Democratic Sentinel, Volume 7, Number 31, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 31 August 1883 — ASTROKE THAT TELLS. [ARTICLE]

ASTROKE THAT TELLS.

The reception of the late expose of the secrets of the Republican campaign of 1880 is Just about what we supposed it would be on the part of the Republican journals. They are violently angry and declare the whole thing a tissue of falsehoods, fabricated by Dorsey’s well-khown ingenuity in a spirit of revenge and desperate malice. That is one wing of their defense, or rather apologyjfor defense. The other is an assumption of grief and indignation that any such charge or charges shoula now be brought, when ' the man against whom they are mainly directed is no longer alive to defend himself. We are sorry that they are so shocked by the bad taste of those who give these charges to the pubc, and if only the individual was concerned we should join them in their desire to throw the mantle of charitable silence over the memory of the dead. But that is not the point. History never admits a nol pros. Whatever the candidate of the Republican party may have done in 1880 he did to a considerable extent in th 6 name of that party and with the knowledge and consent, if not approval of many of the leading men in it. We will admit that so far as Dorsey’s statements stand alone, they must be accepted with the greatest caution, if not suspicion. But, on the other hand, it will not do to say they are falsehoods simply because of a general impression that Dorsey is entirely capable of falsehood. If it is falsehood, it is remarkably ingenious and workmanlike. What Dorsey has said merely supplies the connection to certain detatched facts with which the public is acquainted independently of the recent Secretary of the Republican (’ommittee.» It is a fact that Dorsey knew more about the whole arrangement of ways and means in the campaign of 1880 than any other man. It is a fact that Garfield and his friends were very much demoralized and panic stricken when Dorsey was invited to assume the whole responsibility and almost absolute powers in the conduct of that remarkable campaign. It is a fact that after the Fifth Avenue conference there was a sudden revival of confidence on the nart of leading Republicans without any apparent reason for it, and that immediately after, with as little apparent reason, there was a sudden change in the political complexion of Indiana It is a fact that Garfield wrote to his “dear Hubbell” that he hoped Brady was doing well in the departments, and looked to his unusual resources for assistance in his embarrassment. It is a fact that a dinner was given to Dorsey in New York, after the election, to acknowledge his skill as a dispenser of “soap”, to admit that he saved Indiana with money, and leading Republicans, Garfield among the number, were either present or sent their profound acknowledgments of the worth and value of Mr. Dorsey in the campaign. When we refresh our minds with all these facts we hardly need the testimony of Dorsey or any one else to fill out the story. Instead of there being any improbability about the latter’s statement, it fits the established truth like its complement. Itisthemisvinghalf of a tom leaf. The Jay Gould and Stanley Mathews incident is not dependent upon Dorsey for substantiation. Why has not the Tribune something to say about that part of it? Its editor knows considerable about it, or is said to at least. We believe now as we believed at the time, that the Republican campaign of 1880 was one of the blackest, most corrupt and most desperate conspira-

cies of the century. If new light can be thrown upon the details history demands the revelation, and the testimony of the man who has turned people’s evidence becomes valuable, like all evidence of that kind, only as it harmonizes with and strengthens facts already known. —Boston Post.