Democratic Sentinel, Volume 20, Number 22, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 June 1896 — LEVERING IS NAMED. [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

LEVERING IS NAMED.

The Prohibitionist* Nominate a Ticket. The national prohibition convention at Pittaburg resulted in a split. By a vote of 427 to 387 the narrow gauge members of the party Thursday won their fight to confine the platform to the single issue of hostility to the liquor traffic. The test came on a motion to adopt a free silver plank, which was defeated by a majority of forty. The silver men made good their threat to bolt if they were defeated, and night met in separate convention. The

regular convention nominated Joshua P. Levering, the millionaire coffee merchant of Baltimore, as its choice for President. Hale Johnson, of Illinois, candidate for Governor of that State, was nominated as his running mate.

After the convention had been called to order in the morning a telegram expressing the sympathy of the convention for the sufferers from the St. Louis cyclone was forwarded to the Mayor of St. Louis. A memorial from the national W. C. T. U. convention in Baltimore last year was read and referred to a committee. It reaffirmed allegiance to the prohibition party “as the only political party with the courage to speak out boldly in favor of woman suffrage and the total annihilation of the liquor traffic.” The fight of the day then began. Dr. J. K. Funk, of New York, chairman of the committee on platform, reported the platform. Planks denunciatory of the liquor traffic and proposing straightout prohibition, he said, had been unanimously adopted. Another plank, which declared that no citizen should be denied the right to vote on account of sex, he said, had been adopted by only a small majority. Still otJher planks upon which

there was some division in the committee referred to Sabbath observance, non-sec-tarian schools, election of President, VicePresident and Senators by popular vote, liberal pensions, immigration, naturalization, labor arbitration and co-operation with other parties favoring these views. After a motion to adopt the report had been made ex-Governor St. John offered a minority report. He was applauded by the broad gauge delegates, and especially when he read the silver plank. It concluded: “We demand the full and unlimited coinage of both silver and gold at a ratio of 16 to 1, without consulting any other nation.” Mr. St. John no sooner moved that the

minority report be added to that of the majority of the committee than the storm broke in all its fury. Scores of delegates wanted the floor. Motions followed each other in rapid succession. The “narrows” protested and the “broads” urged the adoption of the mo-

tion. Mr.-Castle, of Pittsburg, moved that it be tabled. The chair called for a viva voce vote. Getting it, he declared the motion to table had carried. Several hundred throats united in one mighty protest and a ypll for a division. On the call of the roll 802 votes were cast and the broad-gaugers had a majority of 182. The silverites had then gained one point, but the great battle was yet to come. The minority report having been added to the other, the platform was taken up for consideration plank by plank. When Mr. St. John’s 16 to 1 plank was reached both sides exerted their full strength. The Western silverites fought with bulldog tenacity and hung on until the last vote was taken. When they saw they had lost by forty votes many sulked and said they would secede. Substitute Adopted. When the vote was announced, R. H. Patton, of Illinois, jumped in with a substitute platform for the other. Its principal plank declares it but right to leave every prohibitionist the freedom of his own conscience upon political questions other than that of prohibition. It was read and adopted by a rising vote. Mrs. Helen M. Gougar vainly attempted to save the woman suffrage plank. After the substitute had been adopted the afternoon session closed in the wildest confusion. Only_ one candidate other than Mr. Levering was named—ex-Gov. Hughes, of Arizona—and his name was afterward withdrawn by request and Mr. Levering’s nomination made by acclamation. A committee, escorted the nominee to the platform amid shouts and cheers. During this time the radical silver men left the hall to organize their own convention. In the convention of bolters it was decided to appoint a committee to visit the national Democratic, Republican and Populist conventions and invite all dissatisfied persons to unite with the new party.

CHAIRMAN DICKEY.

JOSHUA P. LEVERING.

EX-GOV. ST. JOHN.