Rensselaer Republican, Volume 17, Number 3, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 September 1884 — A Magnificent Meeting! [ARTICLE]

A Magnificent Meeting!

The ! Uon. John ll.fi ufler at the Iteiisselaei* Opera House. A Speech /pH of tlnany swerable Logic and an Audience lull of i ' Unquenchable Enthusiasm! The Hon. John M. Butler, one of Indiana’s very greatest lawyers, and ablest. orators, made a political speech, at the Ronsseße;r Opera House last Tuesday evening. The weather had been dark and lowering all the afternoon, and the evening was dark and threatning. This fact Had a most injurious effect UppH jh'e attendance, especially frbnTTTiecountry. Mr. Butler’s great abilities as au orator are well known m Jasper county, and had not the weather been so unfavorable, the vast numbers who would have thronged to hear him, would have filled the Opera House twice over. The Newton township Blaine and Logan club liad arranged to come in a body, the Union township club likewise, while Barkley, Hanging Grove, Jordan, and the outside portions of Marion, would have all sent largo delegations. As it was the spacious Opera House was tided nearly to its utmost capacity; and a more attentive and interested, and at the same time, thoroughly enthusiastic audience seldom listened to a political speaker. -- The Hon. I. D. Dunn, republican candidate for joint Representative, was chosen chairman, .for the evening, and presided in a dignfied and efficient manner. The Glee Club sang an appropriate song, after which the chairmam introduced the speaker, who immediately began a speech which fariiy held his large audience spell bound, for nearly two hours. To give even a synopsis of this great speech would at this time, be impracticable. We only regret that Mr. Buffer could not have found it convenient to have spoken in Ilesselaer in the afternoon, rather than in the evening. Had this been the case' liis auditors would have been numbered by the thousand. At the Conclusion of the speech the Glee Club sang a song of local production, which was re_ ceived with great favor.

In addition to the letter to William Walter Phelps, published on one of our inside pages, wherein Mr. Blaine explains the circumstances of his two marriages, lie has also, lately, answered the interrogatories propounded by the Indianapolis Sentinel. Every question is met and answered in the clearest and most straightforward manner, and unless honor and manliness have utterly departed from the Democratic pariy, they will put an fend to the infamous slanders against Mr. Blaine’s family. '

The following strong and sensible words in regard to the system of education now prevailing in the public school, are fiom the columns of the Indianapolis Journal, but they fit the case probably about as well in one town as another: The public schools are marked for “per cents” and “averages”, they are not conducted for the of turning out sound minds, well educated, in the true sense of the term, in sound bodies. It is “per cents” and “averages” that drive the children into fevers, and sickness, and debility, and, final!#, into premature graves, and which overwork teachers, keep them I prostrate under their burdens, and prevent them from “educating” their pupils, in order to make a I good “record” in the cast-iron “system" which is rapidly’ squeezing the life out of our boasted free schools. This criticism applies all over the country. It is not peculiar to Indianapolis,