Rensselaer Republican, Volume 20, Number 38, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 May 1888 — General Carnahan's Vindication. [ARTICLE]

General Carnahan's Vindication.

The county democratic convention will be held June 2nd, a week from next Saturday. The Newton county republicans will hold their county convention at Mount Ayr, this year. June IGth is the date, . . ■ < . r The long but well written article in regard to the Indiana C niversity, will well repay the careful perusal of all who have any present or prospective interest in educational matters. Especially do we commend it to the attention of those who may be contemplating attending some educational institution, for a greater' or less period of time. The Town Board will fix the tax levy for the. corporation, at their next meeting, and we are much disposed to believe that the best interests of the town will be best served if a considerable increase is made in the rate of the levy. At the present rate the town does not have money enough. We ought to have more money to spend on our streets, more money for sewers, more money for keeping our side-walks in repair. The increment to the sinking fund ought to be much larger than it is. There are §8,500 of school house debt coming due in five years and more effective preparations to meet it ought to .be made. That dfebt ought to be paid as sodn as may be in better shape to build an additional school house, which, if tha present growth of population continues,' will be a necessity within a very few years. An engine house is also an indespensibte necessity, now that the town has a fire department, with an engine and a hook and ladder truck. It ought not to be many years before a system of water-works is secured foi the town, also, and that is another urgent reason why other needed improvmenis shbuld be made and existing debts should be paid off, as soon as it can conveniently be done. In short we advocate a policy of wise but liberal expenditure. We can have a fine town if we will only pay for the privilege, and we can’t have it unless we do. Money wfeely paid out in improving the town will pay itself back,' twtee-over, —once in the increased comfort of our citizens and once in the increased prosperity it will bring to our town. . - ; ; ; .

A big schemers, or at least has been, on foot among some of the leaders of the local democracy. It meat of a new democratic paper in Rensselaer, One John W. Sickles, of Chicago, and a man who is said to havebeen connected with the big dailies of that city since 1860, is to be the editor. According to the florid statements of some of the more windy and leaky proof the scheme the paper will be a “hummer” for a fact. A first-class paper, all home matter, printed on a bran new two thoua*

and dollar printing outfit. Two capable printers are to do the mechanical work, Mr. Bickels is to write heavy editorials, filled only wif|i undiluted Jeffersonian Democracy, while events and incidents are to occur in such numbers and report themselves spontaneously to the office of the dignified editor, that the news department will contain as many interesting items every week, as ordinarily occur in the whole county, in six months. The conditions upon which this matchless organ can be secured are merely nominal. Mr. Bickels must have a bonus of §SOO, and 800 paying subscribers guaranteed, at $1.50 per year. It is also stated, more quietly, but perhaps not less correctly, that Mr. Sickles is to enjoy tne emoluments of the office of postmaster before many years. The income of the paper will be immense. From subscriptions not less than twelve hundred dollars; as much more from mercantile advertising, while the receipts from public printing, job work Ac. are to swell the total to such a sum that the paltry couple thousand or so which will be required to pay the running expenses of the paper, will be a mere bagatelle, a drop out of a full bucket. Oh, it is a great and an eminently practical scheme! and in the language of Col. Sellers, There’s millions in it. If anyone ventures to entertain doubts regarding the easy manner with which 800 cash subscribers can be secured in the county let him listen to the glowing words of the mouth-pieces of the enterprise, when they gravely assert that The Republican “has fully five hundred democratic subscribers who take it simply for the local news,” (and get their money’s worth every time.) These are all expected to shake The Republican, at one full swoop, subscribe for the new paper in a body, and at full cash rates; and the other three hundred will tumble over one another in their race to- enroll their names and hand over their cash. In view of the fact that there are not more than six or seven hundred democratic families in the whole county, most persons will be surprised to learn that The Republican is so universally circulated aiqong them; but no one’s surprise would be greater at learning that fact than that of The Republican man, himself. As to Bro. McEwen, who has served the cause of Jacksonian Democracy so long and so faithfully, he can take the.side-track and let the procesuion go by, or-stay in tho -way and get run oyer. It is all the same to the bosses, they have no further use for him, or will not “if” their great scheme can be realized. But that's an awful big “if.”

The indictment of General Carnahan, at Indianapolis, was an outrageous piece of political skulldugery, brought about for the purpose of counteracting to some extent the injurious effects likely to result to tin democratic party from the indictment of Coy, Bernhamer Ac. There never was the shadow of a case against Carnahan, and the Democrats have known it, all along. The offense with which he was charged was, at worst, only a technical violation of law, and without the least evidence of a wrong motive behind: More than that, the alleged unlawful act for which he was indicted was performed out of the state and entirely without his knowledge. These are facts which have long been publicly known and which the grand jury which prepared the indictment might have known had they made any decent endeavor to investigate the case. It is characteristic of the unfairness and essential dishonesty of the Indiana ’Deffibcracy that with the fuK knowledge of all these facts before them, the democratic United States district attorney, at Indianapolis, should delay bringing Carnahan’s case before the courts just as long as he could, in order that the political effect of the

indictment should continue as long as possible, and that the Democratic state papers should, to the last, continue to howl and shriek against Carnahan as a man guilty beyond doubt, and who ought to be in the penitentiary. Added to this was the further constantly reiterated charge that the delay in bringing Carnahan’s case before the court was due to the unwillingness of Republicans to have the case tried, when, in point of fact; the delay was District Attorney Sellers’ own fault, entirely. When, at last, Sellers could no longer, with any show of honesty or fairness, refuse to bring the matter before the court he is compelled to admit what he has known all along, that there was no shadow of a case against Carnahan, and to ask the court to dismiss the charge. The dismissal of the case occured on Wednesday, of last week. The following report of the proceedings, with Mr. Sellers’ motion for dismissal, is copied verbatim, from the Indianapolis Sentinel, a paper which has taken the lead in the unjust abuse of General Carnahan: “AVhen the federal court convened yesterday afternoon, Dist. Att’y. Sellers arose and presented a paper to Judge Woods. It proved to be a motion for the dismissal of the case against James R. Carnahan, who was under indictment, charged with an attempt to unlawfully get possession of election papers. Specifically, the charge was that at the last general election, in November, 1886, he sent out a printed circular to Republican judges at~the various polling places to take possession of the outside papers. Judge Woods, on reading the motion, ordered a decree of the dismissal of the case to be filed with the clerk of the federal court. The following is the motion:” “The defendant herein is cjiarged with unlawfully advising certain election officers to do certain acts unauthorized by law, relating to the election of a representative in congress. The only evidence upon which an indictment was found and returned was a printed circular purporting to have been signed and promulgated by the defendant. The only part of that circular to Which any exceptions might be taken, is the following clause: “The other poll lists and tally papers should he given to the judge opposite in politics to the inspector and be by him brought to the court-house on Thursday morning next succeeding the election to be used by the board of canvassers.” It may be seriously questioned whether that clause amounts to “advice” to do anything unlawful or omit any duty prescribed by law (sec. 4,712, R. S. 1881), which ..provides thatsaid. papers “shall be deposited with the inspector or with one of the judges selected by the board of judges. However that may be, investigations made subsequent to the return of the indictment, have out to the knowledge of the officers for the government the fact that the circular in question was neither authorized, written nor signed by the defendant, and that he had no knowledge of its contents until after the election at which it was used, and the further fact that he was out of the state when it was prepared and circulated. These facts are notorious, having been shown in open court upon the trial of another cause. For the government to put a citizen upon trial under such circumstances would be manifestly unfair and unjust. I therefore move, this court to discontinue this cause.”