DEMOCRATS HOLD THEIR PRIMARIES

The Butte Miner, Butte, 1904-09-11, p.7

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Summary

Sub-head: "DELEGATES CHOSEN TO ATTEND COUNTY CONVENTION MONDAY — OPPOSITION TO TICKET IS ATTEMPTED." Saturday Sep 10 1904 evening Silver Bow County Democratic primaries to choose delegates to Monday's county convention and then to the state convention at Helena Wed Sep 14 1904. 91 delegates + 91 alternates to state convention. **HEINZE INTERFERENCE.** "The Heinze mines and smelters were closed down last night and the employes, who are not democrats, by a preconcerted plan, swooped down on the primaries at the last moment, in a fruitless attempt to defeat the democratic party. Printed tickets that were put in circulation by the Heinzeites did not bear the democratic or any other party name, the number of the precincts and proposed fraudulent delegates only being given." Context: F. Augustus Heinze, the Butte "copper king," was at this date the principal industrial-political opponent of the Anaconda Company (and the William A. Clark party). The closed-mines-for-the-primary maneuver is a notable Heinze tactic in the 1904 county elections. The Democratic party primary defeated the Heinze ticket. **DELEGATES ELECTED (163 of 180 reported):** - Precinct 1 Walkerville: John Green, Mike Peters, John Whalen, John O'Rourke (del); Pat Coltigan, Pat Glesson, Mat Whalen, Mike Reynolds (alt) - Precinct 2 Walkerville: George R. Brown, John Sivalon, John Purcell (del); Thomas Collins, Thomas Hasty, John Melville (alt) - Precinct 3 Walkerville: Luke Noonan, Ed Fleming, William Mulcare - Precinct 4: Dennis Dunne, P. J. Sullivan, **James P. Murphy**, George Lynch, Thomas Normanly, J. J. McCarthy, Mike McKevitt, James Rice (del); John Church, John Laird, Joseph Nevin, Pat Foley, Thomas Kennedy, Jerry McCarthy, Pat Riley, Jerry Holland (alt) - Precinct 5: **J. D. Murphy**, James Keegan, John Quilty, John O'Leary, Charles O'Brien, **James Chatham**, Batt Riley (del); William Lohman, John Lenihan, Ed Rogers, C. C. Harrington, **James Murphy**, P. V. Ryan, George Decker (alt) ARCHIVE SIGNIFICANCE. (a) **THREE DISTINCT Butte Murphys in the same Democratic Party primary list:** James P. Murphy (Precinct 4 delegate), J. D. Murphy (Precinct 5 delegate), and bare "James Murphy" (Precinct 5 alternate). The lump-bias rule explicitly does NOT apply here — the printer distinguishes. Worth a Butte-Murphy person-records audit on the back-pass; at minimum, James P. and J. D. are two distinct individuals. (b) **James Chatham as Precinct 5 delegate** — the recurring Chatham figure in the user's Butte-Chatham family-orbit surname. Same James Chatham as the inbox PDF "James_Chatham_delegate_to_the_Dem_Country_Convention" — probably the same item the user already had clipped under a different filename. (Worth deduplicating on the next pass.) (c) **The 1904 Heinze-vs-Democrat-Party episode** is itself a major Butte political history landmark — the Heinze copper faction's defeat in the 1904 county elections precipitated Heinze's eventual sale of his Butte holdings to the Amalgamated Copper Company (Standard Oil / ACM) in 1906. The closed-mines tactic captured here is a primary source for the period.

In its time

Narrative

Democratic primaries across the Butte precincts choose delegates for the county convention at the Auditorium on Monday noon, which will in turn name ninety-one delegates and alternates for the state convention at Helena on September 14. The Heinze mines and smelters shut down for the night and their employes are said to have come to the primaries at the last moment with printed tickets bearing no party name, only precinct numbers and proposed delegates. Returns covering 163 of the 180 delegates are listed by precinct, including the three Walkerville precincts and Precincts Four and Five, where James P. Murphy, P. J. Sullivan, George Lynch, J. J. McCarthy, J. D. Murphy and James Chatham are among those elected.

“The Heinze mines and smelters were closed down last night and the employes, who are not democrats, by a preconcerted plan, swooped down on the primaries at the last moment”
“Printed tickets that were put in circulation by the Heinzeites did not bear the democratic or any other party name”
“The missing returns are of distant precincts in the country from which it was impossible to obtain early reports.”

AI-generated (claude-opus-5). Verify against the transcription before quoting.

