Democratic Sentinel, Volume 7, Number 38, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 October 1883 — OHIO. [ARTICLE]

OHIO.

Accounting for the Result of the Recent Election. Various Views, Theories and Comments of Editors and Politicians. The Prohibitionists Censured by the Republicans—Judge Hoadly’s Views. OHIO OPINIONS. [Columbus Telegram to St. Louis Globe-Dem-ocrat.] As the returns beoome more complete and their eccentricities are more fully developed, the Democrats are as much perplexed as the Republicans. Contrary to all precedents, the victorious party has been almost as silent as the vanquished. In no place that can be heard of has there been the usual boisterous demonstrations. Both parties seem to be dazed by the peculiarity of the result. What puzzles the Democrats is that they have lost where they should have gained and gained where they should have lost. The same thing compels the Republicans to wonder at and analyze the figures. Judge Foraker attributes hiß defeat to the zeal of the temperance Republicans in behalf of the prohibition amendment. Both candidates are agreed, for Judge Hoadley attributes his suocess to the same thing. Ex-Senator Thurman said last night that the contest had been won in a scramble, and that all prognostications as to its effect upon the future were worthless. [Cincinnati Telegram to the Chicago Inter Ocean.] Everybody now is discussing the battle and the defeat. Wool, wine and temperance is Halstead’s diagnosis. Others say it was poverty; that the State Central committee had only $9,600 all told; that they hoped for money, and kept on giving orders to the loeal committees and promising money, which they were unable to send, until finally the local committees refused to obey any orders that involved pecuniary liability, and so the battle was lost by default. Here in Hamilton county on election day the Democrats were doubly as full-handed as the Republicans In ready cash. [Columbus Telegram to Chicago Times.] There is cussing among Republicans, who are laying blame, some to Foster, some to Sherman, and others to the Legislature, for letting the temperance people have a chance to trade them off for their amendment. The Democrats attacked the Republicans In the country, where the latter felt-strong, and beat them there. The Republicans spent their force with less suocess in the cities, which were the Democratic strongholds, or their allies, the Germans. The liquor men and others were not to be drawn off this year. There is much talk about Sherman getting even with Foster, for the latter’s alleged conduct at the Chicago convention and treachery on all hands. Foraker made the most brilliant campaign of any candidate for Governor. Hoadly gained friends by the abuse heaped upon him and his sickness, and came back for the last week of the campaign jUst at the right time and when the trading by the Republicans for him In the country and against the second amendment in the cities was at high tide. [Cincinnati Telegram to Chicago Tribune.] Blunders reaching back for two years have made this result possible. The mistakes began after Gen. Foster’s second election when the German Republicans were driven from the party by coquetting with the Prohibitionists. This class has ever since been an element of weakness. They have repeated their action of last year and again defeated the Republican party. The German Republicans, neglected and abused throughout the canvass, returned to the Republican, fold despice its assaults upon their beer and gave It all the respectable show it had In the final struggle. The /Germans dm not defeat Foraker and hand over the whole political machinery of the State to the Democrats. It was the temperance people, who either did not vote at all or sacrificed the whole Republican ticket In the hope of carrying the prohibition amendment. It Is the God and morality portion of the Republican party of Ohio, not the beer-drinkers, that is responsible for the disaster. If the country districts and the Western Reserve had done only a fraction as well as the Germans of Cincinnati and Cleveland there would have been a great Republican victory. [Cleveland Telegram to Chicago Tribune]. The Prohibitionists denounce the Republicans and say they will fight over the same grounds again and again, but the general opinion is that they have shot away all their ammunition and can never make another such showing. [From the Cincinnati Commercial Gazette.] This defeat is attributable to several causes tho principal one of which Is the larrge class who have believed in the supernatural In poltics, who have roosted away up the air of sentiment, and expected the Lord to carry the election. This defeat has scraped the barnacles off of the party and made this a Republican State In 1884. We have bfeen defeated upon purely local Issues. If we had nationalized this fight by making John Sherman our candidate for Governor we would have easily carried the State. PRESS COMMENTS. DEMOCRATIC. [From the New York Snn.] One of the singular features of the election Is the different ways In which the prohibition vote affected the Republicans. The rural counties, where they pushed the defeated prohibition amendment strongly, responded with big majorities for the amendment, but with hardly the average Republican vote. In the cities, where tho Republicans were afraid to push the amendment, they made their chief gains from the. Democrats. Yet the beaten Republicans are at a loss to explain their defeat even to their own satisfaction. Deacon Richard Smith thinks the woolgrowers did It. Field Marshal Halstead thinks the wine-growers did it. John Sherman believes Foster did it; and Foster probably hasn’t recovered from his dozed condition sufficiently to do anything about it. At any rate, it is done, brethren, and vel done. We imagine that you will find that you all contributed to It unawares. The people havc ; 6imply registered their decree that the Republican party must go. That is the meaning of a Democratic Governor and a Democratic Legislature in Ohio. [From the Cincinnati Enquirer.] The Democracy of Ohio won a significant victory on Tuesday. They carried the State for the sixth time since the organization of the Republican party, more than twenty-five years ago. They gained the Governor and the majority of the Legislature in the antiPresidential year, when tho near approach to the national contest and the hot excitement growing out of State questions and local contentions tended to bringing out the electors In force. They overcame an enemy which was under the Generalship of the best Republican politician in Ohio, who was thoroughly equipped for'tho contest, and whose political fortunes were at stake. They survived the factional differences and the bitterness growing out of a warm fight for the nomination for Governor. They successfully resisted the effort to place on them the opprobrium of opposition to what the Republicans claimed to be the great moral reform of the period. They gallantly opposed the long fortification of the Republican party In office in the State and in the United States. They went to the front in spite of the embarrassments sought to be heaped on them by a pestiferous ring of barnacles which had been ousted from the control of the Democratic organization. They opposed treachery within and slander without • their lines, and achieved a victory which every thoughtful man must look upon as one of the guiding elements in the great contest of 1884. Ohio Is still the October State, and she will fire the first gun in the Presidential year.

