Rensselaer Republican, Volume 16, Number 42, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 June 1884 — GEN. LOGAN’S VISIT TO MR. BLAINE. [ARTICLE]

GEN. LOGAN’S VISIT TO MR. BLAINE.

[Special fro* Angusta, Me.J , Gen. Logan and Senator Hale arrived from Washington this afternoon. Quite a crowd,, among whom war veterans were prominent, greeted the party at the depot and cheered Gen. Logan when he alighted. Before he could reach a carriage, Gen. Logan’s hand was wrung a dozen times, and the veterans greeted him with shouts of: “You’re the man for us.” “You’ll give us a good administration,” etc. Cheers were given again as the party drove away. They went directly to Mr. Blaine’s house. There was no formal greeting there, Mr. Blaine received his guests privately, and after a brief rest, Mr. Blaine, Gen. Logan, Senator Hale, and Walker Blaine went off to ride. The beauties of Augusta’s outskirts in June were appreciated, and politics apparently was banished for the time. At 8 o’clock in the evening a procession was formed down-town, and a great crowd marched to Mr. Blaine’s house. A band played a serenade, and then the crowd called for Gen. Logan. Ex-Gov. Connor came to the portico, and made a short speech in eulogy of the candidate for Vice President.

Then Gen. Logan appeared and was vigorously cheered. H e said in response: •Ladies, gentlemen, and comrades: I most fully appreciate this kind compliment tonight. lam truly glad to meet so many citizens of Angusta. I must confess I feel embarrassed in attempting to say anything after listening to what has been said by Gen. Connor. It is true that the soldiers of Maine in the same great contest stood side by sidfe' with those from all other parts of the country, and did their duty for the preservation of this great nntion. Behind them stood the loyal citizens of this grand Republic, giving them their support and prayers, with their hearts full of hope for their success. And, as liberty first found birth on the Atlantic slope, well may it there have found true hearts for its presevation, not only of this country, but of that liberty which God intended for all men. Let that which followed as a result of its preservation not now be lost. This can only be done by keeping the control of the institutions of this conntry in the hands of those who sought to maintain them. Thimpetple believes in the fundamental principles a republican government. The same rule also applies i% their selection of agents for the administration of the Government. The voice of a great majority of the Republicans of this mighty nation has chosen as the standardbearer of that great party in the coining contest for the Presidency of the United States your fellow-citizen, James G. Blaine. [Applause.] And you need have no fear as to the result of the contest It will be a glorious victory, full and complete. Illinois in 1860 gave this conntry its first Republican President. Maine was then associated with Illinois. In 1884 Maine will give as gallant a President to the republic as has been elected by the people. Citizens of Maine, I feel honored And complimented in being associated on the ticket with a man worthy of the confidence of the people, and in every way capable of filling the high office of President with honor to himself and to the conntry. [Applause and cheers for Logan.] ' Blaine Id the South. The most inveterate enemies of the Republican party are in the South. Whatever is said, therefore, of the Republican ticket by the Democratic organs of that section is more than ordinarily noteworthy, and may supply us with some indications of the character of the forthcoming campaign that will be more reliable than any utterances of Northern Democratic papers. Except in the case of a few of the most radical Bourbon organs of the South there is an undisguised admiration of Mr. Blaine’s qualities, and in more than one instance the opinion is expressed by influential papers that, if they are to be beaten by the Republicans, they would rather be beaten by Blaine than by any other Republican leader. A few selections from the prominent papers of that section will give our readers a general idea of the situation. The two strongest Democratic papers in Georgia are the Angusta Chronicle and Constitutionalist and the Atlanta Constitution. The former says:. If the Democrats, reunited and presenting unexceptionable candidate*, cannot beat Mr: Blaine, they could not defeat any one at the conspicuous Republican leaders. Let us hope that the common enemy has nude a mistake, and that due advantage of it will be taken at the next Chicago convention. Mistake or not, we win have trouble enough to elect our men over those i just cam -d at Chicago, and that Let may a*» well be stated and relied upon at once. The campa gn will be redbot, and if we are to win none but a fint-class statesman of incorruptible record moat be the Democratic standard -bearer. With Western men, for twenty odd years, the Republicans hare

