that the decision that a resolution fixing a 
day for hearing the contest required executive signature was sound; and 
the consideration that an affirmative interpretation handed over to a 
party to the contest power to block it by refusing to sign the resolution 
it seems should have constrained the court to give the reasonable side, in 
effect, the benefit of the doubt. But courts elected on partisan tickets 
naturally respond to party exigencies. In the first instance, the feeling 
of the court, for obvious reasons, preferred the democratic Boyd to the 
populist Powers; and so it had the courage of its feelings and Boyd went 
up. In the second instance, the court preferred the republican Thayer to 
the democratic Boyd and again it had the courage of its feelings and Boyd 
was down -- until the federal Supreme Court, too remote for small 
partisanship, picked him up again. The plain moral is that in pure 
political procedure like this the court should be kept out altogether, as 
in all states with modern constitutions.

   While the independents were disconcerted, they were not deterred by the 
interference of the court; and so on the 30th of January the house, by a 
vote of 74 to 18, passed a concurrent resolution designating February 17th 
as the day for hearing the contest; but the fine and final work was done 
in the senate when, on the 11th of February, it was rejected, 11 to 14, 
three independent senators -- Collins of Gage, Turner of Saline, and 
Thayer of Loup -- being the recreants. Even though in partisan war it was 
fair for democratic and republican members to deny the contestants a 
hearing of their cause, which it might be difficult to maintain, yet the 
independents who voted to deny that constitutional right clearly deserved 
the accusations of treachery and corruption which their fellow partisans 
heaped upon them. The testimony taken had at least colorably sustained the 
independent charges of fraud at the elections. Mr. Powers issued a 
dignified remonstrance against the denial of the forms of justice. "Every 
citizen has a sacred right to be heard before the judicial tribunal 
provided for his relief . . . The secretary of state said that James E. 
Boyd received 1,114 more votes than I did. I have proved that over 2,000 
persons were bribed in Douglas county to vote for Boyd, and that over 1,
300 of them voted in Omaha." Whether a trial of the cause would have 
sustained this contention or changed the practical result may always 
remain an open question, but that there was a scandalous miscarriage of 
justice in denying the trial there can be no doubt. The Farmers' Alliance 
naturally emptied most of its vials of wrath on the three recreant 
independents:

   Rarely does it happen when the interests of the corporations and the 
money power are

Page 622

pitted against the interests of the people that traitors are not found to 
betray the latter. The Judas who took the thirty pieces of silver and by 
kisses betrayed the Savior of mankind betrayed the divine man who by his 
teachings has always stood by the great plain people has found -- his vile 
counterpart throughout all the ages. He has been here in Lincoln through 
the contest. He had three doubles in the Senate . . . We dislike to defile 
our pages with their names.

   Collins made a weak attempt to justify his course, but it placed him in 
a worse plight than Turner's silence left him; and Taylor shirked the 
ordeal altogether by flight. The full force of conventional cunning and 
all the arts of scared capitalism were turned against the all but 
untutored populists. The World-Herald openly, and the Bee really were for 
Boyd, while the State Journal, if not warmly for Thayer, was hotly against 
the populists. Of the larger dailies, the Lincoln Daily Call alone battled 
for a fair and square deal. For effect the independents were constantly 
called prohibitionists by their allied opponents.

   On the 6th of February Governor Boyd delivered a business-like message 
to the legislature. He counseled acceptance of the decision of the people 
against prohibition of the liquor traffic and gave cautionary advice as to 
railroad legislation. "The people," he said, "appear to regard the present 
board of transportation as having accomplished little or nothing in their 
behalf. Their interests might, and doubtless would, be better subserved by 
the creation of such a commission as exists in the neighboring state of 
Iowa. Your right to establish maximum tariff rates is not denied. Such 
legislation, however, is deemed to rest on delicate ground, because of the 
vast diversity of commodities and the many peculiar and distinguishing 
features which enter into the carrying trade. The present board of 
transportation has the right to establish reasonable maximum rates though 
it has never exercised its authority. If your honorable body, however, 
should decide to take this matter in hand, I would respectfully suggest 
that your work in that direction be confined to a limited number of 
commodities in carload lots such as coal, grain, live stock, lumber and 
others."

   He recommended the passage of an Australian ballot law and strongly 
argued that presidential electors should be chosen by congressional 
districts. Deprecating the fact that a proposed amendment to the 
constitution to provide for two more judges of the supreme court had been 
defeated, he advised calling a convention for a general revision of the 
constitution.

   The governor congratulated the people over the fact that peace with the 
Indians had been restored, after the ill-starred Wounded Knee campaign, 
without the loss of a man killed in battle. It had not been his intention 
to recall the Nebraska National Guards until the Indians had been 
disarmed, and he had sent a telegram to that effect to Brigadier-General 
Colby January 13th; but it was received after Major-General Miles had 
informed Colby that he could safely withdraw his troops and he had already 
ordered the Nebraska National Guards to their homes.

   The legislature promptly repealed the sugar bounty law of 1889, the 
measure passing the house by a vote of 78 to 16 and the senate by 25 to 6. 
The nays in the house comprised five democrats, eight republicans, and 
three independents; in the senate, one democrat and five republicans, thus 
the repeal was mainly a party measure. Boyd county was constituted out of 
unorganized territory. The most important measure of the session, 
probably, was the Australian ballot act which both of the old parties also 
had promised. The bill was introduced by W. F. Porter of Merrick county, 
as house roll 141. It passed the house by a vote of 80 to 20 and in the 
senate it received 32 ayes and no nays. Of the 20 nays in the house 
thirteen were independents, four democrats, and three republicans. Fifteen 
of these were farmers. Congressional districts were apportioned, the 
number being raised from three to six on account of the increase in 
population as shown by the census of 1890. Judicial districts were 
increased from twelve to fifteen. An act was passed requiring that 
railroad stations should be given the same names as towns in which they 
are situated.

