Rensselaer Republican, Volume 19, Number 34, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 April 1887 — CLEVELAND SAYS NO. [ARTICLE]

CLEVELAND SAYS NO.

Sensational Statement Published by a Leading Western Democratic Journal. The President Will Not Under Any Circumstances Accept a Second Term. 1 A special dispatch from Washington to the St. Louis Republican gives this rather startling information: President Cleveland neither -wishes nor wilt accept'a renomination. This will be startling information to the country, setting at rest the important question of a second term, now the subject of interested consideration in political circles everywhere. The correspondent of the Republican has the highest possible authority for the statement, however, and it can be depended upon as strictly and entirely true. It comes from the President himself, who made a declaration to this effect Wednesday to a prominent Democratic Senator from one of the Western States, who is on terms of especial intimacy at the White House. The President Spoke with so much deliberate earnestness and such studied emphasis that the Senator with whom he was talking is certain there la no reason to question his perfect and entire sincerity. His manner, no lobs than his words, indicated that the declaration was simply the decision of a firm resolution which had resulted from careful consideration of all phases of the matter. The President said he had not given any intimation of his feelings to the representatives of the press for the simple reason that he felt nothing he might say about not wishing or being willing to take a second term would be believed. “I hardly expect anvbedy to believe it,” he said, “except my wife, but it is so none the less." Continuing, he added: “Everything I do, every appointment I make, they think it is to secure re-election. On the contrary, I am counting the days that remain until my release from office, just as if I were a prisoner in confinement.” No man, he said, could endure the severe, strain of such labor, at once physical and mental, for a longer period", than four years without risk of permanent injury to hie health. For these reasons he could hot think of a continuance of his term beyond the four years ho has now half' completed. Nothing, he said to his Senatorial visitor, would persuade him to alter this resolution, which he had deliberately formed. He did not want a second term, and he did not believe there were any obligations of Eublic duty which could require hfan to forego is personal wishes. The Senator, who has repeated this significant conversation to his friends, says that while the President was not talking for the purpose of getting his views about re-election before the Eublic, there was no intimation that he desired is words to be regarded as confidential. The Senator has spoken freely of the interview to personal friends without any injunction of secrecy. and it is not unlikely this private discussion of the matter will eventually provoke some formal and public utterance by the President. The Senator is quite sure there was none of the coy strategy of the artful politician who thinks by this device to appear as being sought by rather than seeking the office in this disavowal of second-term ambition by President Cleveland. He is convinced that every word is meant for just what it implies, and that it will be wholly useless to plan the next campaign on the basis of a renomination of Cleveland. The President was specific and decided in saying ho could not be induced by any possible considerations to change his mind, that there was nothing in the way of argument which could bo brought to bear to alter a resolution determined alike by every consideration of personal comfort and happiness and by the most conscientious regard for what could fairly be asked of him as a patriotic servant of the people.