The man who did more than any other one to win the battle for Fusion is William Travers Jerome, the newly-elected district attorney. He had won his right to the nomination by the courageous and persistent work which he has done the past year for the Committee of Fifteen. This committee is a civie body organised from among the business men of New York, with the object of bringing before the people practical evidence of the conditions that existed. To uproot and cast out crime and vice from the city was hopeless, since they had to work without the aid and, indeed, with the opposition, of the regularly constituted authority But by raiding a pool-room here and gambling place' there, and a disorderly house further on—all plainly known to the police—they could attract the public's attention. Jerome, with his authority of special justice, could mako preliminary disposition of the cases. Jerome with the enthusiasm and persistence that make him what he is, set about the work. He caught in one pool-room the head of one of the chief city departments; he secured e dence that convicted a high police official of taking bribes from the keeper of a disorderly house; and, most effective of all, he was able to show that the police them: selves were in the habit of tipping off keepers of illegal resorts when raids were contemplated. As in the case of most enthusiastics, Jerome in the capacity of district attorney, is likely to make mistakes from excess of zeal, but there is no question that his authority will be exerted against dishonesty and corruption and that he is the most feared man of all by the Tammany cohorts.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.