The Atlanta paper has a still more striking utterance, and one which, read between the lines, makes no concealment of the admiration which it feels for Mr. Blaine. It says: i The nomination of Mr. Blaine is the best it could have made, and it will require all that the Democrats can do to bring about his defeat. Recognizing the nature and extent of his popularity within the limitations which we have mentioned, we are free to say that there is no room in the campaign for any Democratic blunders, and no place in the programme to accommodate the capering ana vaporing proclivities of certain Democratic cranks who assume to lead the party, and who have led it time and again from the emergencies of hope to the certainty of defeat. Should he be elected we believe Ms administration will be a liberal one. He is the ablest and most experienced public man to be found in the Republican party, and if the country is to have another four years of Republicanism, we believe Mr. Blaine will give more general satisfaction than any other Republican. He will at least fly the American flag over the White House and the State House, and there will be some consolation in that. 1 ~ The Houston Post, one of the ablest Democratic papers in Texas, expresses itself in a hardly less striking and significant manner, and rings the alarm bells to warn the Democracy in the following vigorous fashion: The Democ atic party must be aware that by nominating Blaine the Republicans have exhibited the finest trump card in their deck. It is of no use to disguise the fact; Blaine is a very strong man, difficult to beat. He has the magnetism of the few select, who stand head and shoulders above their fellow-men; his private, record is a pure one —to the best of our knowledge—and his ability has been tested a hundred times and not been found wanting. The Democracy should not underrate their enemy. No use to make fun of Blaine’s book. That book will turn out to be the most efficient document of the season. The Republican managers will send hundreds of thousands of copies of that book through the South and other Democratic strongholds, and seek to convert Democrats by the charm and the eloquence of Blaine’s “Twenty Years in Congress.” We have read that book. It is written in the style of an approved master, and it will catch the unwary by its line phrases and its show of impartiality. Blaine is the man of all men who will give the Democrats a hard battle for the Presidency. There is very little disposition in the South to assail Mr. Blaine or Mr. Logan with the bitterness it has manifested toward previous Presidential candidates, and there is no disposition to underrate his strength as a leader, and in more than obo quarter there is evidence to show that his election would not be regarded as a calamity. The Republicans of the South are alio wonderfully encouraged by the nominations. The Crusader, a plucky little paper printed at Natchez, Miss., in the very stronghold of Bonrbonism, says that if Mr. Blaine is elected ballot-box stuffing will not only be very dangerous bnt very unpopular in the South, and announces that when the news of

the nbminations reached Natchez a crowd of ardent Blaine men went out on the bluff and fired a hundred guns in their honor. The Lynchburg (Va. ) News calls the attention of the Democrats to the attempt whic h will be made by the Republicans to carry Virginia. The Virginia Seaport says: All Republicans can cheerfully unite to secure this result, and thousands and thousands of Democrats will heartily join in tbs accomplishment of this end. The Richmond Whig rejoices in the prospect exultantly: We are going to have a good time once more, aml want you to enjoy it —what need to be called, in the days of Mr. Monroe, an era of good feeling. Shortly we shall have ratification-meetings all over this gland old Commonwealth, from Accomac’s seagirt shore to the mountain recesses of Scott and Lee, where the names of Blaine and Logan will be made familiar as household words to the ears of the hardy mountaineers of the Southwest, as well as to the amphibious dwellers of Chincoteague. Little West Virginia is in a blaze of enthusiasm. Within forty-eight hours of the time the news of the nominations reached there a score of Blaine clnbs were organized in various parts of the State, and from half a dozen prominent places dispatches were sent to Mr, Blaine promising hint the electoral vote of the State. The Parkersburg Club sent him one in which they say: “Move back the houses and widen the streets, for we must have room. West Virginia is for you, and don’t you forget it.” The Wheeling Intelligencer says: “The Mountain State will be wrested from Bourbon dominion and again placed where she rightly belongs—in the ranks of the Republican States. ” At Glen Easton, in that State, the Republicans formed a great procession and the Democrats fell into hue. These are samples of the general feeling among the Democrats of the South. There is no question that they feel an admiration for Mr. Blaine. He, as well as Gen. Logan, is known to them, and they cannot help hut admire their courage and brilliant qualities, even though they may not vote for them. It is by no means impossible that they will carry one or more of the Southern States, and it is by no means improbable that by making some of these States debatable ground the line of the Solid South will at last be broken.— Exchange. Mr. Blaine’s Vindication. The connection of Mr. Blaine with the bill renewing the land grant of the Little Bock and Fort Smith Railroad of Arkansas has been so generally misunderstood that the honest, rock-bottom facts about it ought to be stated in a few words for the information of the public. Mr. William Walter Phelps covered the ground fully in his letter of April 24, addressed to the editor of the New York Evening Poet and printed in the Chicago Tribune of Saturday, April 26. Mr. Phelps' letter, however, is so long, and goes so much into detail, that busy men who are less interested in getting at the tenth of this matter than in forming hasty opinions about it wQI not read the evidence in fuLL We desire, therefore, to put the troth in a few words, and refer any-', body wild may not be satisfied with a brief aaalyris'of Hie facts either to Mr. Phelps’ letter or to the Congressional Record at 1876, where Mr. Blaine’s own statements may be found in full. The charge is: * ■ That in the spring of 1869—Mr. Blaine twig at that time the Speaker

