Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 17.djvu/455

Rh their election. Amid all these "parties," and "councils," and "clubs," the organization of a "Workingmen's Trade and Labor Union," with one J. G. Day as president and one D. Kearney as secretary, attracted no attention. This new organization, which, besides a president and secretary, boasted also a treasurer, stretched out a canvas bearing its name, and "resoluted" upon the necessity of "patriotism and integrity in the public offices from the lowest to the highest," calling upon the laboring classes to unite "to elect candidates in whom they can put their trust, and who are above suspicion." This being done, the new organization, by its president and secretary, proceeded in the usual way to ascertain which of the principal candidates were most above suspicion; but it printed no ticket, this particular movement to secure "patriotism and integrity in the public offices" winding up on the night before election in a row in which the treasurer and sergeant-at-arms vainly endeavored to make the president and secretary "come to a divide" on the amount collected, which they charged was between one and two thousand dollars.

But the master spirit of the ephemeral organization that thus unnoticed closed its life of weeks was no ordinary "price club man," who when one election is over retires from politics until the next approaches. The knot of men who had called the meeting of sympathy with the Eastern strikers had afterward organized a workingman's party and run a few candidates with a view to the future, but their intentions were brought to naught by the more energetic and audacious Kearney, who went to work without delay. On the Sunday after the election he again attended, for the last time, the Lyceum of Self-Culture, and, to the astonishment and amusement of the men whose ideas about the rights and wrongs of the working classes he had been berating, told them that they were a set of fools and blatherskites, and that he now proposed to start in with the demand of "bread or blood," and organize a party that would amount to something. The first move was a meeting to consider the Chinese question, at which a speech was made by a highly respected and prominent citizen; but when Kearney, who officiated as secretary, got the stand, he dealt out some more highly seasoned mental stimulant by reading a description of the burning of Moscow as a suggestion of what might be in store for San Francisco. Then appropriating the name of "Workingman's party, Day and Kearney took to the sand-lot, enlisting some other speakers. Though violent, these harangues would have attracted little attention, and in fact the movement might have been choked in infancy (for several rival factions started up, and opposition platforms were erected within a few feet of each other), but for a powerful ally of just the kind needed.

The two San Francisco papers of largest circulation are the "Call" and "Chronicle," between whom intense rivalry has long existed. The "Call" has the greater circulation and more profitable business, drawn largely from the working classes. It is a good newspaper, but