Page:Upbuilders by Lincoln Steffens.djvu/83



“Major,” he said, “you must not interfere with me on any but political bills.”

As if a primary bill wasn’t political! Bosses have their troubles; it takes time and patience to knock all the decency — or, as they would put it, all the poppycock out of a promising young man. Lentz had to stand by and see Colby vote for the primary bill, and that bill became a law. But the honest young legislator, troublesome as he was, had his uses. For example, they won him easily to the support of a bill to require the consent of 20 per cent, of the stock of a Jersey corporation to bring a stockholder’s suit. “It was an awful bill,” he says now. “It was introduced in the interest of the United States Steel Company, and I knew that. But I was told what a great business this was, the steel trust, and how ‘strike suits’ were being brought against it. Strike suits were bad but that bill was worse. It was so bad, indeed, that even I saw my mistake before the session was over.” It was so bad they couldn’t raise a majority for it, and it was killed that year.

By the close of the session, young Mr. Colby had few friends among the leaders in his own party; they wouldn’t speak to him, and one might have supposed that his political career was over. But this was all part of the game. Since the young man was rich, they couldn’t buy him with money,