Page 623

   The state board of health was established, consisting of the governor, 
attorney-general, and superintendent of public instruction; and the act 
provided that the board should have four physicians as secretaries to 
assist and advise it. A "Girls' Industrial School for Juvenile 
Delinquents" was established at Geneva, on condition that forty acres of 
land should be donated therefor; and an appropriation was made of $40,000 
for the erection of buildings and maintenance. The sum of $100,000 was 
appropriated from the state treasury "for the immediate relief of the 
drouth stricken counties of the state of Nebraska." A "relief commission" 
was created by the same act, consisting of Samuel M. Elder, Luther P. 
Ludden, R. R. Greer, Louis Meyer, George W. Martin, John Fitzgerald, 
Andrew J. Sawyer, Charles W. Mosher, J. W. Hartley, W. N. Nason. The act 
provided that county commissioners, county clerks, and sheriffs should 
distribute supplies furnished by the relief commission. Bonds to the 
amount of $100,000, to run five years at four per cent interest, were 
authorized; and the governor was empowered to appoint, with the consent of 
the senate, a "board of relief" of nine members, who should sell the bonds 
and deposit the proceeds in the state treasury for the use of the relief 
commission. A tax of one-eighth of a mill was levied for the interest and 
principal of the relief bonds. County boards were authorized to use the 
surplus general funds of the county to buy food, fuel, seed grain, and 
food for teams and sell them to the needy families at cost, taking 
promissory notes running three years with interest payable annually. 
County boards were also authorized to issue bonds, not to exceed in amount 
three per cent of the assessed valuation of the county or $20,000 in the 
aggregate, for providing seed and feeding teams for raising crops in 1891. 
This authority required a majority vote, and the bonds were to be payable 
in ten years and draw interest at a rate not over seven per cent. A 
depository law which was destined to cause much loss and trouble was 
passed. It authorized state and county treasurers to deposit current funds 
in state or national banks, three per cent interest to be paid therefor on 
daily balances. Personal bonds approved by the governor, secretary of 
state, and attorney-general were required. It was bad policy on general 
principles to loan public money upon personal bonds, but the conjunction 
of drouth and panic illustrated this truth in an unexpected and harmful 
manner. The sum of $50,000 was appropriated for an exhibit at the World's 
Columbian Exposition, and the governor was authorized to appoint six 
commissioners, two from each congressional district and two of them from 
each of three parties, with compensation of $5 a day for actual time 
devoted to duties, and traveling expenses. The sum of $24,000 was 
appropriated to pay the militia and its maintenance, and $13,200 for 
railroad transportation on account of the Wounded Knee Indian campaign. 
The sum of $300 was allowed to each executive officer for attorney's fees 
in the election contest, Majors getting $125 for witness and sheriff's 
fees also; to John H. Powers $300 for attorney fees and $250 for witness 
and sheriff's fees; to Boyd $100 and Dech $125 for witness and sheriff's 
fees; and from $250 to $350 each to eleven notaries public and lesser sums 
to two others; also $5,000 for reporting and transcribing testimony.

   It was left to the so-called revolutionary populist movement to respond 
in a material or practical way to the long continued popular demand for 
railroad legislation; and, notwithstanding the doubtful propriety of 
reform by this necessarily somewhat crude method, the measure at least 
deserves that credit. The Newberry bill (H. R. 12), so called because it 
was introduced by Representative Newberry, was passed in the house by a 
vote of 78 to 17 and in the senate by 23 to 7.

   Boyd belonged to the class, distinctive at the time, known as railroad 
men; so that his veto of the bill was not a surprise but, on the contrary, 
was expected. Notwithstanding that the bill was necessarily crude in form 
and that it might be unfair to the railroads, yet it was the deliberate 
response to the explicit demand of the majority party represented in the 
legislature, and also to the republican platform. The veto, therefore, was 
in derogation of the spirit of modern representative government,

Page 624

and it was rightfully resented as such. Accordingly it was an act of 
political suicide on the part of the governor, and it emasculated his 
party besides. Disapproval of the veto was so strong that J. Sterling 
Morton, in spite of his fixed opposition to legislation of that sort, 
could, as he did, publicly denounce it, as bad party policy, at once 
thereby getting revenge out of his political enemy and gaining such 
popular approval as to be unanimously nominated as Boyd's successor.

   The republican convention for 1891 was held at Lincoln September 24th. 
George H. Thummel of Hall county was temporary and permanent chairman. 
Alfred M. Post of Platte county was nominated for judge of the supreme 
court on the fourth formal ballot, receiving 294 votes to 135 for M. B. 
Reese, 126 for Amasa Cobb, the incumbent of the office, and 17 for Judge 
William H. Morris of Saline county. The platform was devoted especially to 
national questions. It approved the silver coinage law of the 
administration "by which the entire product of the silver mines of the 
United States is added to the currency of the people," but denounced the 
democratic doctrine of free and unlimited coinage, and it repeated the 
usual generalities about railroad control. John L. Webster of Douglas 
county was chairman of the committee on resolutions and Charles H. Gere 
was also a member of the committee. H. B. Shumway of Dixon county and C. 
H. Marple of Douglas were nominated for regents of the University.

   The democratic convention was held at Grand Island September 17th. 
Frank P. Ireland was president of the convention. Judge Jefferson H. 
Broady was nominated for judge of the supreme court and F. A. Brogan and 
S. F. Hermiger for regents of the University -- all by acclamation. Judge 
Broady resolutely declined to accept the nomination, and the democratic 
organization favored giving the support of the party to Edgerton, the 
people's party candidate. The platform condemned the state board of 
transportation for "refusing in the face of overwhelming demands to fix 
reasonable freight rates and give the people relief from exorbitant 
transportation charges" arid declared in favor of a constitutional 
amendment providing for three elective railroad commissioners. It declared 
for a tariff for revenue limited to the necessities of the government 
economically administered -- and the election of United States senators by 
popular vote. It favored "a law establishing reasonable maximum freight 
rates." The friends of Governor Boyd in the convention wished to endorse 
his recent veto of the Newberry maximum freight bill, notwithstanding that 
it had been denounced by nearly all the democratic newspapers of the 
state; but, largely through Bryan's influence, the question was left 
without action. The World-Herald, which disapproved the veto, sharply and 
justly criticised the convention for dodging the issue. The first sharp 
contest between the gold democrats and Mr. Bryan and his following upon 
the money question occurred at this convention. He proposed a plank 
advocating the free and unlimited coinage of silver; but most of the 
Lancaster delegates stood stoutly against the proposal, and a compromise 
was agreed upon to strike out "and unlimited" so that the plank read: "We 
favor the free coinage of silver."