The Democrats now have command of the artillery. The serried ranks of the Republicans have been broken, and the party Intoxicated with power has been taught. that it Is not invulnerable in a State which it has relied on as a Gibraltar In every national contest since Its birth. The result of Tuesday’s election means that the books are te be overhauled; that we are to have a much needed change In the administration of State affairs; that the people have come to understand hollow Republican pretenses; that there Is a tremencuous sentiment against fanaticism and oppression of special Interest; that there tea popular desire in this State for a change of party control In this oountryn that there te a healthy and well-organized opposition to an aristocratic system In the distribution of pnfelio offices; that the olvil-servJee should be arranged in the interest of the people rather than in the Interest of the office-holding class, with the responsible party In control in every place, major and minor; that Ohio is fighting ground next year, and that preliminary to that contest the people prefer the best of the two men running for Governor. REPUBLICAN. [From the Chicago Tribune.] It is now clear that the defeat of the Republican ticket in Ohio was brought about by the Prohibitionists. The losses In the dtle* In last year’s election, mainly due to the defection of the Germans growing out of the “Pond law” -and the “Smith” and antiSunday law, which were declared unconstitutional, were regained for the most part this year, but unexpected losses were met in the oountry districts. The latter were due to the treachery of the Prohibitionists, who voted some for their separate ticket and others for the Democratic candidates in exchange for Democratic votes for the prohibition amendment. The Prohibitionists, who had secured The submission of the amendment from a Republican Legislature, exhibited their ingratitude and treachery by deserting the Republican ticket, and they have assisted In establishing In poWfer a party from which' no restrictive legislation of any kind can be obtained. There never a more conspicuous instance of the perverse and unreasoning character of the prohibition cranks In politics. [From the New York Times.] So far as concerns the moral effeot of the election, it Is bound to be very slight. If the Democrats have carried the State by a small majority they have lost the decided majority of last year, though they were aided by a • much stronger prohibition diversion than at that time. If the Republicans, on the other hand, have reduced'their opponent’s majority in spite of tho Prohibitionists, they have won no victory that secures them the State next year, or that can have any great effect on the elections still to be held this year in other States. We may be sure that Mr. Hoadly’s “boom” for the Presidency, which he sets on foot by an effort to establish a “now Demooracy,” wiH not be again heard of, and we may be equally sure, and not less content, that Mr. Sherman’s prediction that the next Republican candidate will come from Ohie vylll be remembered only by malicious persons guilty of a desire to make Mr. Sherman’s life unhappy. [From the New York Tribune.] The Ohio Republicans were over-confident. It is true that they have polled a remarkable vote, but they underestimated the desperate energy of the Democrats. They relied toe much, apparently, upon the good character of the Republican party, and the bad character of the Democratic party, and Judge Hoadly’s blunders, forgetting that the classof voters whom the money of the liquor dealers would reach care nothing about the character of any party or the mistakes of any candidate. The advocates of prohibition have onoe more injured the cause of temperance by acting against the Republican party. The Republican party had put on tho statute book one of the most popular and most beneficial laws ever known for regulating the liquor traffio. The whole Democratic party wae hostile to it, from Judge Hoadly, who was of counsel against It before the Supreme Court, down to the keeper of the corner groggery, who was against It both for grog and party. If the Prohibition votes have put In Hoadly and a Democratic Legislature; they are In a. fair way to see the Scott law repealed or broken down, and all the ground lost that has been gained in this attempt to regulate liquor traffic. , The Democratic reform movement in Cincinnati is a ludicrous failure, and John R. McLean is boss. CABINET OFFICERS’ VIEWS. [Washington Telegram to Philadelphia Press.) The Republican politicians take the most cheerful view possible of the result In Ohio, and are disposed to treat it as a wholesomewarning. They generally attribute the defeat to the temperance question, and maintain that, in view of this issue, the Republican gains are very surprising. Nearly all the Cabinet officers who have been asked for their views express almost Identically the same opinion. Some of them go farther and think that the election will be a blessing to the Republicans in that it will encourage the Bourbon element in the Democracy ,to think that the tide has turned in their favor anyway, and as a consequence they will be more likely to insist upon extreme Democratic measures this winter than they would had Ohio gone Republican. Said one of the Cabinet officers: “In view of this election the Democrats.in the House will play smash gen erally, and tho result will be a Republican President in 1884. WHAT HOADLY THINKS.* My illness so withdrew me from the current of opinion that my judgment must be largely discounted. I hav.e no doubt the entire Democratic vote was out and solid for me. Besides this, the grape-growing counties gave us surprising gains. The wool-growers’ counties helped, and there was a very large accession to our ranks from the colored vote. Republicans claim that a good deal.of trading was done against them by Second or Prohibitory amendment fanatics.