Democratic Sentinel, Volume 5, Number 26, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 August 1881 — THE EMPIRE STATE. [ARTICLE]

THE EMPIRE STATE.

Stirring Address •( Cite Democratic members of tbe Legislature. The Democratic members of the New York Legislature, their Joint Caucus Committee, have issued an address to‘ the Democratic citizens of the State of New York and to the citizens of the State without distinction of party. The address says : Disorders and quarrels in the Republican majority have separated us from our homes and business for nearly 200 days. The chief cause of this uncalled-for detention was a quarrel with the President of the United States on one side and the Vice President and the two Senators from this Btate on the other. The source of this discord was the question of official patronage or the spoils of office. The Collector of the Port of New York was forced to resign in the midst of his term from a place where he was serving with general acceptance to tho public, and was appointed to a place abroad uncalled for by his friends or by the public, in which he has no experience. Thie change, against which the merchants of New York protested in large numbers, was made m total disregard of every announced principle of civilservice reform, and was not called for by any principle of political duty nor the interest of the public service. The purpose of the act seemed to be to reward those who had been personally successful in securing the Presidential nomination, and to punish those who had resisted the leading member and members of the National Republican Convention claiming the right of a third term of executive service for a previous President. The unseemly quarrel at Chicago, in the summer of 1880, was transferred to Washington after the Presidential election at the close of the same year. The same strife has been continued with more bitterness at Albany through the whole of the present session of the Legislature. It commenced with great vehemence at the Senatorial election in January. when a th rd-class candidate was nominated and elected over first-class competitors for the first office in the gift of the Legislature, and hardly second to any office in the gift of the people of the State. The office then filled after great strife was vacated by a voluntary resignation, and when it had only been held for less than one-fonrth of the first year of the full six years’ constitutional term of servico. Tho mau who inspired this resignation was the senior Senator of the State, who had been three times elected to the United States Senate by one party of the State, whose longer service he now refused, and simply owing to the fact of the nomination to the Senate of one chief offender who had opposed his ambition and wishes at Chicago and elsewhere. The useless resignation of these two men has cost the State not only a large amount of money, but, what is more valuable, its honor, dignity and selfrespect. Two factions, known tty the vulgar hut expressive names of “Stalwarts” and “HalfBreeds,” have governed the Senate and Assembly of the Republican party and State through tho whole session. The Democratic members have many tithes asked and demanded an appeal to the people, but; by force of numbers, in defiance of public opinion and in denial of the opportunity of a timeiy public judgment upon the fact of leaving the State without its constitutional representative m the higher branch of Congress, tho Republican majority refused to leave the choice of the succession to the people of the State. These demands by the Democratic minority, that an appeal be mide to the people, were met by the insulting declaration that the possible choice of Democratic Senators in Congress would be a public calamity to the State, and this after just electing Thomas C. Platt as the successor of Francis Kernan, and after following this succession with the choice of a man named Warner Miller, a member of the present and previous Hous- of Representatives, where he was only conspicuous and notorious as a direct and personal beneficiary of one of the worst monopolies in the country, and where he supported that monopoly by Ins voice and influence, and with a threat that other public interests should suffer if his special interests in wood pulpfend the fnanufacture of paper were not protected. Most distinguished and capable men of the dominant party not in public place, apart from Conkling, out including men like Fish, Wheeler, Curtis, Rogers and others, who have served the State with ability, have had to give place to the two men elected to Congress, and their nomination was made an excuse for passing a law to fill the vacancies made by their election, and for no other reason. These special elections thus provoked will be untimely, as they are unnecessary and expensive. The whole Senatorial question at Albany resolved itself into three most discreditable conclusions : 1. A mistrust of the people of tho State on tho part of the Republican majority in tue Legislature. 2. The quarrel over tho spoils of office in two or three Republican factions, with practical contempt for every principle belonging to what is known and recognized as civil-service reform.

3. Abuse of power from its long use and misuse, until two of the least capable persons have been drawn from the popular branch of Congress to fill the highest places of the State in the Congress of the United States. Another and most disgraceful transaction belonging to this Republican Legislature is tho evidence of bribery and corruption established upon the evidence of members of the dominant party. A leading Republican Senator of oue faction is charged- by a member of tho Assembly of the same party and tho same district of the other faction with offering and paying him $2,000 for a Senatorial vote, and the money was placed in possession of a special committee, and is now inthehands of the State Comptroller. Beyond this fact is the circulation of large sums of money by prominent Republicans pending the Senatorial election, and, as many nelieve, the intended control of the result of the election. The State of Now York with its 6,006,000 of people has been deeply wrongod and disgraced both by the Republican Senators’ action in Washington and bv the action of the Republican party m power at Albany. In the first place, the Chief Magistrate of the Government, for daring to put in practice the principles of Executive right or authority in the choice of a public officer, nearly lost his life.

This sad and terrible crime came not alone through the personal madness of a single man, but from that personal fanaticism which was and is the fruit of greed for public office, and of false and dangerous political education. Nov,*, if ever, is the time to teach all men that public office is the property of the people, and that places of official trust can only be rightfully distributed to men of noble purposes, of pure livas, of wise experience and of unqualified fitness for the work to be performed. The Democratic party of the State desire to inculcate and enforce the doctrine with which the Democratic party came into existence, as when Jefferson declared that the only qualifications for office rested upon the wise, safe and patriotic platform of personal capability, personal honesty and personal fidelity to the constitution.

As members of the Democratic party serving in the Legislature, where in one braneh there were but seven Democratic Senators of thirty-two members, and in the Assembly but forty-seven of the 128 members, we also feel called upon to protest against special, personal and partisan legislation against the public interests. The majority in the Assemb'y, by the Combined vote, with the exception of a single member, refused to even permit the reference for discussion alone or three bills carefully prepared and sent to the Judiciary Committee, and providing for absolute. reforms in primary meetings of cities, towns and villages of the State where candidates are named and made for every officer elected by the people. In the same malignant spirit, where there were and are Democratic city and local Governments, the wishes of the people were defeated by the com- , bined forces of partisan legislators. Important oases awaiting the decision of Btate courts were set aside to await the clamors of parti- ■ sans at homeland in the Legislature, and , this under a ruling upon points of order ! and rales of parliamentary right of practice wholly unprecedented in the history of the State or country. The chief source of the present danger is the Federal patronage i.nd the impure administration of the bodv of Federal officers, whose numbers are now m excess of 100,000 persons, and every year increasing in number. Against this enormqus aggressive and personal power there must be eternal vigilance for the right of free education of the children of the people, and the diffusion of that knowledge, and integrity, and patriotism throughout the State and country, wrhicb alone can maintain a onion among the States and,secure peace and prosperity all over the land. Much was expected from the discovery made by Prof. 801 l that the images pf objects remained on tiiu lviiiia oi^aui-

mals after death. It was thought, for example, that the last scene of a mysterious murder would be found by properly examining the of the victim. Actual tests have shown that the optogram can be of no use in detecting crime. Dr. Ayres made more than a thousand experiments in the laboratory of Prof. Kuhne, at Heidelberg, and met with but poor success. The best result was obtained by exposing the eye of a living rabbit, which had been dosed with atropine, to a photographic negative, and even in this case the optogram was imperfect, indistinct and evanescent.