THOMAS C. BURNS

A LUCKY POLITICIAN

Robert Burns represents Scotland, but the name of Tom Burns suggests a neighboring isle. As the political history of Ireland for a decade is largely the personal history of Robert Emmett, so the political history of Mitchell and of Davison county for a decade is largely the history of the up's and down's in politics of the tactful, clever, whole-souled, cheerful-losing Thomas C. Burns.

Senators Kittredge and Gamble were standing before President Roosevelt, in his official office quarreling over South Dakota patronage. "I'll settle this dispute," said Teddy: "I will flip a coin —heads up, Kittredge's first choice; tails up, Gamble's first choice; and so on until all the patronage at you fellow's command is disposed of. What say you?" "Agreed!" came the united response. A pair of lips drew apart; a double set of polished incisors, bicuspids, canines and molars, arranged in an elongated semi-circle, was revealed; the hand that unsheathed the victorius sword at San Juan thrust itself firmly in to a pocket; a silver dollar came forth in it—just one—one only, not "sixteen to one;" but sixteen chances to one Tom Burns who was red hot after reappointment in the land office at Mitchell, might lose.

THOMAS C. BURNS

Tom's fate was hanging in the balance. Would the coin, when tossed by the hand of authority, come straight down, heads up, bounce up a trifle, fall back in its same position or? would it "flop?" (a thing Tom Burns never did in politics).

Silence!

"Here it goes, boys," said the president; and at that moment the dear little piece of thin circular metal, so greatly loved and so bitterly lamented by Mr. Bryan, was tossed to the ceiling. Hush!

"Ping"———"buzz"———"down" A rush!

Staring eyes strove to catch the result.

"Heads up!" said Teddy.

"I'll take Tom Burns for register of the United States land office at Mitchell!" exclaimed Senator Kittredge.

Several years have now sped by into the irredeemable eternity of the past; the rapidly receding history of our rapidly developing state is now being written by a new regime. The progressive faction of the republican party is in power. "To the victor belongs the spoils." "Whose head goes next?" "Tom Burns!" shrieked out an insurgent."

"Well, I dont' know about that," said the new boss in South Dakota politics. "Dog gone it, I kind-a like Tom. He's the hardest fighter and the best loser in politics that I ever knew.

I believe we better be magnamious in his case and save him." "Well," said another, "we've got to get him out of Mitchell and Davison county, somehow. Just look at the majority that county gave Kittredge at the June primaries in 1908 "

"Wire him to come to Washington," interjected another. In a few hours Tom Burns was aboard a limited train, hurrying toward our national capitol.

Two days later glaring headlines appeared in all the leading dailies of the country:

"Fortune favors the brave." It's true in war, it's true in love, it's true in politics, it's true everywhere; even nature hates a coward. Tom Burns is as shrewd a political fighter as any man who ever got tangled up in the game. Yet his methods are so manly that even his enemies love him.

The greatest thing about Tom is that in politics, as in other things, his word is his bond. He never breaks faith with any man. He is either for you or against you; and, no matter which, you soon find it out.

Sir Thomas, plain Tom, "Uncle Tom," or just Tom Burns, as the case may be (he doesn't care what you call him, so long as it is done with "heads up"), is a politician through heredity, environment, and voluntary servitude. When he entered life 'tis said the first yell he let out of him was "poli." (He had the "tics" in him at the time, but he could not quite bring them to the surface.)

When he began to walk, as the story goes, he kept calling "pot, pot , poli, pot" until he so distracted his mother that she began to search for something to gratify his curiosity. She finally found it —some cards with men's faces on them, and T. C. has been "stacking" this kind of cards ever since.

Tom Burns came to Mitchell about thirty years ago. The better part of his life has been spent in that city. There he has raised and educated his family. There he has woven himself into the home life of the whole community. Unlike most active politicians who are brusque and abrupt, and who isolate themselves from the world, except to their lieutenants, Mr. Burns is very sociable, and he enters into the social life of his home town with his whole heart. He goes to church regularly, visits the sick, comforts the dying, encourages the living; and as a result, is universally liked by everybody. You couldn't get mad at him on a bet.

When he was about to leave Mitchell to assume his position in the land office which had just been transferred to Gregory, in Gregory county, the business men of Mitchell held a special banquet in his honor. A member of the supreme court, the mayor, the leading attorneys, the bankers and the preachers — all made speeches of regret in his behalf, and overwhelmed him with tributes.

Only now and then, only once perhaps in a generation, do, you find a man of Tom Burn's temperament and influence. He is a man whom any community might well feel honored to claim.

Long live Tom Burns!