Democratic Sentinel, Volume 12, Number 1, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 January 1888 — THE POLITICAL FIELD. [ARTICLE]

THE POLITICAL FIELD.

Wore than ordinary interest is attached to the election of delegates to the Pennsylvania State Convention by the Democrats of Philadelphia on the 17th inst, says a dispatch from that city, because of the issues upon which the contest was fought. Upon one side were ranged the followers of Congressman Samuel J. Randall. Upon the other side was the administration wing of the party. It is composed of those who call themselves the friends of President Cleveland. Tho latter combination included Postmaster Harrity, Collector of the Port Cadwalader, William M. Siugerly of the Philadelphia Record, and their followers. The administrationists captured forty-five of the sixty-five delegates to the State Convention, which will most probably assure it eight of the ten delegates to the National Convention from Philadelphia. This is the most disastrous defeat that Randall has ever encountered, and this contest will be followed up by the friends of the administration in the State. There is no concealment of the fact that tlie administration intends to wipe Mr. Raipiall out, if possible. It has transferred the patronage of the State over to tho keeping of Congressman William L. Scott, of Erie, and it has tied up Randall’s hands so that the men whom he placed in position are now rapidly deserting him. At the meeting of the Pennsylvania Democrats State Central Committee in Harrisburg, on Wednesday, a test of strength occurred between the respective followings of Samuel J. Randall and.W. L. Scott, the latter representing the interests of President Cleveland. Randall’s man, Dallas Sanders, was defeated for chairman of the committee by Scott’s nominee, Elliott Kisner, by a vote of 42 to 35. A resolution was adopted strongly commending the administration of President Cleveland, with especial approval of the President’s policy regarding tariff reform and surplus re-

duction. May 23 was fixed as the date of the Democratic State Convention. A Washington special to the Chicago Tima states— That Mr. Randall wiH not attend the next Democratic National Convention at the bead of the relegation from Pennsylvania is the opinion of weU-informed politicians from that State in Washington. This de eat breaks Randall’s power to control the party in Pennsylvania, and puts the element led try the tariff reformer, William L. Scott in possession of the party machinery. When Randall left Washington to attend the meeting of the committee he was confident that his man would ba chosen, although his admirers had warned him of the growing dissatisfaction in Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, and "other parts of the State, on account of his opposition to tariff reform.