Democratic Sentinel, Volume 14, Number 5, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 21 February 1890 — WAS IT A CONSPIRACY? [ARTICLE]

WAS IT A CONSPIRACY?

HOT WORDS OF SENATOR M’PHERSON, OF NEW JEKSEY. He Tells Dirty Joe Foraker that the Hasty Publication of the Ballot-Box Forjery, Without Inquiry, Makes It Look Like a Dark Plot. [Wahington special.] “It was a conspiracy!" shouted Senator McPhersou to-day in denouncing the lorgery of his name by ex-Gov. For.tkei’s friend Wood. “There was ample opportunity to ascertain the falsity of the signature, but naste was made to give th s document to the world without any effort to ascertain the genuineness of the signature, and it must be regarded as a conspir.cy." Gov. Foraker" inquired if it would not depend on the circumstances under which the paper had been procured an.l the appareut proof to support its character. Senator McPherson replied that as the paper, if genuine, would degrade and ruin publio men, and properly so, they should have been consulted whou it was possible to do so by traveling four or five miles. When he heard that his name was attached to the ballot-box contract he had intended to have all parties connected with the matter arrested within forty-eight hours. “It’s not too late yet, Senator,” said Gov. Foraker, with aggravating coolness; “the courts are still open.” “I don’t know about that,” retorted the Senator. “Halsted got down in the dirt and rolled over in his humiliation, and attempted to remedy the wrong, which changed the situation somewhat. ” While everybody excepting Foraker and one or two o This faithful friends is laughing at the terrible rumpus kicked up by this phenomenal falsifier and inventor, Wood, bold and genial Ben Butterworth says it is no laughing matter. “Suppose,” says Butterworth, “my name had been the only one on the forged document. Then suppose the steamer oh which I was sailing from Europe had been wrecked and I bad been drowned. Would my name have been cleared from the infamy which Wood and his co-conspirators attempted to put upon it? Would the members of my family have been able to establish mv innocence? It is a pretty serious matter when a cunning liar and forger can concoct a document and a story like that and go about inducing Governors of States to give it credence and publicity, and the sanction of their authority. ”