The Guardian And Evening Star, with which is incorporated the West Coast Times. THURSDAY, JULY 10th, 1921. SELECTING A CANDIDATE.

Hokitika Guardian, 10 July 1924, Page 2

The Guardian And Evening Star, with which is incorporated the West Coast Times. THURSDAY, JULY 10th, 1921. SELECTING A CANDIDATE.

Tiif. work of selecting a candidate to carry the Democratic banner «t the approaching United States presidential election has continued dining the past week without much apparent progress being made. The innumerable ballots that have taken place have tom the present convention with passions (reside which it is difficult to place any comparisons, the only apparent result being the breaking up of the party itself, which has become divided into a series of hitter factions. It is difficult to suggest anything more aggravated tlian the position the delegates comprising the Democratic Convention find themselves in after thoir long sittings and repeated ballots. The mutual animosities that have been aroused seem to have already reached the utmost; limit of virulence and explosive power. It was resognised at the beginning that the two strongest competitors wore too evenly balanced and too provocative of opposition to be acceptable as candidates, and that the pplv safe course would be to pqss them

both over in favour of some weaker man with fewer enemies. It i.s natural that neither Mr M'Adoo nor Air Smith was eager to accept this conclusion, and one cannot blame them for wanting to put the matter to a vote mid test their strength. But "hai rational purpose luit that of wrecking the Convention can l>e served by insisting upon eighty-seven tests and then demanding more? The fact that appears to he most noticeable i.s that Mr McAdoo i.s more concerned that ho should defeat Air Smith than that their party should defeat the Republicans; and that Smith attaches the like importance to the defeat of AlcAdnn. Nor is there any indication that their respective partisans do not share their views. Day after day tho personal struggle has proceeded, day after day it has become more embittered, ami day al'tei day tiro largo issues have been more and more completely obscured by irritating ami degrading personalities and irrelevances. A week ago. it was suggested that if the Kit Klux Klan did not wreck the Convention, there were those who would raise a “wet” issue in such a way as to ensure that result. It seems. however. that the wreckers will net need to play their trump card. Though by the vote of a single delegate who had changed her mind at the last moment, the Convention took what appeared to he the line of least, resistance on the drondctl Klan issue, it was prophesied that the net result of the day's work—the debate, doubtless, rather than tlt» division would he “to create dissension within the ranks of the patty, and to release it tlood of religious hatred likely to cause riot and bloodshed.'' The work of the past few days has drawn the attention of the whole world to the complicated issues that have arisen, the personal differences of the two leading candidates Inning caused foi more savage displays of feelings hy far than the earlier debate which of itself was of a most spectacular and stirring nature.