   The people's independent convention was held at Hastings August 18, 
1891, seventy-eight counties being represented by over six hundred 
delegates. William A. Poynter, then a state senator from Boone county, was 
chairman, and C. H. Pirtle secretary of the convention. Joseph W. Edgerton 
was nominated for judge of the supreme court, without opposition, and A. 
D'Allemand of Furnas, and E. A. Hadley of Greeley, for regents of the 
University. The platform contained the now recognized orthodox planks of 
the populist faith -- all money to be issued by the government; abolition 
of national bank currency; free and unlimited coinage of silver; no alien 
ownership of land; graduated taxation of incomes; government ownership of 
all means of public communication and transportation; election of 
president, vice president, and United States senators directly by the 
people. It denounced the veto of the maximum freight rate bill and 
expressed sympathy for laborers in their efforts to enforce the eight-hour 
law. After a virulent campaign in which the World-Herald

Page 625

insisted that the judicial contest was a sharply defined railroad issue 
and, in particular, indulged in violent personal attacks upon Judge Post, 
he was elected, receiving 76,447 votes against 72,311 cast for Edgerton, 
If the independents had nominated a stronger lawyer than Edgerton fusion 
would have been successful. Mrs. Ida M. Bittenbender, the prohibition 
candidate, received 7,322 votes.

   The national convention of the people's independent party for 1892 was 
held at Omaha July 2d.

   The republican state convention to elect delegates to the national 
convention was held at Kearney April 27, 1892. Bradner D. Slaughter of 
Nance county was temporary and permanent chairman. John L. Webster of 
Douglas, Edward D. Webster of Hitchcock -- who was a delegate from 
Nebraska to the national republican convention of 1860 -- Lucius D. 
Richards of Dodge, and Amasa Cobb of Lancaster, were elected delegates at 
large. A motion that Edward Rosewater be made national committeeman was 
carried after a spectacular fight. Opposition raised in the convention to 
choosing John L. Webster as a delegate, on account of doubt of his fealty 
to President Harrison, compelled him to come before the convention and 
spell the name of the president in staccato fashion. The platform endorsed 
the McKinley bill, Blaine's reciprocity scheme, and Senator Paddock for 
reëlection. The delegates were instructed to support President Harrison 
for renomination.

   The first democratic convention for 1892 was held at Omaha April 13th 
and 14th. It was one of the most exciting and spectacular political 
conventions ever held in the state. By this time Mr. Bryan had become 
characteristically positive and aggressive in the advocacy of the free 
coinage of silver, while a majority of the democrats were loyal to 
Cleveland and approved his conservatism with reference to the silver 
question. At the Lancaster county convention, held for the purpose of 
choosing delegates to the state convention, there was a very heated 
contest between the Cleveland democrats and the followers of Mr. Bryan. 
The former were in the majority but, being unwilling to deal too harshly 
with so promising and popular an acquisition to the party as Mr. Bryan had 
become, and, moreover, not appreciating at that time the length to which 
his audacity might hurl itself, they magnanimously put him upon the 
delegation. Robert A. Batty of Adams county was chairman of the 
convention. The first controversy was between the Boyd and anti-Boyd 
factions for representation. At the county convention of Douglas county 
there had been a breakup, and a double set of delegates asked for 
admission to the state convention. Charles Offut and Charles Ogden were 
the leaders of the Boyd faction and Euclid Martin, Timothy J. Mahoney, and 
Michael V. Gannon of the anti-Boyd faction. The contest resulted in the 
seating of Boyd's friends. The Lancaster delegation elected Andrew J. 
Sawyer, a gold democrat, as its representative upon the committee on 
resolutions; but the convention added Bryan as a member at large of the 
committee. The platform as reported by the committee merely emphatically 
endorsed the national platform of 1884, saying nothing specific about the 
money question. Mr. Bryan in a minority report introduced the additional 
resolution that, "We declare ourselves in favor of the free coinage of 
silver."

   Half an hour was allowed each side for discussing the minority silver 
plank. Bryan's friends conceded all the time to him for the affirmative, 
and the negative time was divided between Robert A. Batty of Adams county, 
Nathan S. Harwood, Andrew J. Sawyer, and Albert Watkins of Lancaster, 
Charles Offut of Douglas, and Judge James C. Crawford of Cuming. 
Immediately after the temporary organization was made permanent (by 
general consent as the writer remembers for the move was not strictly in 
order) Albert Watkins offered a resolution favoring Cleveland. As the 
Cleveland resolution was read, "it was wildly cheered and unanimously 
passed." As first offered the resolution contained instructions for 
Cleveland; but, on hearing a goodly number of objections to that part of 
it, the mover promptly withdrew it and the remainder was adopted without 
opposition and with great enthusiasm. Mr. Bryan's speech upon

Page 626

his silver plank was the first taste that a general assemblage of the 
democrats of the state had of his magnetic eloquence; and, though at the 
beginning the convention was overwhelmingly for Cleveland, after he 
disclosed the fact, which he had theretofore kept secret, that he favored 
Horace E. Boies of Iowa, for president, it seemed as if the convention was 
almost willing to follow him. This part of the proceedings was very 
exciting. Mr. Offut, who was a dramatic Kentuckian, while speaking on the 
stage against the resolution, turned around and facing Mr. Bryan, who sat 
near, thinking to surely catch him in an inconsistency, demanded, "You are 
for Cleveland, are you not?" But Bryan promptly and unexpectedly answered 
loudly enough to be heard by the audience and with the utmost dramatic 
fervor, "I am for Horace E. Boies." The free silver part of the convention 
was very boisterous and unwilling to give the antisilver speakers a 
hearing. After the first roll call the chairman announced that Bryan's 
amendment was defeated by 237 to 267.

