Democratic Sentinel, Volume 12, Number 14, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 April 1888 — CONKLING. [ARTICLE]

CONKLING.

Borne Interesting Reminiscences of New York’s Famous Ex-Senator. His Own Version of the Reasons Leading to His Resignation from the Senate. The Blaine Episode—Recollections of His Youth—His Boyhood Home. [New York telegram.] "Funeral services were holdover the remains •of ex-Seuator Conkling on Friday morning in Trinity Chapel, West Twenty-fifth street Rev. Morgan!* Dixofficiated,assisted by other clergymen. In the afternoon the remains 'were taken on a special train to Utica, N. 1., where the final interment took place on Saturday. The pallbearers were: Judge Shipman, Abram 8. Hewitt, 8. L. M. Barlow, Clarence A. Seward, Manton Marble, Senator John C. Jones, Senator Don Cameron, William J. Wallace, Walter ■B. Church, Isaac B. Bailey, and ex-Secretary •of State Hamilton Fish. In New York and Brooklyn flags were placed at half-mast on the City Hall and other public buildings out •of respect to the memory of the dead statesman. Cause of Mr. Conkling’s Illness. Henry C. Melville, of New York, the law associate of Mr. Conkling, says: “It was not the •better experience of the blizzard that brought •on Mr. Conkling’s trouble. He did not complain at all of any pain or illness thereafter. Mr. Conkling contracted a cold in Judge Hor--ace Russell’s office, March 29, while in consultation with ex-Surrogate Rollins, Leslie W. Russell, and Horace Russell. There was no fire in the room, and Mr. Conkling shivered frequently. All next day he complained of pain in his ear. The following Monday, April 2, I received a letter from him, saying he was ill and could not attend to business. The n#xt day I visited him at his rooms. He said that he had been in perfect agony since Friday. The physicians had given him so much opium, he said, that he was beside himself. The following Thursday I saw him •again. He said he had not had a wink of sleep in a week, and could not sit or lie still in bed, such was his agony. He realized that he was in a desperate state, but seemed to think the pain was due to the opiate and not to the abscess. He ghowed that delirium was .coming on him in other ways.” *

Hk Boyhood Home. On Madison avenue, near the Reformed 'Church, stands the house where Roscoe Conkling was born, Oct 30, 1829, says the Albany correspondent of the Chicago News. It today presents practically the same appearance ■as when that illustrious man first saw the light of day. It was here that the statesman, •when a boy, labored faith! uly in the old academy and acquired in'it the rudiments of an education that, in after years, made him a leader among men. From Albany Roscoe ■Conkling was sent to New York and placed under the instruction of a private tutor. There he was “birched into the •classics,” as he was wont to say, but liked them less than the English essayists and reTiewers. His early passion was for rhetoric, ■oratory, and politics, and to them he directed no small share of his attention. Old friends •here love to tell of the promise of his early ■days; how, while yet a strippling, his personality drew about him a following, and his ■oratorical gifts enchained multitudes. He was always a great student, and the light -often shone far into the night from his study windows as he pored over the books in which he sought the solution of knotty problems of law. After reaching man’s estate he frequently visited his birthplace, and his old friends gave him a royal welcoma His loss is deeply felt here by citizens, irrespective of party, who knew the man and honored him for his true worth.

Conkling as a Leader. The death of Mr. Conkling is not an incident, but an event, remarks the New York Herald. As a political influence, rather than as apolitical leader, Mr. Conkling will be honored. He was not born to lead a modern democracy. He was Coriolanus, rather than Rienzi—a master, not a tribune. The arts of modern leadersnip—tact, compromise, recognition ot the limitations and weakness of devoted friendship—were unknown to his haughty spirit He rather led the leaders of men—the centurions, the captains of the fifties—who were attracted by the force of his character and followed him from admiration of his picturesque and splendid genius. ' "The intense honesty of Mr. Conkling became often intolerance. There was no bending that intrepid will. His devotion to a principle •or a friendship was that of Loyola and not of Talleyrand. We have lost the most aggressive leader in American politics since Clay and Webster died, thirty-six years ago. But he is not dead. His life remains an incentive, an example—let us say an admonition. For it may be well-to remember as an admonition that in any public career, pride, intolerance, and the Swift-like gift of withering invective may retard or prevent opportunities of lustrous service to the commonwealth. Attitude of the Blaine Men. There is one possible result of the death of Roscoe Conkling which the Republican politicians here are contemplating with much interest, says the Washington correspondent of the Chicago Inter Ocean. Perhaps the question which has suggested itself more frequently than any other is, What effect will the aeath of Mr. Conkling have upon the Republican nomination for the Presidency? The Blaine men have but one answer to that question. They are very positive that the result will be to encourage the movement in favor of the nomination of Mr. Blaine. For one thing is to be noted—the immediate friends of Mr. Blaine, whatever may have been meant by the famous letter which is generally termed his letter of declination, do not for a moment intimate that he is not a candidate for the Presidency. On the other hand, they all insist not only that he will accept the nomination, but th at" he will be nominated. The Blaine men here maintain that the death of Mr. Conkling will give an impetus within the -State of New York to the movement in favor of Mr. Blaine which that movement would not have had otherwise. A Notable Episode Recalled. Hon. & 8. Cox gives the following interesting reminiscences of Mr. Conkling: “I happened to be present when the contest occurred between Blaine and Conkling. It was a wild scene. It began with a little matter about Provost Marshal Gen. Fry. It was not a great theme, but it aroused intense excitement, inasmuch as Mr. Conkling had insinuated some dishonesty against the General. It was a hot debate. We Democrats stood aloof and-observed it, not without some satisfaction. It began, as a great many of these troubles do in Congress, about the report of the debate. Mr. Conkling charged Blaine with frivolou? impertinence in putting into the debate an imputation upon his motives. It ended some time in April, 1866, about this time, twenty-two years ago. But it was renewed on the last day of April. “It was a terrific encounter between two men who were thoroughly iron-clad by that time. It began on that day with a demand from Mr. Blame to have Gen. Fry’s letter read. Mr. Blaine contemptuously referred to Mr. Conkling as *the member from the Utica district’ Then the debate began. Mr.

