Jasper County Democrat, Volume 3, Number 5, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 May 1900 — PreMature Counting. [ARTICLE]

PreMature Counting.

The Republican national arithmetician of 1896 has resumed business at the old stand. Congressman Grosvenor, assuming that McKinley will be renominated by the Republicans and Bryan by the Democrats, has issued Bulletin No. 1 t>f the current Presidential year. He says that McKinley will have 200 electoral votes and Bryan 174. He generously concedes to the Democrats (with mental reservation as to Bryan’s home state) the States of Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Idaho, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebaaska, Nevada, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Utah and Virginia. All the rest he gives to the Republicans, except Kansas, which he sets down as doubtful, and South Dakota, which seems to have been lost in the tabulation shuffle. We beg to say that General Grosvenor’s figures are not absolutely conclusive. Delegates will be chosen as usual and conventions will be held, and thousands of mature men of both parties, including those who have made a special study of the Grosvenorian system of political mathematics, will sit up till after midnight on the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November, waiting for the returns. The national organization of the Republican party will go on with its tremendous capitalization scheme and the Federal officeholders and employes need not expect to escape from the “stand and deliver” agent.

Still there are curiosities and surprises in this “ciphering” that make it interesting. Why should the official statistician give up Kentucky? Has he no faith in the ability of the “powers that be” to steal it again? Unquestionably the electoral vote of Kentucky was stolen for McKinley and Hobart in 1896. The same safe-blowers are in charge of the McKinley campaign of 1900, with a few minor and unimportant changes. What is the matter with Maryland and West Virginia? Have these states receded in virtue in four years? r The present debatable character of the politics of Indiana and the manifest revolt of Hoosierdom Republicans against the Puerto Rican tariff infamy has led many Democrats to look upon themselves as on fighting ground in that state. General Grosvenor says, though: “All this talk about Indiana going Democratic is bosh. The Puerto Rican tariff is going to help rather than hurt.” Of course it is better to have false hopes dashed to the ground early in the campaign. To treasure them till the melancholy days of November and then have them fall from a greater height would only cause more pain. Hence it is that we especially note what the official statistician says alxnit Indiana. It is as to the Hoosier State that he presents his strong 'St ar?;ument or reason—indeed, the ony “argument” or “reason” he offers in his whole bulletin, to wit: “Bosh.”—Cincinnati Enquirer,