   And then! it was like the hot chamber of hell. Men climbed over the 
tables and yelled in angry denunciation . . . And that convention went 
mad -- absolutely insane. Men could not do things crazy enough. Batty was 
hooted at and sworn at Bryan tried to soothe things. It was impossible
. . . Governor Boyd and three reliable gentlemen on the stage had kept tab 
. . . At last in the sheol of noise it was decided to take another vote
. . . The recount was taken amid much excitement, and Chairman Batty 
finally announced its result -- 229 yes; 247 no! . . . The majority report 
was then adopted.

   In the midst of the collective brainstorm Bryan's livid face, 
compressed lips, and defiant eyes were a vivid reminder of Edwin Booth in 
his most dramatic moments. In after years Bryan could not have repeated 
that remarkable theatrical role because only the impetuous abandon and 
daring, the freshness and fire of youth, unhampered by knowledge and 
unrestrained by experience could accomplish, or would under-take it. The 
master actor had been nurtured in the low tariff or free trade school, and 
his speeches on the tariff question at that time were inimitably apt and 
taking; but he had given little attention to the deeper and more difficult 
principles of money, so that his sympathy and his ambition fell easy 
captive to the superficial shibboleth, "free silver." That great turbulent 
body of men, representatives of the state's sufferings, hopes and fears, 
was of course less schooled than the ambitious leader, and a majority of 
them, perhaps, were ready to give him the benefit of every doubt. It was 
from the first apparent to the maturely thoughtful that this captivating 
issue was destined to be short-lived, and it was discredited by the sober 
second thought of the people. Economic privation was an inevitable, if not 
legitimate source and stimulus of its strength in Nebraska. On the eve of 
winter in 1890 there were from 1,500 to 2,000 families in destitute 
condition in the western part of the state, and soulless railroads were 
hauling coal to them without compensation. It was even argued that the 
alleged gross election frauds of that year should be condoned lest 
investigation might delay relief by the legislature. "What does our 
legislature mean by this unseemly wrangle when 20,000 of our citizens are 
now starving?" This was not the temper to learn to labor and to wait 
before venturing, for possible immediate relief, to dislocate a vast 
national financial system. Under the influence of the Miller-Boyd faction 
President Cleveland had made the mistake of going to J. Sterling Morton's 
home town to select a revenue collector in the person of Morton's 
immemorial political and personal enemy, Stephen H. Calhoun.

   It was the opinion of the most acute politicians upon the Nebraska 
delegation to the national convention that but for the aggressive fight 
made against Bryan in the Lancaster county convention and which was 
carried on in the state convention, the enemies of Cleveland would have 
defeated him. It will be remembered that the delegation from his own state 
was aggressively against him and without the sixteen delegates from 
Nebraska he could not have sustained his strength long enough to obtain a 
two-thirds vote under the rule of the national convention.

   The people's independent convention was

Page 627

held at Bohannan's Hall, in Lincoln, June 30th. Jacob V. Wolf of Lancaster 
county was temporary and permanent chairman. All of the counties except 
ten participated in the convention with a representation of 722 delegates. 
The welcome return of Van Wyck to favor and the passing of Burrows was the 
principal incident of the proceedings. Though the name of the late 
imperious leader was presented as a candidate for delegate at large it was 
passed with apparently unanimous tacit assent, while Van Wyck received 
almost as many votes as John H. Powers, the high man. The independents 
proudly pointed out that whereas sixteen delegates to the republican 
national convention comprised seven lawyers, six bankers, and not one 
farmer, their own delegation of thirty-two contained twenty-four farmers, 
three lawyers, and three editors.

   The republican state convention for 1892 was held at Lincoln August 4th 
and 5th, John R. Hayes of Madison county was temporary chairman and A. E. 
Cady of Howard county, permanent chairman. Samuel D. Mercer of Douglas, 
chairman of the state committee, called the convention to order. Church 
Howe seconded the nomination of his immemorial political rival, Thomas J. 
Majors, for governor. On the first ballot, he received 344 votes; Lorenzo 
Crounse, 376; A. E. Cady, 82. On the second day Crounse was nominated on 
the fifth ballot, receiving 446 votes to 327 for Majors. The platform 
declared in favor of an elective railroad commission, empowered to fix 
local freight and passenger rates, and for postal telegraph and savings 
banks, besides approving the national platform.

   The state convention of the people's independent party was held at 
Kearney August 4th. The platform demanded reduction of freight rates to 
the Iowa level; declared against the restoration of the sugar bounty, and 
that all obligations payable in money should be payable in money 
authorized by the United States government -- stipulations to the contrary 
notwithstanding; favored a constitutional amendment authorizing the loan 
of the school fund to citizens on first mortgage real estate security at 
an interest rate of not more than five per cent; the settling of labor 
differences by arbitration, and equal pay for equal work to both men and 
women; denounced convict labor; demanded the election of president, vice 
president, and United States senators by direct vote of the people; 
denounced the state militia as an expensive ornament. A plank in favor of 
woman suffrage was laid on the table. Charles H. Van Wyck was nominated 
for governor on the first ballot, receiving 552 votes to 147 for William 
Leese and six for William A. Poynter. John H. Powers, the first candidate 
of the party for governor, refused to be a candidate for the office before 
the convention and also refused to take the nomination for state auditor. 
With a fickleness characteristic of politics the convention showed a 
continuing reaction against the late "Dictator Burrows" and in favor of 
Van Wyck.

