declaring for local option license, an adroit resolution was constructed by the committee on platform to enable the party to secure the saloon vote, without openly placing the party on the Democratic platform for local option.
The following is the resolution which was reported and adopted:
“Resolved, That prohibition is no test of Republicanism. The General Assembly has given to the State a prohibitory law as strong as any that has been enacted by any country. Like any other criminal statute, its retention, modification or repeal must be determined by the General Assembly, elected by and in sympathy with the people and to it is relegated the subject, to take such action as they may deem just and best in the matter, maintaining the present law in those portions of the State where it is now or can be made efficient and giving to other localities such methods of controlling and regulating the liquor traffic as will best serve the cause of temperance and morality.”
The Democratic Convention met at Des Moines on the 23d of August and renominated Governor Boies and Lieutenant-Governor Bestow; John Cliggett was nominated for Supreme Judge, J. B. Knoepfler for Superintendent of Public Instruction, and Thomas Bowman for Railway Commissioner. The resolutions favored a local option license law and a Board of Control for the public institutions.
The Populist Convention met in Des Moines on the 5th of September and placed in nomination the following candidates for State officers: Governor, J. M. Joseph; Lieutenant-Governor, J. E. Anderson; Supreme Judge, A. C. Weeks; Superintendent of Public Instruction, Mrs. E. J. Woodrow; Railway Commissioner, John Idle. The resolutions reiterated the former declarations of the party on national issues, favored woman suffrage, and on the liquor question made the following declaration:
“The utter demoralization of the Democratic and Republican parties is again manifest in their attitude towards the liquor question. They are engaged in an attempt to outbid one another for the support of the saloon element in the State and are seeking to drown by their cry for the saloon
