But Victor and his associates--on the platform, in the paper, in posters and dodgers and leaflets-- continued to press home the ugly questions--and continued to call attention to the fact that, while there had been ample opportunity, none of the candidates had answered any of the questions.And presently--keeping up this line of attack--Victor opened out in another.He had Falconer, the League candidate for judge, draw up a careful statement of exactly what each public officer could do under existing law to end or to check the most flagrant of the abuses from which the people of Remsen City were suffering.With this statement as a basis, he formulated a series of questions--``Yes or no? If you are elected, will you or will you not?'' The League candidates promptly gave the specific pledges.Sawyer dodged.David Hull was more adroit.He held up a copy of the list of questions at a big meeting in Odd Fellows' Hall.
``Our opponents have resorted to a familiar trick-- the question and the pledge.'' (Applause.Sensation.Fear lest ``our candidate'' was about to ``put his foot in it.'') ``We need resort to no tricks.I promptly and frankly, for our whole ticket, answer their questions.I say, `We will lay hold of ANYand EVERY abuse, as soon as it presents itself, and WILL SMASHIT.''
Applause, cheers, whistlings--a demonstration lasting nearly five minutes by a watch held by Gamaliel Tooker, who had a mania for gathering records of all kinds and who had voted for every Republican candidate for President since the party was founded.
Davy did not again refer to Victor Dorn's questions.But Victor continued to press them and to ask whether a public officer ought not to go and present himself to abuses, instead of waiting for them to hunt him out and present themselves to him.
Such was the campaign as the public saw it.And such was in reality the campaign of the Leaguers.But the real campaign--the one conducted by Kelly and House--was entirely different.They were not talking; they were working.
They were working on a plan based somewhat after this fashion:
In former and happier days, when people left politics to politicians and minded their own business, about ninety-five per cent.of the voters voted their straight party tickets like good soldiers.Then politics was a high-class business, and politicians devoted themselves to getting out the full party vote and to buying or cajoling to one side or the other the doubtful ten per cent that held the balance of power.That golden age, however, had passed.People had gotten into the habit of fancying that, because certain men had grown very, very rich through their own genius for money-making, supplemented perhaps by accidental favors from law and public officials, therefore politics in some way might possibly concern the private citizen, might account for the curious discrepancy between his labor and its reward.The impression was growing that, while the energy of the citizen determined the PRODUCTION of wealth, it was politics that determined the distribution of wealth.And under the influence of this impression, the percentage of sober, steady, reliable voters who ``stood by the grand old party'' had shrunk to about seventy, while the percentage of voters who had to be worried about had grown to about thirty.
The Kelly-House problem was, what shall we do as to that annoying thirty per cent?
Kelly--for he was THE brain of the bi-partisan machine, proposed to throw the election to the House- Reform ``combine.'' His henchmen and House's made a careful poll, and he sat up all night growing haggard and puffy-eyed over the result.According to this poll, not only was the League's entire ticket to be elected, but also Galland, despite his having the Republican, the Democratic and the Reform nominations, was to be beaten by the League's Falconer.He couldn't understand it.The Sawyer meetings were quite up to his expectations and indicated that the Republican rank and file was preparing to swallow the Sawyer dose without blinking.The Alliance and the Democratic meetings were equally satisfactory.Hull was ``making a hit.'' Everywhere he had big crowds and enthusiasm.The League meetings were only slightly better attended than during the last campaign; no indication there of the League ``landslide.''
Yet Kelly could not, dared not, doubt that poll.It was his only safe guide.And it assured him that the long-dreaded disaster was at hand.In vain was the clever trick of nominating a popular, ``clean'' young reformer and opposing him with an unpopular regular of the most offensive type--more offensive even than a professional politician of unsavory record.At last victory was to reward the tactics of Victor Dorn, the slow, patient building which for several years now had been rasping the nerves of Boss Kelly.
What should he do?
It was clear to him that the doom of the old system was settled.
The plutocrats, the upper-class crowd--the ``silk stockings,'' as they had been called from the days when men wore knee-breeches--they fancied that this nation-wide movement was sporadic, would work out in a few years, and that the people would return to their allegiance.Kelly had no such delusions.