   The democratic state convention was held at Lincoln August 30th. 
Matthew W. Gering of Cass county was temporary chairman and William H. 
Thompson of Hall, permanent chairman. A reaction of sentiment against 
Governor Boyd had taken place, due largely to his veto of the Newberry 
maximum freight rate bill. Even Morton himself, regarded as an ultra 
conservative on the question of railroad legislation, thought it expedient 
to publicly denounce the veto. In the convention there was a decided 
sentiment in favor of Morton's coming back -- explicable largely by the 
feeling in the party and especially on the part of the Morton faction of 
it, that Cleveland would be reëlected and that to strengthen Morton's 
leadership would be of material aid in the resulting division of federal 
spoils; and so the old leader of many campaigns and as many defeats was 
enthusiastically nominated by acclamation. The name of Samuel N. Wolbach 
of Hall county was presented to the convention by Constantine V. Gallagher 
of Omaha, and Frank P. Ireland of Otoe was also named, but both withdrew. 
Charles H. Brown of Omaha, a bitter opponent of Miller and Boyd, presented 
Morton's name to the convention.

   All three of the candidates for governor made aggressive speaking 
campaigns, Crounse and Van Wyck engaging in joint discussions

Page 628

all over the state. Toward the end of the campaign Morton displeased many 
of his old time friends by directing most of his energies to lampooning 
Van Wyck, thus apparently playing the role of tail to Crounse's kite. The 
nomination of Crounse was a recognition by republicans of the serious 
antimonopoly inroads into their party, this present help in time of need 
having been long and consistently opposed to the aggression of railroads. 
Though, measured by present standards, Crounse was a conservative, yet his 
appreciably progressive attitude toward the paramount railroad question 
and Van Wyck's radical advocacy of free silver coinage gave the Bee 
sufficient excuse for abandoning its old ally. It went so far as to charge 
him with degeneracy because in the joint debate with Crounse at Beatrice 
he declared that the republican Congress of 1873, in abrogating free 
coinage of silver, benefited the "shylocks of Europe" at the expense of 
the "toilers" of the United States. Crounse was elected by a vote of 78,
426; Van Wyck receiving 68,617; Morton, 44,195; C. E. Bentley, 
prohibitionist, 6,235. On account of his aggressive hostility to Van Wyck, 
the antimonopolist candidate, Morton's vote was about 2,500 behind the 
average of his ticket. The republicans lost three of the congressional 
districts. William J. Bryan, democrat, was elected over Allen W. Field, 
republican, in the first district; William A. McKeighan, people's 
independent and democrat, over William E. Andrews, in the fifth district; 
and Omer M. Kern, people's independent, over James Whitehead, republican, 
in the sixth district. By rational coöperation among those voters who 
stood substantially upon the same ground all of the republicans would have 
been defeated. Americans, long inured to the two-party habit, are 
slowly -- but surely -- learning to vote for present issues regardless of 
past names.

   The fifteenth legislature met in the twenty-third session and the 
thirteenth regular session January 3, 1893, and finally adjourned April 
8th, the sixty-eighth day. The senate comprised fourteen republicans, 
thirteen independents, and six democrats; the house forty-eight 
republicans, forty independents, and twelve democrats. The republicans of 
the senate took the honorary office by electing Erasmus M. Correll of 
Thayer county, temporary president, and the democrats and independents 
evenly divided the substantial spoils. Three democrats, Babcock of 
Douglas, Mattes of Otoe, and North of Platte, voted with the republicans, 
making Correll's total 17. Two democrats, McCarthy of Howard, and Thomsen 
of Dodge, voted with the independents for William Dysart of Nuckolls 
county. Hale of Madison, democrat, voted for Mattes. There were three 
ballots to choose the officer in question, on three successive days. J. A. 
Sheridan, independent, of Red Willow county, was elected temporary speaker 
over Church Howe by a vote of 51 to 48. J. N. Gaffin, independent, of 
Saunders, was elected speaker over Jensen, republican, of Fillmore, by a 
vote of 53 to 47. The independents took the chief clerkship, also, for 
Eric Johnson. They allowed the democrats six minor places.

   For eight days beyond his term, pending the revolutionary proceedings 
of the legislature of 1891 over the contested election case, Governor 
Thayer held to the executive office at the capitol which, under his 
orders, was guarded by armed militia. After the canvass of the returns, on 
the 9th of January, 1891, he applied to the supreme court for a writ of 
quo warranto to oust Boyd. On granting leave on the 13th, the court 
intimated to Thayer that in the meantime he had better yield the office to 
Boyd, whom the legislature had recognized as governor, and on that hint on 
the 15th Thayer complied with an order of the commissioner of public lands 
and building to vacate the executive office, whereupon Governor Boyd took 
possession of it. On the 5th of May the court entered a judgment of ouster 
against Boyd, on the ground that he was not a citizen of the United States 
and was therefore ineligible, and Thayer was reinstated.

   It appeared at the trial that Governor Boyd's father, who had come to 
Ohio from Ireland, took out his first naturalization papers in 1890, after 
the governor had arrived at legal age. The attainment of citizenship by 
the father, therefore, did not apply to the son, and the supreme court of 
the state decided that his.

Page 629

election was invalid; but an appeal was taken to the Supreme Court of the 
United States which decided, February 1, 1892, that when Nebraska was 
admitted as a state, Boyd was a resident and therefore became a citizen by 
adoption. Justice Maxwell had dissented from the decision of the state 
court on this ground. On the 6th of February, John L. Webster, Thayer's 
attorney, sent him a letter which convincingly assured him that he had 
been actuated by the highest patriotic motives in holding over until it 
had been established that his prospective successor was constitutionally 
eligible to fill his official shoes, and that he might now, with safety to 
the commonwealth, relinquish the post he had so faithfully and 
conscientiously guarded. In turn, the holdover governor wrote a letter to 
Boyd recount in the information he had received and proposing to 
relinquish the office on the following day; whereupon Boyd again became 
governor on the 8th of February, 1892.

