NEW YORK MUNICIPAL ELECTIONS.
The skirmishing stages of the campaign for New York Municipal Elections, which take place on November 5th, are developing. Ostensibly the main fight is between the Democratic party on the one hand and the Republican party on the other, with Socialists forming the next largest but an inconsiderable group. Actually the traditional broad principles which divide, at any rate, the two major parties in national affairs have little place in the municipal elections. Party loyalties count, but on both sides a strain is put upon them. Both Democratic and Republican papers have been notably hostile or lukewarm to candidates bearing their own party labels. The actual issue in the campaign is whether the control of the Government of New York City, an area of over 300 square miles with more than six million inhabitants and an annual budget of $550,000,000, shall remain in the hands of Tammany Hall. The prospect is that it will arouses little enthusiasm among a large number of citizens, including many Democrats. The forces arrayed against Tammany, however, are as usual disunited, and altogether inspire as little enthusiasm in the electorate as Tammany itself. The strange anomaly is presented of America's greatest city winking at all sorts of inefficiency in Government because it likes the personality of the genial candidate for re-election as Mayor.
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