Then, unlike
most of the leaders in politics, I am not trying to get myself office or
profit, and so the men feel that I am disinterested. Then I try to be
friendly with the whole ward, so that if I have to do what they don't
like, their personal feeling for me will do what my arguments never
could. With these simple, strong-feeling, and unreasoning folk, one can
get ten times the influence by a warm handshake and word that one can by
a logical argument. We are so used to believing what we read, if it
seems reasonable, that it is hard for us to understand that men who
spell out editorials with difficulty, and who have not been trained to
reason from facts, are not swayed by what to us seems an obvious
argument. But, on the contrary, if a man they trust, puts it in plain
language to them, they see it at once. I might write a careful
editorial, and ask my ward to read it, and unless they knew I wrote it,
they probably wouldn't be convinced in the least. But let me go into the
saloons, and tell the men just the same thing, and there isn't a man who
wouldn't be influenced by it.
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