Democratic Sentinel, Volume 3, Number 46, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 December 1879 — DARK DESIGNS [ARTICLE]

DARK DESIGNS

Desperate Republican Games —Determined to Win by Fair Means or Foul, and Count In the Next President Whether Elected or Not. [Washington Cor. Cincinnati Enquirer ] There is no donbt whatever that the Republican leaders are already beginning to lay their plans for the execution of some desperate schemes to carry the country for the Republican party next year. The most strenuous efforts are being made to disguise their movements and blind the people of the country as to their intentions; but some things have leaked out which have excited a good deal of apprehension among Democrats, and which giveoolor to the belief that they mean to inaugurate another Republican President regardless of whether the majority of the peoplo of the country want him or not. It has unquestionably been determined that no effort shall be'made to carry any Southern State; and, more than this, steps bavo already been taken to prevent any Southern State from being carried. A part of this programme was carried out in the recent election in Louisiana. It will be remembered that the talk which prevailed at one time of sending Northern Republicans to canvass that State was suddenly stopped; that no Republicans went there except Mr. Stewart L. Woodford, of New York, and that after his arrival there there was a sudden and inexplicable apathy on the part of the Republicans ; and that when the election returns came to be counted it appeared that in certain parishes where there is a very large colored population no Republican votes at all were cast. The Republican newspapers are already citing this last fact as an evidence that there was intimidation and bulldozing by Democrats in those parishes. The Democratic members of Congress who represent these parishes declare positively that the charges are absolutely false. There is more than reason to believe that the failure of the negroes in those localities to vote was in obedience to the instructions carried to Louisiana by Mr. Woodford, who, it will be remembered, has had a good deal of reputation as an intriguer in politics, and was prepared to play a pretty important figure in the election of 1876 if the much-talked-of scheme of inaugurating Mr. Tilden in New York had been attempted. In plain English, it is charged, and there is reason to believe that the charge is true, that Mr. Woodford went to Louisiana for the" purpose of informing the Republican leaders of that State of the plan which had been determined upon by the leaders of the Republican party to keep the South solid and make the North solid; and that in certain parishes the negro vote was kept at home purposely by the Republican leaders in order that there might be no possible chance of the Republicans carrying that State; and, also, for the purpose of furnishing a pretext for just such assertions of intrigue and bulldozing perpetrated by Democrats as are now being printed in the Republican newspapers throughout the North. A similar series of this Republican programme may be expected to develop in New York, which State, there is grave reason to apprehend, the Republicans propose to seize, through the instrumentality of the present. Legislature, which may be expected to exercise its undoubted prerogative under the constitution to change the method of choosing Presidential electors in New York, and pass a law that they shall be chosen by the Legislature, and then itself choosing Republican electors, in spite of the fact that New York was Democratic at the last election by 40,000 majority, and without giving the people of the State a chance to express their preference upon the subject next year. The charge that the Republicans intend to do this thing will doubtless be denounced as sensational. But some of the shrewdest observers in politics, and some of the longest-headed politicians here, are confident that the Republicans have really determined upon this plan of action, and really mean to seize New York in this way. Several things which have already happened are explainable upon this hypothesis. It will be remembered that a few weeks before Congress met Senator Matt Carpenter delivered himself of the opinion at some length that the Democrats intended to inaugurate the next President, whether they elected him or not. This sensational opinion of Senator Carpenter was set up in type here, and slips of it were sent to all the leading Republican papers throughout the country. It appeared simultaneously in nearly all of the largest cities in the country. Its appearance created very great surprise at the time, inasmuch as no Democrat had hinted or thought of such a thing. The only reasonable explanation of Senator Carpenter’s act is that he meant to prepare the public mind for extraordinary proceedings in the next Presidential election, and desired to create the impression that the Democrats contemplate seizing the Government by fraud or force as an excuse for what the Republicans had already determined upon. The journey of Mr. Woodford to Louisiana, otherwise inexplicable, is easily understood in the light of this programme. And now the Republicans are following out a line of procedure in regard to Maine which also squints in the same direction. As is well known to all who have watched the situation in Maine at all seriously, neither Gov. Garcelon nor any one of the Council have performed any act or used any word wnich gives the slightest ground for the suspicion that they intended to do anything in that State contrary to the laws of the State and the constitution, or that they had any ulterior object in view, or 'meant anything else than to issue certificates of election to those State officers and members of the Legislature to whom they were authorized to issue such certificates by the law. Nevertheless, Senator Blaine, the entire Republican delegation from Maine, and the Republican newspapers .in Maine, and elsewhere, are charging daily that Gov. Garcelon and the Democratic party in Maine mean to seize upon the Government of that State wrongfully, and that the Legislature, after they have thus wrongfully seized it and possessed themselves of it, mean to change the law in that State and choose Democratic electors next year. The purpose of this is very plain. Senator Blaine is exceedingly anxious that the Maine Pemocrats shall do just

this very thing. He and all his allies in the Republican party are trying by every means in their power to goad the Fusiouists in Maine into changing the law in Maine in regard to the choioe of electors, and enaot a law whioh shall give that choice to the Legislature. The object of having the Democrats in Maine do this is to give the Republicans an exouse for doing the same thing in New York, The Republicans realize that they can afford to have this thing done in Maine, even if it should be carried to completion, and the Maine Legislature should elect Demooratio electors, because the Republicans could lose Maine, and still carry the country, if they can secure New York and Indiana and the other Northern States. It is proposed to carry Indiana by the means of the negro-colonization scheme, which has already been inaugurated. The Democratic majority in that State is only about 5,000. The law of that State allows any man. to vote after a residence of six months. Between this and spring the country may expeot to see 100,000 negroes transported to Indiana from North Carolina and other Southern States. This, in brief, is the desperate scheme which eomo of the most sagacious political leaders here firmly believe the Republican party is determined upon, and which they seem to be already preparing to carry out.