of the House of Representatives—a bill renewing the land grant of the Little Bock and Fort Smith Railroad, in the State of Arkansas, wai before the House, and in his capacity of Speaker he promoted its passage because he had a pecuniary interest in the road. The troth is: . I 1. That Mr. Blaine at the time of the passage of the bill had no pecuniary interest whatsoever in the railroad or its land graut, and expected to have none. • , 2. That he had no acquaintance with any persons who did have any pecuniary interest in the railroad or its land grant. 3. That he did not “promote” the passage of the hill, and that it did not need his influence, inasmn h as it had already parsed the Senate by a unanimous vote, and was not objected to by anybody in the House. In fact, it passed the House by a unanimous vote, as soon as it was before that body, on its merits. 4. That Mr. Blaine’s sole connection with the bill was to rule out au amendment tacking to it the very odious and objectionable land grant of the Texas and Pacific Railroad, a measure which ojiglit not to pass, and which, if it had been fastened to the Little Rock and Fort Smith Railroad measure, would probably have dragged it down to an unmerited defeat. When this highly offensive amendment was proposed, Mr. Rcot, j one of the Arkansas members, called the Speaker’s attention thereto, And, at Mr. Blaine’s suggestion, Mr. John A. Logan, then a member of the House, raised the point of order that*, the amendment was not germane, and it was ruled out of order forthwith. The bill then passed by a unanimous vote. Nearly three months after these events Mr.- Blaine for the first time obtained an interest in the railroad, purchasing the stock and bonds as any other buyer might do, and then for the first time formed the acquaintance of those who had been instrumental in pushing the enterprise in the State of Arkansas. He bought a block of securities belonging to the Little Rock and Fort Smith Railroad, including stock and first and second mortgage bonds, in June, 1809, after the adjournment of Congress, and placed the first-iportgage bonds during the three months following with a number of his friends in Massachusetts ana Maine. The entire series of bonds at his disposal was closed out during the months of July, August, and September, of 1869, so the transaction was ended when, in his letter of Oct. 4, 1869, Mr. Blaine wrote to Fisher, and merely in the way of curious reminiscence called attention to the fact of his unsolicited and accidental services to the road the April previous, when he was in no way interested in its affairs, and had no reason to suppose that he ever would be. The truth is, that his attention was first directed to the railroad by its application to Congress for a renewal of its land-grant, and it first seemed to him a favorably investment after its land-grant had been renewed by a unanimous vote of both houses of Congress. Mr. Blaine sold the securities of the road to his friends, with a personal pro mise that if any loss should ensue he would take back the stock and bonds at tbe price for which he sold them. Shrinkage did ensue, and the stock and bonds were thrown back upon his hands, and, though he had given no written guarantee of redemption, he paid for them, at a great personal sacr - lice, out of his own pocket. The Ne. York Evening Post has since alleged that he unloaded his disastrous investment upon the Union Pacific Railroad, but it lias produced no proof of any such transaction, whereas Mr. Blaine has exhibited the sworn statements of the officers of the railroad that no such transfer was ever made; and his statement has been accepted as conclus ve by those who are familiar with the circumstances of the case. Indeed.it was this part of the. controversy that George Wili am Curtis considered in Harper’s Weekly when he wrote in May, 1876, that Mr. Blaine’s statement was “as thorough a refutation as was ever made.” We are convinced that no candid person can invest’gate without prejudice all the facts connected with Mr. Blaine’s record in this case without coming to the firm conclusion that it was in all respects honorable and proper, and creditable to him, both as a private citizen and a public man.— Chicago Tribune.

The Boston Bolters. Mach amusement was created among Republicans here, sajs & Washington telegram, by the account of the bolter ->’ convention at Boston, as it is diagnosed by the Massachusetts members of Congress, who say that nearly all of the leaders are Democrats or disappinted Republican office-seekers, or extreme free-traders like Prof. See'ye of Amherst, Elliott of Harvard, Dana, and others. According to this analysis furnished, Codman, the President of the meeting, has been twice defeated when a candidate for Mayor of Boston. Henry L. Pierce has been twice defeated as a candidate for Congress. Martin Brimmo is a defeated Congressional candidate. Joseph H. Walker, of Worcester, is a defeated legislative candidate. Samuel Hoar, of Concord, was defeated as a candi date for the State Senate. David Flint was kicked out of place by Butler, and holds Republicans responsible because they did not stand by him. Col. Tom Higginson is a defeated candidate for the Legislature. Edward Atkinson is a Democrat. Saltonstall was President of the last Democratic State, Con yen tion. These names, it is claimed, art a sample of the whole lot. The Blaio* men here assert that the committee of 100 comprises about all the bolters n Massachusetts. They further point t the fact that the Boston Hdcertixei has become silent in its opposition: that the Buffalo ExprctM has come on* positively for Blaine, and so eonclnd that the situation is in every wsy en t-ou raging. ■ '• '• ’’ i '•“ .» Mb. Bum has received about I,o'* letters da ly since bis nomination. Hi son. Walker Blaine, wifi soon rear-1 Augusta from Washington,' and wil take charge of bis farher’s correspond ence. He will be assisted by a. corps to short-hand writers. —^