Democratic Sentinel, Volume 16, Number 20, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 June 1892 — THE REPUBLICAN CAMPAIGN. [ARTICLE]

THE REPUBLICAN CAMPAIGN.

Democrat* Can Take Advantage of the Factional Squabble. Democrats can afford to watch with complacency the development of what is going to be a savage Republican campaign. At no previous time in the history of parties in this country had the Democrats so great an opportunity to take advantage of the factions and quarrels of their opponents. It is to be remembered that Republican candidates have generally been defeated by Republican conspiracy. Sometimes cabals have accomplished their work before or during a convention. Sometimes they have waited until a campaign was under full headway. The defeat of Folger in New York, resulting In his death, was the result of a party conspiracy against a party nomination. The defeat of Blaine in 1888 was due to Republican machination with a Republican minister as its mouthpiece. The defeat of Arthur was the result of a Republican conspiracy that would have accomplished at the polls, had he been nominated, what it preferred to accomplish by preventing his nomination. All the ammunition used against unsuccessful Republican candidates sinoe the war has been supplied from Republican arsenals. The latest instance of this persistent Republican characteristic was the revelation of Alger’s war record. Suggestion leading to it emanated from the war department, which has been in possession of Republican politicians almost continuously since the war. Had there been serious danger of Alger's nomination in 1888 tl*> record would have been produced then. ReEublican managers know he can never e elected to any federal office, as he < cannot now be elected to any office in his own State. They held back an authenticated transcript until necessity for its use ceased for that year. As soon as he loomed up once more as a formidable pretender for the Presidency hint of the actual nature of the war department flies concerning him was given out from a high Republican source. The record Itself was not furnished. That was reserved for further party use. The Secretary of War, Mr. Elkins, announced suggestively that he would publish it only at the request of Col. Alger himself. The Democratic newspaper, to which sufficient hint had been conveyed, nagged Alger unceasingly until he, believing the Sun had the record entire, became alarmed, and preferred to break the blow by giving the true story in part, with minimizing explanatory comments. If Alger be nominated for the second place at Minneapolis Republican official sources will supplement the published portion of the flies with other documents. Alger knows this and is playing carefully among contending cabals. The Harrison' Republicans, to give another instance, are justly in a position to charge on Blaine and his faotion bad faith. When the Secretary wrote the Clarkson letter of solemn and absolute declination he disarmed the administratior. Had he failed or refused to write the letter of declination at that crisis in the preliminaries of the campaign, administration men would have been able to anticipate the claims of the Maine statesman. They are now entitled to stigmatize that letter as a trick unworthy an honorable man, treacherous on the part of a subordinate to a chief and willful in its deceit of the rank and file of the party.' Retaliation is inevitable. Threat of it is already given in the suggestion of exposure of illicit relations between Grace, of New York, whose name was involved in the Peruvian scandals of the Garfield administration, and Blaine In the intrigue that preceded peaceful settlement of the Chilian dispute. It is needless to say that this would be only the beginning of disclosures the administration agents would precipitate if Blaine be nominated. Added to these will be the old charges never met. Republicans have been so long in possession of the power and patronage of the Presidency that they can not suffer to let it go without desperate effort to hold on. But no faction in the party is willing to permit the other to bo supreme. The fight on Harrison is purely a fight of revenge and of greed. It makes little difference now which faction wins at Minneapolis. If Democrats nominate a man disentangled from domestic hatreds within their own ranks, they will receive enough Republican help to give,them the Presidency in November. —Chicago Herald.

The Minneapolis Convention. Michigan is in it this year, and she shouldn’t permit any one to forget it. — Detroit Tribune. Thebe is little doubt now that James G. Blaine will be offered the nomination for President "by the Republican Convention to be held at Minneapolis next month. There is even less doubt that he will accept.—Albany Press and Knickerbocker. UnxiESS Blaine shall break the lines of the opponents of Harrison by a more emphatic declination, his name will undoubtedly be presented to the Minneapolis Convention at the proper time to carry his nomination on tne spontaneous combustion principle. Madison Democrat. Next to President Harrison, the only man seriously thought of for the Presidency is Mr. Blaine. Sherman, McKinley, Alger, Lincoln, and some others are spoken of, but President Harrison would likely have a majority against any of them on the first ballot. But the popularity of Mr. Blaine seems to admit of no rival.—Cleveland Leader. Mb. Blaine will stampede the Minneapolis convention, after a ballot or two of compliments have been oast to appease the little men who are his competitors. If Minnesota is prepared to embrace the opportunity, she can place beside this great leader her own Governor, and in honoring him honor herself. Mr. Blaine is an old man, and an aggressive and vigorous personality like Mr. Merriam’s would admirably supplement the qualities of caution and experience which he would supply.—St. Paul Globe. The combat deepens. The quarrel at Minneapolis will be a very pretty thing in politics. Day by day the opposition to Harrison is gathering strength, and its strength is the greater because it now has for its rallying cry, unrebuked by this member of the Cabinet of President Harrison, the magnetic name t of Blaine. A month ago President Harrison, reposing in the utmost confidence of the outcome, assumed a dignified attitude which he has completely abandoned. At the sound of the approaching Waterloo his soul’s in arms. The great Harrisonian army of officeholders is summoned to the field. The mustering squadron and the clattering car are swiftly forming in ranks of war. There is mounting in hot haste. Harrisonians are stricken with terror dumb, or ipith white lips are whispering, “The Blaine foe come!” The situation is one which can be viewed with the utmost complacency by Democrats. It is a glorious spectacle, as Byron said of battle, to one who has no friend or brother there. Let these contestants have their fight out. The spectacle will be worth the watching, and whether the nominee shall be Blaine or Harrison the Democracy will welcome him to that crushing defeat which, notwithstanding all the perplexities in their own camp, Ihey hope shall be visited upon the Republican candidate in 1892.—Chicago Times.