Demos

It rained pitchforks at Frankfort, Kentucky's capital, last week. And the legislators were afraid. They were about to pass Governor Ruby Laffoon's 1% tax on sales, while outside in the rain demos milled on the Capitol lawn. Fearful Senators could decipher through rain-streaked windows the soggy banners which irate Kentucky merchants carried: "Bankrupt Retailers Pay No Taxes At All," "Tenant Farmers Pay Sales Tax Too," "Sales Tax Hits The Farmer--Goodbye Tobacco." "Economy, Not Taxation," "Down With The Sales Tax." Many a water-logged citizen carried on his hat a sinister label: "Laffoon Sleeps, Wake Him."

From the front door of the Governor's Mansion near the Capitol, Douglas Majors, Negro doorman, watched the scene with trepidation. With horror he saw 100 to 200 men and not a few women drift away from the main throng, start up the driveway toward the Mansion. It was like a cinema mob scene, like the beginning of a lynching bee.

Negro Majors threw himself before his portal, spurned $40 to let the crowd in. They heaved him aside, passed through, while he wailed that Governor Laffoon was not at home. "Then we'll see his women folk," snarled the invaders.

A few men mounted a stairway to the second floor. But a maid quickly persuaded them that neither the Governor, nor Mrs. Laffoon, nor their daughters, Lelia Laffoon and Mrs. William Rees Robinson, were home. Only members of the family there were the grandchildren. William Rees Robinson, Jr., 11, and Tommie, two and a half.

So demos sat down for a good time, with a "This isn't the Governor's house. It belongs to us. We paid the taxes to build it." The intruders played the piano, tore up the music. They let cigars burn grooves in the furniture, threw live butts on the carpets. After an hour's playfulness the intruders decided they had better go outside, perhaps prevent passage of the 1% sales tax bill.

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