systematizing this traffic. A regular scale of prices was
adopted: so much for an excavation, so much per foot for a
railway switch, so much for a street pavement, so much for a
grain elevator. Edward R. Butler was the master under whose
commands for many years this trafficking was reduced to
systematic perfection. He had come to St. Louis when a young man,
had opened a blacksmith shop, had built up a good trade in
horseshoeing, and also a pliant political following in his ward.
His attempt to defeat the home rule charter in 1876 had given him
wider prominence, and he soon became the boss of the Democratic
machine. His energy, shrewdness, liberality, and capacity for
friendship gave him sway over both Republican and Democratic
votes in certain portions of the city. A prominent St. Louis
attorney says that for over twenty years "he named candidates on
both tickets, fixed, collected, and disbursed campaign
assessments, determined the results in elections, and in fine,
practically controlled the public affairs of St. Louis." He was
the agent usually sought by franchise-seekers, and he said that
had the Suburban Company dealt with him instead of with the
members of the Assembly, they might have avoided exposure. He was
indicted four times in the upheaval, twice for attempting to
bribe the Board of Health in the garbage deal--he was a
stockholder in the company seeking the contract--and twice for
bribery in the lighting contract.

Cincinnati inherited from the Civil War the domestic excitements
and political antagonisms of a border city. Its large German
population gave it a conservative political demeanor, slow to
accept changes, loyal to the Republican party as it was to the
Union. This reduced partizan opposition to a docile minority,