"From Minnesota the movement spread to Iowa, and there is no contradiction of the fact that the railway employes' vote was one of the strongest forces in the State election of the fall of 1891. It also overflowed into Kansas, Nebraska, Missouri and Texas. Had the election of last November been normal it is probable that the effect of the Railway Employes' Club vote would have been as visible in two or three of those States then as it had been in Iowa in the preceding year. But in the deluge which occurred all trace of the smaller streams and currents was obliterated. Had the members of the clubs not taken the precaution to do considerable work in the local nominating conventions of both parties they would be compelled to confess that their campaign of 1892 was a failure.... "So far the clubs have admitted and will admit of no negotiations with the State committees of other parties. They hold their own meetings and decide for themselves that such and such a candidate is inimical to their interests as railway employes, and such and such a man is their friend. Then they go to the polls and vote--voting in the main their normal party ticket, scratching only a man here and a man there, their attention being chiefly centered upon members of the boards of railroad commissioners and of the State legislatures. "In Minnesota in 1890 their weight was thrown chiefly in favor of Republicans. In Iowa in 1891 it was given to Democrats. In all States the men whom they oppose are those who have made themselves conspicuous as 'Granger' and anti-railway politicians. The keynote of the movement and the one plank in the platform of the clubs is that the extreme anti-railroad legislation of late years has reduced the earnings of the companies to a point at which they are unable any longer to keep full forces on their payrolls or to pay such wages as they should, and that by this legislation the railway employes are necessarily the immediate sufferers.... "A railway party is therefore already in existence.... And moreover, though accidentally only, it is working forcibly in behalf of railway interests as a whole.... "Meanwhile Mr. A. F. Walker, the chairman of the Joint Committee of the Trunk Line and Central Traffic Associations, prophesies that if things go on as they are going now, before long 'the managers of the railways will be chiefly receivers.' In the year 1891 receivers were appointed for twenty-six companies in the United States, representing $84,479,000 of capital, and twenty-one companies, with 3,223 miles of road, with a capitalization of $186,000,000, were sold under foreclosure.