Conkling, in his measured, quiet, sardonic tone and humor threw his hoc shot upon the member from Maine. Of course, the Democrats enjoyed it. This debate showed Mr. Conkling in his beet light of repartee, so far as the House was concerned. Several gentlemen interposed to stop, if they could, the blows that were given and taken, but Mr. Blaine, who was skilled in the dialectics and rules of the House, got the last word; and, after repaying what he called ’the cruel sarcasm’ in which Mr. Conkling was an expert, he hoped that he would not be too severe in that mode of handling his innocent self. ‘The contempt of that large-mindod gentleman is so wiittng, his naughty disdain, his grandiloquent swell, his majestic supereminent, overpowering, turkey-gobbier strut has been so crushing to myself and all the members of this House that I know it was an act of the greatest temerity for me to venture upon a controversy with him. ’ “Then Mr. Blaine referred to the man whom I supposed to be the moat eloquent orator I have met in Congress—Henry Winter Davis. He referred to the ‘little jocose satire of Theodore Tilton—that the mantle of Davis had fallen upon the gentleman from New York,’ and that that gentleman had taken it seriously, and it had given ‘an additional strut to his pomposity.’ Tt is striking,’said Mr. Blaine; ‘Hyperion to Satyr, Thersites to Hercules, mud to marble, dung-hill ■to diamond, a singed cat to a Bengal tiger, a whining puppy to a roaring lion.’ These phrases have never been repeated in the House with so much vindictive animosity. But the Democrats enjoyed it It was not their fight ”

His Withdrawal from the Senate. A personal friend and admirer of Mr. Conkling, says a New York telegram, gives Mr. Conkling’s own version of the circumstances attending his resignation from the United States Senate in 1881. This friend was a fellow-passenger with Mr. Conkling on the steamship Gallia, in a voyage to England in the summer of 1885. “Senator Conkling hinted to me,” said he, “ the reasons for his indisposition to support Garfield for the Presidency, but as he did not express himself in detail on this point I think it better to pass over it He told me that at first he determined to take no part in the canvass of 1880, but later, at the urgent solicitation of Gen. Grant and other friends, he consented to enter the campaign and speak for the Republican party, but not for the candidate. Thereupon he returned to his clients retaining fees to the amount of about SIB,OOO, chartered a private car, and took a man with him to prepay his bill at every hotel where he staid, in order to be free from all obligations. He delivered his first speech in the campaign at Warren, Ohio, and from there went to Mentor to call upon Gen. Garfield, who expressed his gratitude and sense of obligation to him in the strongest terms. Mr. Conkling made several speeches at other places—in Indiana and elsewhere—incurring a total personal expense in the canvass of about $29,000, including the amount of the fees he returned to his clients. Soon after Garfield’s election Mr. Conkling informed his friends of his purpose to resign from the Senate. This intention was stated privately as early as November, 1880, though it was not then publicly announced, as there was a desire that Mr. Conkling should do certain things to further the administration in the State of New York. He not only assented, but took immed:ate steps to carry out the President’s wishes. At this time Garfield voluntarily assured Mr. Conkling that when he made the principal appointments in this State he should select whatever persons were acceptable to that Senator. In the same week the President, without another word to Mr. Conkling, sent to the Senate the nomination of persons especially objectionable to him. “Soon after this a caucus of the Republican Senators was called, at which a committee was appointed to wait on the President and inform him that in the opinion of those Senators his course in regard to these appointments was calculated to disturb the harmony of the party. When the committee informed President Garfield of this action of the caucus he expressed much indignation, saying that he did not propose to be dictated to, and that any Republican Senator who voted against these nominations would thereafter receive no favors from the Executive. Senator Conkling then determined to carry out his original purpose of resigning from the Senate. Ho felt that if a co-ordinate branch of the Government was to be dictated to by the President in that manner he had had enough of that administration.”