   During nine months of his administration there had been a saving in 
expenses at the hospital for insane of $15,637.48 over expenses of the 
previous nine months, a difference of nearly twenty per cent. He claimed a 
large saving for other state institutions and that they could be conducted 
on an expenditure of sixty-six per cent of the prevailing expenses, 
exclusive of salaries. He recommended an investigation of all the state 
institutions. The sum of $38,000 had been expended in the Wounded Knee 
affair in January, 1891, and a bill for reimbursing the state for this 
expenditure had passed the Senate of the United States and was pending in 
the House. A year after the vote of the Newberry freight rate bill he had 
queried members of the legislature to find out whether they would pass 
such a reasonable measure as he had recommended in his first message if he 
should call a special session of the legislature; but he found them still 
radical, from his point of view. The present board of transportation, he 
said, had the same right to fix and regulate rates of freight as the Iowa 
commission, but seldom if ever exercised it. If the board were directly 
responsible to the people there would be better results. He recommended a 
choice of presidential electors, except two at large, by the people. 
Michigan had adopted that plan and the Supreme Court of the United States 
had sustained it. According to the report of the relief commission, aid 
had been given in about ten counties and to approximately 8,000 families, 
averaging five in number, and during four to six weeks. Already $30,000 of 
the $50,000 appropriated on account of the world's fair at Chicago had 
been expended -- $16,332.43 for the building -- and he recommended an 
appropriation of $50,000 more.

   By the act of Congress of March 2, 1891 (Stat. 26, p. 822), all direct 
taxes levied by the United States under the act of August 15, 1861 (Stat. 
12, p. 294), were to be refunded. It appeared from this refunding act that 
only one tax had been levied, the aggregate for all the states and 
territories being $20,000,000, and Nebraska's quota thereof, $19,312. The 
usual allowance of $20,000 for the expenses of the legislative session of 
1863 had been offset against the tax and no session was held.

   Governor Crounse delivered his inaugural message January 13, 1893. He 
found the state enjoying a prosperity rarely equalled in its history. 
Crops had been bountiful and prices in the main fairly satisfactory. There 
had been good crops in the former drouth stricken districts. Like his 
predecessor he made a strong appeal for economy in expenditures. 
Appropriations for state institutions should be cut to the minimum. The 
other recommendation was for a firm but wise control of railroads. "Your 
authority to control these railroads is undisputed, and you will stop 
short of your duty if you fail to do so, if occasion demands it." He 
remarked that nearly 70,000 votes had been cast for a ticket resting on a 
platform which declared that the roads were by unjust rates taking 
millions of dollars from the people annually.

   Another Newberry bill (H. R. 33), classifying freight and fixing 
maximum charges was passed at this session, and the board of 
transportation was authorized and directed to reduce its rates on any 
class or commodity and to revise classification but not so as to increase 
rates. Railroad companies might bring suit in the supreme court to show 
that the rates

Page 630

were unjust and the court might order the board of transportation to 
permit the roads to raise rates in amounts fixed by said board but not 
higher than those charged by any road on January 1, 1893. The bill passed 
the house, 63 to 30, the nays all republican but three -- Leidigh and 
Sinclair of Otoe, and Withnell of Douglas, democrats. All the members from 
Douglas and Lancaster voted no except Ricketts of Douglas, who was absent. 
A phenomenally strong if not complete control of public sentiment by the 
railroads in the two large cities of the state seems to be indicated by 
this vote, which was typical up to this time. The bill passed the senate 
18 to 14. The nays comprised three democrats -- Babcock of Douglas, Mattes 
of Otoe, North of Platte. The other eleven were republicans. The 
independent members voted solidly in the affirmative. Clarke of Douglas 
and Everett of Dodge, republicans; and Hale of Madison, McCarty of Howard, 
and Thomsen of Dodge, democrats, voted aye.

   A bill (H. R. 138) was passed authorizing the supreme court to appoint 
three commissioners to assist the court under such rules as it should 
adopt. Their term of office was fixed at three years and no two of them 
should be members of the same political party. It was enacted that the 
professors of botany, geology, chemistry, and entomology, in the State 
University, should be called state botanist, state geologist, etc. The sum 
of $35,000 was appropriated for the expense of a commissioner-general and 
employees for the World's Columbian Exposition with authority for the 
governor to appoint the commissioner-general at a salary of $2,000; 
combinations for fixing prices on commodities were prohibited; the 
bringing of persons or associations into the state for police work was 
prohibited and every undersheriff or deputy was required to be a resident 
of the state. This much mooted law, directed against the Pinkerton system, 
which is still in force, passed the house by a vote of 72 to 1, Van Duyn, 
republican, of Saline county, voting nay. It passed the senate 19 to 12.

   There was an exciting contest over the senatorial election, William V. 
Allen, independent, being chosen on the twenty-eighth day of the session 
and by the eighteenth joint ballot, receiving 70 votes to 59 for Algernon 
S. Paddock. All of the 53 independents and all of the 18 democrats, except 
Farrell, who did not vote, supported Allen on the successful ballot. All 
of Paddock's supporters were republicans. Kyner of Douglas voted for Paul 
Vandervoort; Ricketts of Douglas, for Crounse, and Clarke of Douglas did 
not vote. Allen received only one vote on the fourteenth ballot and one on 
the fifteenth. On the sixteenth he received 65 and the same number again 
on the seventeenth. Paddock had 32 votes to begin with and for thirteen 
ballots his strength varied from 20, the lowest, to 33, the highest. His 
nearly full republican support on the last ballot was merely a compliment 
to incumbency, the die of defeat having already been cast by the 
opposition compromise on Allen. On the fourteenth, fifteenth, sixteenth, 
and seventeenth ballots John M. Thurston received 61 votes, within one of 
the total republican strength and within three of victory. John H. Powers, 
candidate for governor on the independent ticket of 1890, received the 
full independent vote on most of the ballots up to the thirteenth, when 
for three ballots it was given to William L. Greene of Buffalo county. 
Powers had 1 additional vote on four ballots and Greene 3 -- 56, in all -- 
on one ballot. The highest votes received by other prominent candidates 
were, J. Sterling Morton, 6; James I,. Boyd, 5; William J. Bryan, 8; 
Thomas J. Majors, 13.

