Rensselaer Republican, Volume 17, Number 16, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 December 1884 — POLITICAL TOPICS. [ARTICLE]

POLITICAL TOPICS.

not OHIO ELECTION. The special committee appelated by Congress to investigate tbe alleged misconduct of Marshal Lot Wright, tn the Ohio election, has beat tokof Cincinnati, but temporarily living at Washington, teetifled that he wae In Cincinnati the day or election; eaw the riot going on la the Plnm street district, but did not know who were the aggressota; heard person* say that respectable people wonld not go Into that district to vote; had beard that dupnty marshals took part In the riot. Theta were a great many unemployed negroes standing around the streets, and he was told they werefrom Kentucky. Frank P. Morgan, newspaper reporter, oi Washington, testified to being in Cincinnati election day; he saw several men from Washington there, acting aa deputy marshals and weartag metid badges. They were Moses Wright, John Wright and James Donnelly. Witness paid them a social call in the evening, and they produced buD-dog pistols, which were part of their equipment. They got their instructions lrom Lot Wright first, and were afterward drilled by Pennon Detective Rathbone. Rath bone, it waa general ly understood, had charge of the imported talent, gentlemen who had been summoned by the Republican National Committee, as sher said, to see a fair const. Witness visited a voting preettet in tbs Fourth Ward, and saw a good deal of fighting. The deputy marshals appeared to be overbearing, insolent, and Insulting. They were hard-looking characters, and seemed t%> be selected from the wept classes. Colored men went around swinging pi-tola as a policeman would swing his “billy.'The efforts of the Deputy Marshals tended rather tobreak tbe peace than to keep ft A week before election there had been a convention of colored Odd Fellows in Cincinnati, and the witness met a prominent colored man named Pledger, who told bfm that, while bd wa« in the city ostensibly to attend the convention, his real object was to carry the election. Witness said he belived ninety-nine ont of one hundred of these Deputy Marshals were roughs. They looked dissipated and capable of intimidating decent people. Hiram T. Doyle, who waa in Cincinnati election day as corre-ipondent-ot the Washington Sunday Herald, testified to the bad appearano# of the Depnty Marshals. He thought they kept a great many respectable men from the polls, and their p&senoe gave rise to a feeling es insecurity. O. P. C. Clark, Commissioner of Pensions, waa oalled and sworn, but, as he had not bad time to comply with the order of the oemmitjtae to bring certain papers with him, his was postponed. '

GEN. SHERMAN’ AND JEFF DAVIS. The Former Makes Public m Letter Written by Aleck Stephens. Gen. Sherman has made public a letter signed by Alexander H. Stephens, Vice President of the late Confederacy, addressed to H, V, Johnson, of Georgia, and dated CrawfordarUle, Ga., April 8,1864. Gen. Sherman says It waa loaned to him by Dr. H. C. Robbins, of Ores ton. 111., who obtained it en Mr. Jobn-.on’S premises in Georgia, in 1864, while surgeon of the One Hundred and First Illinois infantry. Mr. btephans’ letter is in reply to rne in which Mr. Johnson remonstrated with him for his supposed antipathy to President Davis. Mr. Stephens denies such a fesling,and says that in criticising the ast suspending habeas corpus ha bad been actuated by general principles. Ha goes on to say that bis feelings toward Mr. Davis are “more akin to suspicion and Jealousy than of animosity cr hate.* *1 hare regarded him," he says, "as a man of good intentions, weak and vacillating. I am now beginning to doubt bis good intentions. My reasons are these: Binc-e his first elevation to power he has changed many of his former State-rights principles, %s in the case of conscription. His whole policy—the organization and discipline of tbs anp.v -la perfectly consistent with the hypothesis that he is aimlng'at absolute power. Not a word has come from him showing disapproval of the military usurpation in the orders for martial law by Bragg and Van Pom, * * * Again, it is well known that the subject of a dictatorship has been mooted, talked of, and discussed id private tod in the public Journals, and that the most earnest advocates of such a course have b en editors near him, editors of Journals recognized aa organs of the administration. * • * These are bad signs. They.shonld put the country on its guard.* Mr. Stephens goes on to say that hia indignation is for the policy, not for the man. He again speaks of Mr. Davis’ weakness and imbecility, and says he has no more feeling of resentment toward him for theae defects than toward bis poor, old, blind and deaf dog. He says riot one-tenth of the people approve the acta of the administration. Gen. Sherman says it was the Stephens letter he referred to when he said Davis wsa trying to establish a despotism instead of a confederacy ot States. He said the letter waa captured in the latter part of November, 1864, by a party Ot foragers under his Immediate command. The foragers found the letter lira bo* with a number of other things while prodding the grounds of Johnson's residence with their bayonets for bnried objects. Geq. Sherman said be had a dozen letters like Johnson's letter, but nowhere is proof presented in so substantial a form's* in it. The other letters are ipom great men in the South and cover a portion of the tfround mentioned in the Stephens letter.

