The Election of Senator Kyle This information appears in Chapter LXIII of "History of South Dakota" by Doane Robinson, Vol. I (1904), pages 343-346 and was scanned, OCRed and edited by Joy Fisher, http://www.rootsweb.com/~archreg/vols/00001.html#0000031 This file may be freely copied by individuals and non-profit organizations for their private use. Any other use, including publication, storage in a retrieval system, or transmission by electronic, mechanical, or other means requires the written approval of the file's author. This file is part of the SDGENWEB Archives. If you arrived here inside a frame or from a link from somewhere else, our front door is at http://www.usgwarchives.net/sd/sdfiles.htm CHAPTER LXIII THE ELECTION OF SENATOR KYLE. With the first of January, 1901, with the Sioux uprising still in progress, the legislature convened to divide the attention of the people and divert their thoughts from the possibility of a general massacre. A unique situation prevailed. In the senate, consisting of forty-five senators, the Republicans had a majority of one over the combined vote of the Democrats and Independents. The house consisted of one hundred and twenty-four members. There were sixty-one Republicans, nineteen Democrats, forty-three Independents and Mr. Charles X. Seward, of Watertown, a Republican, but elected upon a ticket which bolted the regular nomination and was not therefore bound by party action. On the day of the organization of the house, Mr. Beach, an Independent, from Clark county, was absent, and the Democrats and Independents having agreed to fuse upon the organization, Mr. Seward held the balance of power upon the organization and when all of the members of both houses were present upon the joint ballot as well. Both parties were quick to see the importance of Mr. Seward's position and made overtures to him for support, but some hostilities had been engendered in the campaign, which set his sympathies more to the support of the fusion and he accepted from the Democrats and Independents the nomination for speaker and was elected by a vote of sixty-two to sixty-one. The capital campaign co-incident with the legislative election, had led to a good many irregularities at the polls upon which it was easy to base contests and party supremacy demanded that the majority of the prevailing party should be increased sufficiently to give the fusion a working number, and accordingly about ten Republicans were unseated and their places filled with Independents. Naturally intense feeling was engendered and the proceedings were tense and exciting. Gideon C. Moody was chosen as the candidate of the Republicans for re-election the Democrats nominated Bartlett Tripp and at the beginning the Independents did not make a caucus nomination, the very many statesmen of that party preferring to take their chances in an open contest upon the floor. The first joint ballot was taken on Wednesday, January 21st, and resulted in giving Mr. Moody seventy-six votes; Bartlett Tripp, twenty-four; J. W. Harden, twenty; George G. Crose, fifteen; Alonzo Wardall, ten; S. W. Cosand, nine; Hugh J. Campbell, five; Z. D. Scott, two; Eugene A. Dye, one; the speaker cast his vote for J. F. Norton, a Republican, and six other Republicans voted for other than the caucus candidate, as follows: H. C. Preston, three; A. B. Melville, one; John A. Pickler, one; G. C. Lake, one; making the vote on that day eighty-six fusion to eighty-two Republican, only one being absent. With all votes present, eighty-five were required to elect. On no succeeding day were there so many members present. The next day J. H. Kyle appeared with seven votes; E. W. Martin, F. M. Hopkins and B. F. McCormick with one each. In the earlier days of the session the speaker constantly cast his vote for some unaspiring Republican and after a day or two the Republicans attempted to create a diversion by scattering their votes among prominent party leaders, but returning to Mr. Moody whenever the tide appeared to turn that way. On the 4th of February Mr. Moody released the Republican caucus from further support and it was deemed wise to endeavor to give another candidate an opportunity to draw strength enough from the opposition to land an election. The friends of Senator Americus B. Melville, of Beadle county, thought he could accomplish this and he was given the party nomination. On the next day Mr. Melville received thirty-five votes, without making any inroads upon the fusion strength. The entire Republican strength was at his command had it been possible to elect him. On the 6th Mr. Melville had fifty-one votes, all Republican and on that day the Independents largely united upon Hugh J. Campbell, giving him fifty--three votes. Mr. Melville touched his high water mark upon this day and having secured no assistance from the fusion ranks the Republicans gave him up and on the 9th scattered the vote so that the highest number received by any one Republican was thirteen for Mr. Moody. On the 11th the Republicans, having failed to make gains through any of the other aspirants, swung back to Mr. Moody and on that day the Independents concentrated upon Mr. Kyle with fifty-nine votes. On the 12th the entire vote present were for the first time concentrated upon candidates representing the three parties, Mr. Moody receiving sixty-nine, Mr. Tripp twenty-five and Mr. Kyle fifty-eight. That night the Republicans concluded to try an entirely new man who had not yet been at all considered. Thomas Sterling, of Redfield, it was though might bring out a few independent votes and he was given the party nomination and on Friday, the 13th, received the entire vote of the party present, sixty-nine in all. On this day a few of the Democrats for the first time left Mr. Tripp to vote for Mr. Kyle, giving the latter sixty-three votes out of a total of one hundred and forty-eight cast. A change of six votes would have been required that day to have given Mr. Sterling the election, he being nearer the prize than any other Republican during the session, but he had failed to secure any opposition strength. The next day, Sunday, was a busy one. Up to this date the fusion organization had been held intact, but that day certain members of the Brookings county