   The disclosures of the impeachment proceedings and kindred prosecutions 
showed that republicans would have chosen the wiser as well as the better 
part if they had voluntarily undertaken their own neglected house cleaning 
instead of waiting for it to be forced upon them by their enemies. The 
Bee's insurgency in the next state campaign was virtually an 
acknowledgment of this mistake. A resolution was passed to employ three 
lawyers, one of each political party, to be chosen by the members of the 
several parties in the house. The republicans selected Stephen B. Pound; 
the independents, William L. Greene; the democrats, Eleazer Wakeley. Judge 
Wake-

Page 631

ley declined to serve, and George W. Doane was appointed in his place. 
Barry, independent, of Greeley county; Van Housen, democrat, Colfax; 
Lockner, republican, Douglas, were appointed a committee on impeachments. 
A resolution for the impeachment of John C. Allen, secretary of state; 
Augustus R. Humphrey, commissioner of public lands and buildings; George 
H. Hastings, attorney-general, and John E. Hill, treasurer, passed the 
house unanimously.

   A resolution that articles of impeachment against the executive 
officers above named for misdemeanor in office be prepared and presented 
to the supreme court was passed by a vote of 127 to 4. Those voting nay 
were Cooley, republican, of Cass county; Kyner, republican, Douglas; 
North, democrat, Platte; and Rhea, republican, Seward; the articles 
against Hastings were adopted by a vote of 95 to 24; against Humphrey, 92 
to 5; against Allen, 87 to 4; against Hill, 95 to 9. Barry, independent; 
Colton, republican; and Casper, democrat, were appointed a committee to 
employ attorneys and prosecute the impeachment. The articles of 
impeachment against the four executive officers named, who constituted the 
board of public lands and buildings, were confined to charges of fraud 
which had been perpetrated at the state penitentiary and at the hospital 
for the insane at Lincoln. Article 1st, against George H. Hastings, 
attorney-genera], for example, recited that at the twenty-second session 
of the legislature $40,000 had been appropriated for the construction of a 
cell house at the penitentiary. The first specification alleged that 
Charles W. Mosher controlled the labor and service of the convicts in the 
penitentiary under a contract with the state and during the year 1891 and 
until February 1, 1892, he employed William H. Dorgan as his foreman and 
superintendent to take charge of said convicts; that the board of public 
lands and buildings, well knowing that said Dorgan was the agent of 
Mosher, employed him as the agent and superintendent of the state to 
superintend on its behalf the construction of said cell house; that Dorgan 
in rendering his accounts from time to time to the state board of public 
lands and buildings for the labor of said convicts charged the state with 
the sum of $1 a day for each convict whereas, in the contracts made by 
Dorgan in behalf of Mosher to individuals, firms, or corporations, he let 
the said convict labor at the rate of forty cents a day and that the board 
of public lands and buildings should have procured said labor for the 
construction of the cell house at the same rate of forty cents. 
Specification 2d charged that the board of public lands and buildings from 
time to time paid over to Dorgan as the agent of the state large sums of 
money in advance of his procurement of material or expenditure of labor 
for which the money was to be paid. Specification 4th, charged Dorgan with 
having expended a part of said funds of the state for material which was 
not needed or used in the construction of the cell house. Specification 
1st of article 3, charged that the board of public lands and buildings let 
the contract for a supply of coal required for the use of the hospital for 
the insane at Lincoln, for the quarter commencing April 1, 1890, to the 
firm of Betts, Weaver & Company; that said firm furnished under the 
contract for the month of April, 1890, coal to the amount of 336,000 
pounds and no more, but rendered an account for 438,000 pounds and that 
the board of public lands and buildings approved the fraudulent account. 
Specifications 2d and 3d, made similar allegations of startling 
discrepancies between the amounts allowed to the same firm and the amounts 
actually furnished. Specification 4th, charged that in the month of July, 
1890, the Whitebreast Coal Company of Lincoln actually furnished to the 
hospital for the insane 250,000 pounds of coal and no more, but made an 
account for 720,000 pounds, which the board allowed.

   There was a general investigation of the administration of the state 
institutions in response to charges of corruption and mismanagement. A 
committee of eight, four from the house and four from the senate, and 
comprising members of all political parties, reported unanimously that the 
death of Powell, a convict at the penitentiary, "was the direct: and 
proximate result of cruel and inhuman punishment inflicted upon him." The 
com-

Page 632

mittee found from the evidence that "the punishment in vogue in the 
Nebraska state penitentiary for many years has been inhuman, barbarous and 
cruel in many cases," and gave revolting details in illustration of this 
charge. A committee of seven members of the house, comprising three 
independents, two democrats, and two republicans, was appointed to 
investigate the administration of the penitentiary. The committee's 
unanimous report found gross corruption and mismanagement.

   A committee of the house, consisting of G. A. Felton and Austin Reiley, 
independents, and C. D. Casper, democrat, found a still worse state 
corruption, if possible, in the administration of the hospital for the 
insane at Lincoln.

   The committee of the house to whom the penitentiary contract between 
the state and William H. Dorgan and Charles W. Mosher was referred, 
requested the opinion of William Leese, attorney-general, as to its 
validity, and they were informed by that officer that the act of 1879, 
which undertook to extend the contract with W. H. B. Stout, and that of 
1887, to extend the contract to Mosher, assignee of Stout, were both 
invalid. Thereupon the committee reported unanimously that in its opinion 
the contract was null and void and recommended that the state take charge 
of the plant, prison, and grounds. The house adopted the report. A motion 
of Jensen of Fillmore county, that this action of the house be referred to 
the senate with the request that that body should concur was also adopted; 
but the senate appears to have smothered the report. The house committee 
appointed to investigate the management of the permanent school fund 
reported that "the state has lost large sums of money in the form of 
interest which would have accrued to the temporary school fund, the exact 
amount of which has not been computed by your committee." The committee 
recommended that action be brought against Hill, ex-state treasurer, to 
recover the money so lost. This report was signed by two of committee, the 
third member refusing to concur.

