EDWARDS WINS OVER JOST BY 8,391 MAJORITY.
Republicans Score Decisive Victory In Face of Heavy Odds.
CARRY 14 OF 16 WARDS.
THE WINNING TICKET
Eugene H. Blake, R., Comptroller
Harry E. Barker, R., Treasurer
Fred W. Coon, R., Police Judge
John f. Kiernan, R., Police Judge
NEW MAYOR GEORGE H. EDWARDS, WHO WILL REDEEM CITY BY CLEAN, BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION
The verdict was a powerful rebuke to Mayor Jost, and his Democratic associates for the character of administration of public affairs they have been giving for the last two years Practically the verdict was unanimous, as Edwards and all the Republican candidates were successful in fourteen of the sixteen wards of the city.
The voters took no chances. They voted the Republican ticket straight fromtop to bottom, and there was little, if any, scratching done. It was a glorious victory.
John P. O'Neil and Miles Bulger, who were refused Democratic renominations to the lower house of the council, ran independent and were elected in the First and Second wards, respectively.
The election of Mr. Edwards means that the people had become thoroughly tired and out of patience with the kind of government they have been getting at the city hall. Improvements have been tied up, the city's progress in municipal affairs has been at a complete standstill, and waste and extravagance have been charged and not denied.
It was a Democratic family divided by bitter quarrels and factional fights. Greed for jobs and patronage was seemingly of more importance to the factional Democrats than public service, and when Shannon demanded more of his share of the patronage Pendergast and his followers filed a remonstrance and the taxpayers became the real sufferers. The Pendergast aldermen in the two houses of the council became estranged from Jost, and everything he favored the opposed. The Shannon aldermen took sides with Jost, with the result that for nearly a year the meetings of the council were travesties and a reproach to the intelligence and fair name of Kansas City.
The public suffered in silence and waited the day when it could square accounts and get for themselves servants with higher ideals than the petty ones squabbling squabbling over pelf and patronage.
That day came yesterday and they cleaned house from top to bottom. In two weeks time a new regime will be inaugurated at the city hall, and the men who have been responsible for the deplorable conditions of the past will be cast into the oblivion which they created for themselves by their attitudes toward the public good.
George H. Edwards, mayor-elect, promises the people a clean and businesslike government. At the outset he will be handicapped by having an upper house of the council that will be numerical a tie -- eight Republicans and eight holdover Democrats. Three of the eight holdover Democrats are identified with faction of that party that has been anti-Jost, and in all likelihood they will take the side of Mr. Edwards and uphold his hands in giving to the city a business administration.