People

James Chatham (Butte Precinct 5 Dem delegate 1904)(as printed: James Chatham)
role: precinct 5 democratic delegate 1904 · family confidence: 50 candidate

Also mentioned

James P. Murphy · precinct_4_democratic_delegate_1904
Distinct Butte Murphy. Distinguishing detail — middle initial P. + Precinct 4 + 1904 Democratic activity. Worth a person record on a back-pass; held in mentioned only here.
J. D. Murphy · precinct_5_democratic_delegate_1904
Distinct Butte Murphy. Middle initial D. + Precinct 5 + 1904 Democratic. Two-records rule preserves him separate from James P. Murphy and bare-name James Murphy.
James Murphy · precinct_5_democratic_alternate_1904
Third distinct Butte Murphy on the same 1904 Dem primary slate (the alternate, separately listed from J. D. and James P.). The 1912-03-05 Gregson banquet attendee list also has bare-name 'James Murphy' alongside 'James J. Murphy' as separate entries — this is plausibly the same recurring James-no-middle-initial Butte Murphy across 1904-1912 records.
F. Augustus Heinze · implied_corporate_principal_of_heinze_party
Not named in the clipping but the implied principal of the 'Heinzeites' — the Heinze faction that closed the mines for the primary and attempted to defeat the Democratic ticket. Major Butte copper-mining figure 1898-1906.
P. J. Sullivan · precinct_4_democratic_delegate_1904
George Lynch · precinct_4_democratic_delegate_1904
Possibly = the George Lynch in later JJM-cluster coverage; not the same as Judge Jeremiah J. Lynch.
J. J. McCarthy · precinct_4_democratic_delegate_1904
John O'Rourke · precinct_1_walkerville_delegate
Possibly = J. K. O'Rourke who recurs through the JJM cluster from 1911 onward.
Jerry McCarthy · precinct_4_alternate
P. V. Ryan · precinct_5_alternate
= Pat V. Ryan, brother-in-law of person_james_j_murphy_butte_died_1927 (per the 1927 obit). Confirms PV Ryan as a Butte Democratic Party figure 1904.

Places

Themes

Source type

news_item, list_of_officers

Related sources

1912-03-05 — The Butte Daily Post, p.4 — MERRY EVENING AT GREGSON SPRINGS

Transcription

transcription: complete · confidence high

# DEMOCRATS HOLD THEIR PRIMARIES ## DELEGATES CHOSEN TO ATTEND COUNTY CONVENTION MONDAY — OPPOSITION TO TICKET IS ATTEMPTED. *The Butte Miner, Sunday, September 11, 1904, p. 7.* The primaries of the democratic party to elect delegates to the county convention were held at the various precincts throughout the city last evening. The county convention will be held at the Auditorium tomorrow, and will be called at noon. At this convention ninety-one delegates and the same number of alternates will be named to attend the state convention, which will be held at Helena next Wednesday, September 14. The HeinzeButte: companies, unions & placesThe Copper KingsWilliam A. Clark, Marcus Daly and F. Augustus Heinze, whose rivalry over Butte’s mines ran Montana politics from the late 1880s to 1906.More in Key terms → mines and smelters were closed down last night and the employes, who are not democrats, by a preconcerted plan, swooped down on the primaries at the last moment, in a fruitless attempt to defeat the democratic party. Printed tickets that were put in circulation by the Heinzeites did not bear the democratic or any other party name, the number of the precincts and proposed fraudulent delegates only being given. The following were elected delegates to the convention, so far as the returns were received, the list representing 163 of the 180 chosen. The missing returns are of distant precincts in the country from which it was impossible to obtain early reports. | Delegates. | Alternates. | |---|---| **Precinct One, WalkervilleButte: companies, unions & placesWalkervilleA separate small city on the hill above Butte, grown up around the Alice and Lexington silver mines.More in Key terms → —** John Green, Pat Coltigan. Mike Peters, Pat Glesson. John Whalen, Mat Whalen. John O'Rourke, Mike Reynolds. **Precinct Two, Walkerville —** George R. Brown, Thomas Collins. John Sivalon, Thomas Hasty. John Purcell, John Melville. **Precinct Three, Walkerville —** Luke Noonan, Ed Fleming, William Mulcare. **Precinct Four —** Dennis Dunne, John Church. P. J. Sullivan, John Laird. James P. Murphy, Joseph Nevin. George Lynch, Pat Foley. Thomas Normanly, Thomas Kennedy. J. J. McCarthy, Jerry McCarthy. Mike McKevitt, Pat Riley. James Rice, Jerry Holland. **Precinct Five —** J. D. Murphy, William Lohman. James Keegan, John Lenihan. John Quilty, Ed Rogers. John O'Leary, C. C. Harrington. Charles O'Brien, James Murphy. James Chatham, P. V. Ryan. Batt Riley, George Decker.

Dotted underlines mark key terms on first mention — hover or tab to one for a reference note. The wording is the source’s own.

Open questions

elections — confirm exists in /vocab/themes.yaml or add.
The James_Chatham_delegate_to_the_Dem_Country_Convention.pdf inbox item may be a duplicate of this clipping under a different user-supplied filename. Check on a future pass and deduplicate.
Promote James P. Murphy (Precinct 4) and J. D. Murphy (Precinct 5) to candidate-Butte-Murphy person records on a back-pass — both have enough distinguishing detail (middle initial + precinct + 1904 Democratic activity) to warrant separation under the two-records rule.