   Steven and Casper, of the committee "to investigate the charges of 
improper use of or offers of money to influence the votes of members of 
the legislature in the matter of the election of United States senators," 
reported that offers of money were made to eight members for the alleged 
purpose of so influencing their votes, and in the opinion of the committee 
the offers were made with corrupt intent. McKesson of Lancaster county 
made a minority report in which he said that Krick and Soderman, members 
of the house, were guilty of soliciting corrupt offers of money for their 
votes; that W. A. Dungan, sergeant-at-arms, was guilty of making false 
statements as to the corruption of members and ought to be removed from 
his office; and that R. B. Thompson, "who unblushing tells of offers made 
by him, is deserving of the contempt of his fellowmen, and I only regret 
that suitable punishment cannot be meted out to him."

   Goss of Douglas and Gerdes of Richardson, of the committee to 
investigate charges that money had been used in relation to insurance 
legislation, found that corrupt influence of members had been attempted, 
but unsuccessfully. The committee appointed to investigate the bill 
presented by Shilling Brothers for merchandise furnished to the state of 
Nebraska found that the firm had made a gross overcharge and recommended 
that the sum of $1,870.88 be allowed for the bill instead of $2,314.48, 
the amount claimed. The committee to investigate charges of the improper 
administration of the institute for feeble-minded youth at Beatrice was 
able to make a report that was relatively unique, inasmuch as it gave 
Superintendent A. T. Armstrong of the institute, a clean score for his 
management.

   Four of the accused men were indicted under the charge of corrupt 
dealing with the hospital for the insane. Nova Z. Snell had been elected 
county attorney of Lancaster county in 1890 on the democratic and 
independent ticket and the prosecutions were begun under his 
adiministration [sic]. In the meantime, at the beginning of 1893, he was 
succeeded by William H. Woodward; but Governor Crounse appointed Mr. Snell 
and the law firm of Reese & Gilkeson -- Judge M. B. Reese and J. R. 
Gilkeson -- to assist in the prosecution of this class of cases. Gorham F. 
Betts was con-

Page 633

victed and sentenced to two years in the penitentiary. He escaped, 
however, with a few months in the Lancaster county jail because the county 
attorney failed to make out in due time a bill of exceptions on the appeal 
of the case to the supreme court. The other persons indicted were tried 
and were acquitted. although the evidence against them was nearly the same 
as that upon which Betts was convicted. The special attorneys for the 
state complained that the county attorney hampered them in the trial of 
these cases and that they were unable to procure proper jurymen. It 
happened that the Betts & Weaver business had been sold before Betts was 
tried, and their successors in the business furnished yard sheets which 
showed conclusively that car loads of coal which had been charged to the 
asylum and paid for were really run into the private yard of Betts & 
Weaver and sold as their private property.

   The impeachment case against John E. Hill, ex-treasurer, and Thomas H. 
Benton, exauditor, was dismissed on the ground that the defendants had 
retired from office in January, 1893, the power of impeachment conferred 
by the constitution upon the legislature extending only to civil officers 
of the state and could not be exercised after such officers had become 
private persons. The case against Attorney-General Leese was dismissed on 
the same ground, and also upon the ground that the managers of the 
impeachment had, without constitutional authority, changed the articles 
which had been presented by the legislature. The case against George H. 
Hastings, attorney-general, John C. Allen, secretary of state, and 
Augustus R. Humphrey, commissioner of public lands and buildings, was also 
decided rather upon a technicality than upon the general facts. Two of the 
judges, Norval and Post, held that where an official act for which an 
officer is impeached results from a mere error of judgment or ommission of 
duty without the element of fraud, it is not impeachable although it may 
be highly prejudicial to the interests of the state. Impeachment, the 
majority of the court held, is essentially a criminal prosecution, hence 
the guilt of the accused must be established beyond a reasonable doubt. 
Justice Maxwell dissented from the decision of the majority, holding that 
the duties of the members of the board of public lands and buildings in 
passing upon the accounts in question were not judicial. He held that the 
rule of the majority in this case would have protected the notorious Boss 
Tweed from prosecution.

   Judge Maxwell also observed that Dr. W. M. Knapp, superintendent of the 
asylum, testified that he did not believe the amount of coal charged had 
been delivered, and yet he approved vouchers for the full amount.

   Judge Post, while agreeing with Judge Norval in the theory which 
protected the defendants from prosecution, was unsparing in his 
denunciation of the transactions which were the subject of the 
impeachment. He said in reference to the coal bills at the asylum: "The 
overcharge for the first three months of the respondents' term of office 
which the legislature failed to detect was 2,020,000 pounds, while for the 
remaining nine months, according to the specification, it is less than 
twice that amount. It is not contended that negligence of the legislature, 
however gross, would excuse the wilful disregard of duty by the 
respondents. . ."

   He said again: "It appears further that Dorgan, the superintendent, 
rendered a bill for their (convicts') labor at $1 per day during all of 
said time (when they were laid off.) He attempts to justify his action by 
reference to a custom to charge subcontractors for the labor of convicts 
from the time of their assignment unless sick or disabled. This 
explanation merely proves the wisdom of the scriptural saying that one 
cannot serve two masters. Dorgan was appointed to employ laborers by the 
day and to make time contracts for labor."

   George W. Doane of Omaha, Stephen B. Pound of Lincoln, William L. 
Greene of Kearney, and Genio M. Lambertson of Lincoln, were counsel for 
the state in the impeachment proceedings.