delegation declared that in the event of the failure to elect upon the next ballot they should vote for Governor Mellette and the Republicans secured other pledges of support for Governor Mellette, which made it appear possible to elect him. This situation frightened the Democrats into action and upon the first ballot all but eight of the Democrats abandoned Mr. Tripp and voting for Mr. Kyle, gave him the election. Aside from the senatorial election, which attracted widespread interest, the legislature's most important action was the adoption of the Australian ballot law and a stringent corrupt practices act. The abuses and corrupt practices incident to the capital election of the previous autumn had awakened the people to the necessity for strong legislation to secure clean elections and the bills upon this subject were carefully drawn and introduced in the senate by Senator Preston, Republican, and Senator Sheafe, Democrat, and the two bills combined in committee and passed with but one dissenting vote. Complete codes of law relating to revenue, education and irrigation were passed at this session; by the latter the water in the irrigation basin underlying the state being declared to be public property. Near the close of the session four deaths occurred, which threw a gloom over the legislature and made the hotels and capital appear more like a house of mourning than the rendezvous of legislators and lobbists. Hon. David Clark, a senator from Pennington county, and Messrs. Horace J. Austin, member from Clay county, and J. C. Hielman, a representative from Hand county, and Hon. George A. Hand, the legislative representative of the Northwestern Railway, were the stricken. Each was a man of integrity and high standing, Mr. Hand and Mr. Austin being especially prominent in South Dakota affairs. The former was a native of Akron, Ohio, where he was born August 9, 1837. He served in the Civil war as a private in the Chicago Board of Trade Battery, and located in Yankton in 1865. In 1867 he was appointed by President Johnson, United States attorney for Dakota, and from 1874 to 1882 he was secretary of the territory, having been during the long interregnum from the beginning of the fatal illness of Governor Howard until the appointment of Governor Ordway acting governor. He was a high-minded gentleman and a splendid citizen. Mr. Austin was among the early citizens of the territory and had been active in the surveying of the public lands. He had served as register of the Vermillion land office and had been a member of the territorial legislatures of 1865, 1866, 1867, 1868 and 1875. Like Mr. Hand, he had the high esteem of the people. On March 11th, only four days after the adjournment of the legislature, Frank A. Gale, formerly president of the First National Bank of Canton, and a Democratic politician who had been especially prominent and active during the administration of Governor Church, committed suicide by shooting himself. On the 14th of August Hon. John R. Gamble, member of congress, died at his home in Yankton. He was elected the previous year and had not yet take his seat. Mr. Gamble was a native of New York and settled at Yankton in 1873. He was a lawyer of great power and a citizen of incorruptible integrity. Governor Mellette at once called an election to fill the vacancy. This was the first election under the Australian ballot law. Col. John L. Jolley was nominated by the Republicans, W. H. Smith by the Independents and Col. James M. Wood, of Rapid City, by the Democrats. Jolley won by a plurality of three thousand over Smith. Judge Nowlin, of the Seventh circuit, resigned his position owing to ill health, and in October Governor Mellette appointed William Gardner to the vacancy. Following the death of President Olson, of the State University, there was a good deal of difficulty in getting the institution running on a satisfactory basis again and President Roach having resigned, Rev. S. G. Updyke, of Aberdeen, was called to become acting president. His selection was very distasteful to the members of the faculty, who felt, as they say in the army, that they had "been ranked by a civilian." The student body was incited to rebellion and after a few weeks of warfare President Updyke, of his own motion, closed the institution, but a few weeks before the graduation would have taken place. Matters were not adjusted for some weeks, when Dr. Joseph W. Mauck was called to the presidency since which time the institution has constantly done good work and with relatively little friction. The sugar bounty feature of the McKinley tariff bill promoted great interest in the beet growing possibilities of South Dakota and the matter was industriously agitated for a couple of years. About the latter part of 1891 it was the chief topic of interest in the state, but no substantial results followed. The harvest of 1891 was a bumper one and the courage of the people revived by leaps and bounds. It is a fact that in spite of two crop failures the people who had stuck to their lands had steadily reduced their obligations and had made few new ones and the good crop of this year placed many of them in very comfortable circumstances. It was widely published that the wheat crop alone had returned to the counties east of the river an average of a million dollars each. This was no doubt all exaggeration, but nevertheless a very large return was realized. Irrigation, however, was still a subject of investigation and experiment, and about this time a great sensation was made by the announcement that the art of rain making had been discovered, and parties claiming to possess the secret went about attempting to sell the right to use it to the various counties. Several of the leading counties of the state were induced to make experimental tests of the invention, always at a very large expense, and of course no results were secured. Gen. J. B. Pattee, a native of Vermont, and famous as commander of the celebrated Pennsvlvania "Buck Tail" Regiment in the Civil war, died at his home in Canton in November. He was fifty-five years of age and had resided at Canton since 1871. David D. Jewett, father of the well known wholesalers, Jewett Brothers, died at Sioux Falls October 13th. He was a native of Ohio, born in 1815.