Democratic Sentinel, Volume 11, Number 46, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 9 December 1887 — THE GREAT SOLD OUT. [ARTICLE]

THE GREAT SOLD OUT.

Sayre’s Politico-Dynamite Bomb Epplodes at Robertson's Home in Fort Wayne. Republican Camp Swarming ”ike a Nest of of Enraged Horuets. Somebody is Lying Abort That Famous Republican Dennison House Caucus. The Robertson Campaign “On”— The Fort Wayne Post Office Already Promised— A Literary Bureau, etc.

A special correspondent of the Indianapolis Sentinel writes from Fort Wayne^Nov. fßth: I arrived here just in iime. Yesterday mornirg’s Fort Wayne Gazette contains a letter from Speaker Sayre, of the Indiana House of Repres ntatives that is a regular dynamite bomb in the camp of “Sold Cut” Robertson, as the Sentinel has s i aptly named him.— Bei g exploded, too, right here at Robertson’s home, where he daily ppears in the role of a lachrymose martyr mourning over his ‘betrayal by the party managers and those who should have been his friends in the late Legislature,’ it has set the Republican camp swarming lik? a hive of enraged bees. The chief trouble appears to be that Sayre dlr ctly and distinctly contradicts tbe utterances of Robertson in the authorized interview of Robertson, in his own personal organ, the Fort Wayne Gazette, and generally understood here to have been written by old “Sold Out” himself. Sayre also completely “knocks the stuffin’ ” out of Robertson’s great impersonation of the “martyr and the betrayed,” in which he has filled r star engagement ever since the time when Sayre says that he (Robertson) “ran up hxS flag of surrender and abdicated his office.” In his authorized interview Robertson, in reference to rhe famous Denison House caucus, and, after virtually calling Sayre a liar and that his statement is absolutely false, says: “A meeting was held at the Republican committee jiooms in the Denison :hat evening, at which a resolution was passed declaring it to be the sense of the meeting that I should preside. Later, quite a number of those present declared that in their opinion I should not attempt it; that it would be a disobedience of tbe injunction granted 1y th Circuit Court, and we wo’d be put in tbe position of law breakers by such action. One after another fell in and concurred in this idea, until it might be said that the meeting was practically unanimous; but that I ever consented is not true in any sense. I said emphatically that I desired to preside and was ready to do anything the party representatives would stand by me in; that I wanted the opportunity to disobey the injunction, because the convention was to assemble under a statute of the United States, and was one with which the Circuit Court had nothing to do, and if arrested for contempt, I could sue out a habeas cor. us in th 6 United States Court; but that if I was overruled by my own party mananers, I could do nothing but submit. “At this meeting the resolution have spokeu of was not rescinded. Those present only declared an opposite view after passing it, and as they were dispersing, attention was called to the fact that nothin g had been decided.” ‘ The reply was, ‘Well, wait till morning; something may happen to cnange all our minds,’ and this was the last thing said at the meeting, and I considered the question undecided.” Now listen to the clear trumpet notes of Speaker Sayre on this point, as he peals them forth in his letter and shows how Robertson “abdicated ” ‘What Isay, and it is the truth,

is this: At a caucus oi Robertson’s friends the night before the joint convention, when Robertson, Senator Ha risen, Attorne Michener and others were present, it was determined and agreed to by Robertson that in no event would he preside or attempt to preside, in the joint convention because he had been that v’.iy or the day before enjoined in so doing by the Marion Circuit Court, and Robertson had appealed that case to the Supreme Court. I had advised in that caucus that Robertson sho’d ignore the judgment of the court on the ground of no jurisdiction, and to go on in spite of it and perform the duties of his office.— Everybody but John C. New and Senator Huston was opposed to this view, and advised that Robertson should obey that judgment until it should be removed. Robertson’s o-«n opinion was thus expressed: -Impulse tells me to ignore the judgment of the court and preside in the joint convention, but|my[betterjudgment, fortlfi d’as it now is by the opinion of Senator Harrison and other wise men, is that I should obey the judgment of the court.’ Tims he, the night before the joint convention, by reason of that judgment, abdicated his office and he and everybody else then agreed that I should preside in the convention.

“So that when the morning came, the only question to be settled and that was settled by the agreement, was as between me and Green Smith who should preside Robertson was not considered, as all knew he had abdicated.” Thus it is that the handful of adherents of the great “sold out” find the halo on their martyr’s brow growing dim. Th? revelations of the secret proceedings of the caucus by one of the great leaders of the part says plainly and emphatically that Robertson had “abdicated” willingly, and where willing and graceful abdication has occurred, surely there can be no martyrdom.

