KENTUCKY. 



KOREA. 



329 



erty alone confers the right of suffrage. The first 

 duty of Kentucky citizenship is to repeal the 

 Goebel election law, which is the source and con- 

 tinuing strength of the wrongs done in this State." 

 The Democrats, in State convention at Lexing- 

 ton, July 20, nominated J. C. W. Beckham for 

 Governor. Among the resolutions adopted were 

 the following: 



" We recommend that the election law of 1898, 

 which was enacted to prevent the repetition of 

 well-known Republican frauds in certain districts 

 of this State and which was a marked improve- 

 ment upon the then existing law, but which has 

 not proved sufficient for that purpose, be amended 

 so as to secure this end so thoroughly that the 

 most hypercritical can find no excuse for charging 

 fraud or unfairness to our party in the conduct 

 of the election. Until such amendment can be 

 enacted by the General Assembly we declare that 

 the Republican party shall have representation 

 upon both the State and all county boards of elec- 

 tion commissioners. 



" We declare to the world that the mob and the 

 assassin shall not be the arbitrators of the rights 

 of the citizens of Kentucky, nor shall the penalty of 

 n appeal to the law and the regular constituted 

 .uthorities be death at the hands of assassins, 

 w and order must and shall prevail in Kentucky. 

 " We present to the people of Kentucky the 

 icture of an army of intimidation, unlawfully 

 uartered in the public buildings of the State: a 

 itate Senator, in the discharge of his duty to the 

 itate, stricken down by an assassin's bullet, fired 

 in ambush in the executive building, then occu- 

 ied by his political adversary, who hoped to profit 

 y his death; that adversary arming, filling, and 

 .unrounding the building with armed men, in- 

 itructed to defy the civil authorities and prevent 

 arch for the assassin; the same political adver- 

 ry and Republican pretender, by force, dissolving 

 he Legislature, in violation of the Constitution; 

 .ttempting by military power to force the Legis- 

 ture to meet in a veritable slaughter pen for the 

 imocratic members ; driving its members through 

 .e streets of Frankfort at the point of the bayo- 

 .et, forcibly preventing the Legislature from meet- 

 g in its lawful and proper place ; keeping armed 

 iotous and disorderly men under the very window 

 i the room where lay dying the assassin's victim ; 

 riving the Court of Appeals from the Capitol; 

 iding with the soldiery and spurious pardons 

 ihose lawfully accused of capital crimes to flee 

 oni justice, and by military force defying the 

 rit of habeas corpus; the same Republican pre- 

 mder fleeing from the State after indictment and 

 emaining a fugitive from jiutice, protected by 

 open violation of the Constitution of the United 

 tates, after having declared to the people of the 

 tate, ' I am a citizen of this State and amen- 

 able to its laws; I am not a criminal, neither 

 shall I ever be a fugitive from justice. When- 

 :ver indicted I shall appear for trial.' " 

 The convention of the People's party, at Louis- 

 ille, Aug. 1, made W. H. Carden the candidate 

 'or Governor, demanded the repeal of the Goebel 

 election law, and recommended the initiative and 

 referendum. 



The Prohibitionists named John D. White as 

 their candidate for Governor. Besides reaffirming 

 the general principles of the party, they declared 

 in favor of an election law that would insure the 

 counting of every voter's ballot as it is cast. 



The vote on presidential electors stood: Demo- 

 cratic, 234,899; Republican, 226,801; Prohibition- 

 ist, 2,429; People's party, 2,017; Social-Democrat, 

 760; Social-Labor, 289. Mr. Beckham was elected 

 Governor, and he was inaugurated Dec. 11. 





KOREA, or CHO-SEN (" Morning Radiance "), 

 a country in eastern continental Asia, between 

 Japan and China and adjacent to Russian, British, 

 and German possessions on what was once Chinese 

 territory. It is separated from Siberia and Russian 

 Manchuria by the Ever- White mountains and the 

 two rivers the Tumen on the north and the Yalu 

 on the west. Without an exact census, estimates 

 of population vary from 10,000,000 to 15,000,000 

 souls, females being in the minority, owing to less 

 care being taken of the girls in infancy and child- 

 hood. Of the three social classes, the gentry 

 (yany-lmn, meaning civil and military) live in 

 idleness, not usually paying taxes or tolls, and 

 to some extent in Government employ, or in ex- 

 pectation of it. The common people are almost 

 wholly agricultural, and below them are the seven 

 degraded classes. Physically the Koreans are a 

 finer race than the Japanese, and more refined 

 looking than the Chinese, but they lack moral 

 stamina. Confucianism is the cult of the higher 

 classes, and a debased form of Buddhism the re- 

 ligion of the common people. Sorcery and super- 

 stitions abound, influencing nearly all the actions 

 of life. Old evidences of these exist numerously 

 in the grotesque stone and wood sculptures of 

 mythical beasts, the carved wooden distance posts, 

 and the idols set up at the entrances of villages. 

 Christianity, in making rapid headway, is greatly 

 modifying social customs. The old guilds which 

 formerly controlled all industry are abolished in 

 form, but are still powerful. 



Government. Ki-ja, an ancestor of Confucius, 

 is called the founder of Korean civilization, 1122 

 B. C. Four great historical periods are noted. 

 Old Cho-sen lasted from 1122 B. c. to 9 A. D., giv- 

 ing way to San-Han, or the Three Kingdoms 

 (9-960 A. D.), a.nd these to the one kingdom of 

 Korai (960-1392), and this to the Cho-sen of 

 to-day, founded by the present ruling dynasty in 

 1392, when Seoul, on Han river, was made the 

 capital. The ancient limits of Korea were far 

 greater than at present. In 1864 the dynasty 

 failed of direct heirs, and the present King, then 

 a minor, was nominated, his father, the Tai-Wen- 

 Kun, being the virtual ruler of the kingdom 

 twenty years. The King reached his majority in 

 1873. Since the war between China and Japan 

 in 1894-'95, as confirmed by the treaty of Shi- 

 monoseki, Korea is no longer a vassal to China, 

 but an independent state. On Oct. 14, 1897, the 

 King assumed the title of Emperor, naming his 

 realm Dai-Han (Great Han, in distinction from 

 the ancient San-Han, or Three Kingdoms). In 

 August, 1899, the written Constitution of the king- 

 dom was issued. Its nine articles declare the 

 country's independence and the absolute power of 

 the King. He is assisted in government by a 

 Council of State and 9 ministers, presided over 

 by the Premier. The ministries are Royal House- 

 hold, Finance, Home Affairs, Foreign Affairs, War, 

 Justice, Agriculture, and Education. There are 

 14 provinces in which is a governor and 360 dis- 

 tricts in each of which a magistrate presides. Ex- 

 cept revenue vessels Korea has no navy, but her 

 army of 5,000 men is uniformed, armed, and drilled 

 in modern style. Of foreign interests in the do- 

 main, those of Japan outweigh all others, but 

 Russian influence is very powerful. To the new 

 and specially appointed envoy to Tokio, in No- 

 vember, 1900, the Mikado's Government declined 

 to assure Korea's complete neutrality. 



Open Ports. Nine ports are open to foreign 

 trade, including Chemulpo, 20 miles south of the 

 capital and connected with it by railway; Fusan, 

 in the southeast coast, between which and the 

 capital surveys and estimates for a railway have 



