Republican Farmers Are For Judge Durand

REPUBLICAN FARMERS ARE FOR JUDGE DURAND

Several Prominent Washtenaw Republicans Interviewed at Whitmore Lake

What They Had to Say to the Representative of a Detroit Newspaper--Sentiment at the Picnic Was All One Way

John Fitzgibbon, the well known Evening News staff correspondent, was at Whitmore Lake Saturday and told the political situation as he saw it there in the Sunday News-Tribune. His letter in full is as follows:

Whitmore Lake, Mich., Aug. 30.- "When you are in a crowd and you hear a cry 'there goes the balloon,' don't look up, but look down. It's a cry of men who have designs on your watch and pocketbook. That's the cry, though, that I'm sorry to say our party leaders in Michigan are raising, or at the least some of them. They are shouting to the people to gaze at the glorious territorial expansion balloon, and the prosperity balloon, and the mightiest-nation-on-earth balloon, and a few other national balloons, so that they can secure another two years of Gov. Bliss' administration. They want to get our attention so firmly fixed on these balloons that we will forget about the evils in our present state rule. I say, beware of the men in politics who ask you to look up at the balloons as you would of the men who raise the cry in a picnic or circus crowd."

George Wing, a prosperous republican farmer living in Scio township made this remark at the annual picnic here today of Washtenaw, Livingston and Oakland counties farmers. He was one of a good number of democratic and republican prosperous farmers among the crowd of 6,000 which also included Congressman Sam W. Smith, ex-Congressman Edward P. Allen and Charles E. Townsend, republican candidate for congress in the second district. These three and a gentleman who sang dialect songs were the only entertainers who appeared on the rostrum in the grove that has rung with the oratory of candidates at every picnic for the past 20 years.

SAM SMITH'S BIG VOICE.

Sam talked 47 minutes on rural mail delivery, good roads, and public ownership of telephones and telegraphs. He talked off-hand as many statistics as are printed in two pages and a half of a census bulletin. Two years ago he was making the same kind of practical speeches, and the voters of the sixth district re-elected him by 4,016 majority. They applauded as liberally today as if they intend to do it again next year. Capt. Alien and Townsend consumed together 31 minutes talking generalities and telling stories. The picnic committee had warned them in advance that the rules bar political talks. The dialect singer got the most applause. Sam Smith was second best.

"Gee whillikens! You wouldn't think a little man like him could talk as loud and as long as that!" exclaimed one old farmer who looked as if he'd been voting since Andrew Jackson's time.

But, though politics were barred on the rostrum, there was no bar anywhere else. For some mysterious reason, less than. half a dozen candidates for office showed up. Capt. Alien said he guessed Bill Judson's primary election scheme must have convinced them that money spent at picnics would be wasted. But the more than a score of republicans were asked what the outlook was in their particular neighborhood on governor.

DON'T LIKE BLISS

Republicans only were questioned, and they were questioned entirely at random. Four out of every five were openly hostile to Gov. Bliss's candidacy for another term, and in the main their objections were the same as were expressed by republican farmers at the Lenawee and Hillsdale picnic last Thursday.

But some of these prosperous farmers at the Whitmore lake picnic had a pat way of telling the reasons for their objections. George Wing, in addition to the warning of balloon cries, said:

"On national questions I will not split my ticket. I support the principles of the republican party as recited in the national platform, but I think this is a year when the organization in the state can benefit by purifying it, and it can be purified only by defeating Bliss. I am not a politician and have no ambition to hold office. I have no quarrel with any man in our party, not even with the governor, but I do not think a man should be given a second term who can be led by political grafters as Bliss appears to be led. The mam trouble with him seems to be that he hasn't any lime in his back bone. I feel as my old Scotch republican friend in Webster township, William Latson, was telling here today. He said that during the civil war if he split his ticket and voted for a democratic candidate for governor he would have been boycotted, but he can do it now and the state will be the gainer and he Is going to do it."

PRESIDENT LELAND'S VIEWS.

The newly-elected president of the picnic association, and he was elected when the rostrum entertainment was concluded, is Emery Leland, a well-to- do farmer, who also travels in Washtenaw, Jackson, Livingston and one or two other counties entirely among farmers, selling machines for the Deering Harvester Co. Mr. Leland was elected without his knowledge, which is a pretty good indication of bis good standing. He said:

"Our party managers have a big task to win back even a fair portion of the republican farmers in the several counties where I have been working since the state convention. Incapacity and the permitting of himself to be controlled by unscrupulous politicians appears to be the general indictment against Bliss. The very name of machine politics has finally become odious to them so it would seem. Republican farmers everywhere are saying openly that they will vote for Durand. Only the other day I met an Ohio traveling man at a hotel in Ann Arbor. He was a stranger, but in the course of our talk he remarked casually that our governor must have made himself very unpopular because he was hearing republicans say every day that they were going to vote against him. This Ohio man knew nothing about Bliss or the political conditions of Michigan."

RESIGNED AS DELEGATE.

One republican who mingled with the picnic crowd because he has a summer home at the lake, is Gen. William C. Stevens, who was auditor-general when Gen. Alger was governor, and also during Gov. Begole's administration. He has retired from active business. The last republican that Washtenaw elected to the legislature, ex-Representative Wheeler, of Salem township, and who at the convention last June that renominated Gov. Bliss, resigned from the Washtenaw delegation on the eve of the balloting when Bill Judson was putting the unit rule gag on it rather than morally obligate himself to vote for Bliss at the polls, was talking to Gen. Stevens when the latter was asked how the situation looked to him.

"I haven't told yet that I'm going to vote against Bliss," with a suggestive emphasis on the "against."

"Nor have I told that I wouldn't," spoke Mr. Wheeler, "but it's a matter of record that I resigned from the delegation so that I wouldn't have to vote for him in November."

Gen. Stevens continued:

"I have known Gov. Bliss for a good many years, and I am scarcely disappointed at the record of his administration. He is altogether too weak. Interests that seek advantages not for the best welfare of the state can get what they want from him. Now take the matter of ripperism. I was in no way materially affected by any of the so-called ripper bills passed at the last session, and signed by the governor, but the principle of such legislation is wrong, not to speak of the methods by which some of the bills were railroaded through at Lansing. I have been here at the lake most of the summer, so haven't heard as much as I otherwise might, but certainly a great many republicans are saying they will vote for Judge Durand. If I was their adviser I would suggest that they not talk too openly about it or else corrupt means may be used to get other votes to offset their defection.

BLISS'S CHANCES IMPROVED.

"It occurs to me that the death of Senator McMillan has indirectly improved Bliss's chances. The election of a successor of McMillan means a contest for legislators, which will bring out, I should say, not less than 125,000 voters who would not have voted if the contest was for governor only. This will help Bliss. Gen. Alger is the choice of the majority of republicans, so far as I observe, for senator. I have been a personal friend of his for many years, still I don't think I am exaggerating when I say he is the popular choice."

If Gov. Bliss had any friends at the picnic, they didn't make a peep. He delivered a speech at last year's picnic. Bill Judson, even, was absent, but there was a good showing of anti-Judson republican leaders.

"I'm afraid the democrats are going to count in Durand," was a joke of Isaac S. Savary, a grand army veteran and a republican. He talked for Judge Durand.

JOHN FITZGIBBON