THE LIE DIRECT. Relative to Speaker Sayre’s first statement + hat Robertson knew of the meeting, and its purpose, when the compromise agreement was adopted, Robertson hits straight out from tiie shoulder, calls Sayre a liar, and that what he sjys “is absolutely false.” I give his exact language from his published and authorized interview. “xhis is absolutely false. I was not only not present, but was not invited, nor had I slightest intimation that such a project was being considered. I was in the hall of the House of Representatives or in the corridor all the time, and the first intimation I had of it came to me when the members of the House were returning to their seats after the hour fixed for the convention to meet, and not five minutes before the Senators filed into the House. The first information I had of it was when a Representative said io me as he came in, ‘They have lejt you out.’ I inquired what he meant, and he replied: ‘They have agreed to a compromise by which you are left out and will not be permitted to preside.’ Just then the Senate was announced, and I knew no more until I heard the famous agreement read by order of the Speaker. I felt that I was deserted by those who should have stood by me, and that I was utterly alone.” Please note how clear and emphatic Robertson is that he had not the slightest intimatian of the meeting, and then listen to the glorious broadside that Speaker Sayre fires on the same topic. He says: “lhe compromise agreement was made in the speaker’s private room adjoining the Assembly chamber, and Robertson was in the Assembly Chamber and knew we were in caucus, and could have been present had he desired, and would have been there if his rights or prerogatives were being bartered away or even being considered. — But he had already the night before put up his flag of surrender. “I say he knew we were in caucus,

because while the caucus was in session he wrote us a letter in about this langu ge and sent it in to us: ‘I have just be.-n informed that a deputv sheriff is in the corridors with a warrant for my arrest. I think I had better get out and be arrested, and that may solve the whole difficulty.’ We sent back word to go ami be arrested if he wanted to. “What he meant by it was, that the question decided by the Circuit Court for a threatened violation of which his arrest would he made, would give the Federal Court jurisdiction, because it involved the election of a United States Senator.” Robertson’s friends here are paralyzed at this, for Sayre has the “sold out” foul. Robertson must have known of the circus, or, say they, he would not have written + he letter and sent it in. They are also astounded at Robertson’s lack of nerve in not going out into the corridor and being arrested after being told by the “party leaders” to do so. A genuine “martyr,” say they, would have been arrested, for the true stuff seeks every opportunity, if needs be, to die for the cause.

AGAIN THE LIE. Relative to the also famed meeting of the great trio Sayre, New and Robertson, which Sayre hac described, Robertson again shouts “liar.” He says: “It is not true that Mr. Sayre had a meeting with John C. New and myself at the Grand, and that I ‘then explained the matter to Mr. New.’ ” Again the Speaker’s gavel falls and the House comes to order, and Mr. Sayre rises to remark: “I saw them together, and I said,. -Now you are both here; I want to say that the Journal has led the people to believe that we, without Robertson’s knowledge or consent, excluded him from presiding in the convention by the compromise agreement, Mien you both knew that Robertson had abdicated his office the night before the agreement was made, and that the compromise agreement had no relation whatever to Robertson. New said ‘That is so, I ’fess up.’ Robertson said, ‘ A ell, he thought that while that was tne determination that night, it was subject to change.”— But he knew better, for there was to be no other meeting the next morning, and he never meant to preside New did not like th* idea of Robertson not presiding, even in the face of the judgment, and said, ‘Well b— G —d, if he is not to preside I will fill the Journal full of threats that he will, and see if we can’t drive the Democrats into a separate c invention.’ Robertson and all heard this. I said, ‘SupposH we have two conventions, will Robertson preside in the Republican convention?’ and they all determined that he should not.”

THE CROWN OF MARTYRDOM SHATTERED. In the first part of his authorized interview Robertson says with much emphasis, ‘I said emphatically that I desired to preside.— That I wanted the opportunity to dissolve the injunction of the court, etc.’ But how weak and fearful he was to grasp the “oportunity,” is portray with a master hand by Speaker Sayre who, speaking again of the compromise agreements says: “I went almost every day to Robertson and Senator Harrison and said to them, ‘lf this agreement is wrong or is doing either of you injustice, I am the only one man who can destroy it, and if you shall say that I shall knock it over, over it goes, and Robertson shall preside if he will.” All such overtures were rejected by both of them.

Now, if Robertson was so eager to preside and wauted to “disobey the injunction,” why did he not grasp the “opportunity” thus presented. Verily, when the fires first touch d the “marty’a” feet his spirit failed him and he recanted. — Thus, at every part is the foundation of “Sold Chit’s*’ claim to be-

travel and martyrdom under min; J and swept away by the speaker of the Republican House, vho pieat all the caucuses and who must know whereof he affirms. Robertson is, however, not dismayed. He has opened his campaign for the nomination for Governor in earnest. Ho is organizing a formidable literary I ureau and making up a patronage slate for his friends. Not content with promising all the State patronage be would have as Governor, he is bargaining away the Federal offices in event of a Republican President being elected. The Fort Wayne post office he has already, it|is claimed, to both editor Page, of t e News, a man that the Indianapolis Journal calls a “Mugwump,” and to ex-Deputy United States Marshal Hayden,sometimes known as “Thousand Dollar John.” He has picked out his man for chairman of the County Republican Central Committee, and, in fact, is dictating the whole business. — He ha* declaied again and again that he has “been promised the nomination for Governor” and pro- { loses to be nominated. Sayre’s etter has, as 1 stated, created a great furore, and to-day he would have a majority 01 the delegates from this, Robertson’s own county, for Governor. The alarming fact has just come to light that Robertson has not always been a good Republican; that when Judge Lowry first run for Congress in this district, RobeHson made a speech at a Democratic meeting for Lowry, and said “all decent Democrats would vote for Lowry,” and lots of evidence is here handy that Robertson, that election, voted for Lowry. But of that and other matters in my next. Gridiron.