Democratic Sentinel, Volume 2, Number 33, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 September 1878 — The Grant Movement Frosted. [ARTICLE]

The Grant Movement Frosted.

Besides shelving Blaine as a candidate for President, driving little Eugene Hale to the shades of private life, waking up ancient Hamlin from a Rip Van Winkle sleep, and demoralizing the Republican party on the eve of the fall elections, the result in Maine has had another effect, which has not been taken into account. It has blasted the Grant movement with an early frost, from which recovery is hardly probable. Mr. Blaine recently declared for it, as reflecting the sentiment of a present majority of the Republican party, and other men of prominence have been helping it with all their influence in the most effective way. That a regular campaign for a third term was organized and directed with skill on their side, seconded by Grant’s efforts in Europe, no longer admits of the least doubt. If the scheme was not planned before he went abroad, it has certainly taken shape and been industriously worked up in the last eight or ten months, with the artful appliances known to shrewd politicians. Grant himself is cunning, and did not require much instruction after the general plan was marked out. A part of the programme was that he should come home by way of California, and be greeted

with a series of preconcerted receptions, on the largest possible scale, from San Francisco to New’ York. Though quite willing to take any ordinary chances promising success, Grant, has an innate dread of defeat, and has no inclination to be the scapegoat of others, or to lead a forlorn hope. He will npt need to be told that with the foundation of the Republican party in New England undermined by a defection that cannot be repaired in time for 1880, if ever, he would be beaten as no other candidate has ever been, if nominated two years hence. The popular repugnance to a third term, and the corruption, ring rule, and robberies of Grantism, would have crushed him in any event, had he possessed far more strength than his friends have ever claimed. But this upheaval in Maine, which is the first blast of an angry storm that will carry all before it in other States, is an admonition which no man like Grant is likely to disregard. He will be told that the capitalists of the country, the national banks, and the railroad corporations will all unite upon him, and that their union means an election at any price. His instincts and his personal associations and his tastes being all in this direction, he will accept this assurance as in the main true, the wish being father to the thought. Tempting as the suggestion is, it has drawbacks. A combination of wealth and corporate pow’er would lead almost necessarily to a union of popular elements, against which they could not stand, ami might provoke a condition oi things which all good men would deplore in any political contest. Capital is naturally conservative, and would depart from safe moorings if it ever consented to engage in a struggle like that proposed. National banks depend upon Congress for their charters, and on the people for their support. Railroad corporations have no strength to sacrifice in politics, and are in no condition to invite risks.

When Gen. Grant comes to reflect on the surroundings of the next Republican candidate, lie will be very apt to conclude that discretion is the better part of valor, and refuse to be put up merely to be knocked down like a ninepin. Should he, from any weakness, yield to the temptation, and allow himself to be conquered by the politicians, his career will probably close in clouds, like those which darkened it before the great opportunity came that rescued him from ruin, and worse. The next Republican candidate will be the last under the existing organization. An overwhelming defeat will lead to a new’ formation, out of which may grow a great party in the future, when their opponents shall have run in the beaten track of success and proven their incapacity to bear it.— New York Suu.