BAM RANDALL. A Southern Attack on th« Fnuujhula Congressman. The Louisville Courier-Journal recently printed a special dispatch from Washington —a dou ole-leader, with editorial approval—Utterly attacking ex-Speaker Samuel J. Randall, who was booked for speeches In Louisville sad several other Southern cities. It has created a genuine sensation in certain'political circles. Tim following is an extraetdrom the Courier-Jour-nal dispatch: The proposed visit of Sam Randall to Kentucky, Tennessee, and Alabama is well understood here to be a declaration of war by the protectionist* upon the revenue reformers ot the States in question. Joe Brown, of Georgia, is the Southern manager of this scheme. Mr. Randall's hope to to secure something like * demonstration at Louisville, which tbe protection newspapers can claim as a ribuke of Beck, Blackburn. Carlisle, and Willis; and another at Nashville to rebuke Isham G. Harris; and then a great uprising of iron workers at Birmingham, Ala.. to tell the world that there to a revolution of opinion on the tariff in the Bouth and a consuming fire for the Pennsylvania idea. Mr. Randall is expected to start out with the black flag in both hands. His friends say he has nothing to lose, and may make something by his expedition, while they hope to make a sensation. The general impression among politicians here to that Mr. Randall has lowered himself and shown bto true colors, in patting himself in the hands of a few cranks and aoroheed* who want to use him as a stiok to heat hia colleagues, whose only crimes are' that they are honest revenue ref or met* who represent their people and wonld reduce war taxea. The idea of aa ovation to a man who six months ago was acting with the Republicans to defeat a Democratic measure to scouted. Mr. Randall to not on speaking term* with the leaders of hie own par y, though on cordial terms with the Republicans. The story that be to a favorite with the new Presideat to flatty contradicted by those who know. It is even stated that tbe mention of Randall's name in connection with the Cabinet to offensive to Mr. Cleveland, who understands and believes that any suspicion of being Randall's friend wonld wreck his administration on the threshold.

POLITICS AND POLITICIANS, Gen. Geo. B. McClellan is only 58. Col. Ingebsoll is mid to hare mad* $25,000 from fifty lectures during the last two months. President Abthub is said to he enjoying more robust health and looking better than for years. The official vote of Dakota, just declared, is: Republican, 70,400; Democratic, 15,075; Republican majority, 55,334. Ben Bctleb has repurchased his famous mansion just south of the Capitol at Washington, which be sold to John Cassells the other day. Ben: Peklet Poore, the veteran correspondent.. is credited with inaugurating the wheel-barrow bet for elections about thirty yean ago. The majorities for the four amendments to the lowa Constitution voted for at the November election ranged as follows: First, changing day of election from October to November, 74408; eeoond, in relation to the number of District Judges, 39,792; third, reducing the number of grand jurors, 42,saaeawr- — 1 Thebe is no complaint at »w fudao tion in the South.