The state rights democrat. [volume] (Albany, Linn County, Oregon) 1865-1900, 1866-02-03
!. W. NEsmITm AM oURsELr.

M ACeeSA NtPCoAS0 Al the
Salem Statesman from this parsonage,
filed only with blackguardism and lies
against ourself. The production needs no
contradiction at our hands-barely a no.
tice. It bears its own condemnation of
the writer rather than the person it ~assails
upon its own face. Decent and honest
people of every party will think that if a
Senator of the United States really be-
lieved or knew that a man had the char
acter Senator Nesmith charges ur IN us, he
would be utterly wanting n that dignity
and bearing which ought to characterize
a Senator, if he noticed the person at all;
that to reply to such a character would be
simply getting down to his level. It is
oolerably well known hat Senator Nes-
NTH and ourself we're very intimate per-
|sonal friends up to the time he betrayed
the Democratic party for his present seat
in the Senate, when we broke off the re-
%lations which had before existed between
US. On his return from Washington in
1861, Senator Nesmith and ourself met in
a public room in Yreka; he came towards
US with hand extended in the sualfriendl
way, to greet us, and addressed US in the
old familiar style. We declined the honor
Of a renewal of tlat acquaintance. We
have no respect for men who betray their
party, sell their friends, and violate
the most sacred public and private
pledges in the interests of their party,
for a seat even in the u. S. Senate.
All these things Senator Nesmith had
done, and we resolved from that moment,
when his perfdy and corruption were
patent, to cease all intercourse or acquain-
taFeeship with him. He has since on
one or two occasions besought mutual
friends to intercede with us for a resump-
ton of the old friendly relations ; we have
invariably and respectfully declined. He
has franked US public documents; we
have as often sent them directly back to
him. He has in spite published portions
of private letters We years ago sent him
We have still several private letters which
he sent to us in those days. They are
sacredly kept from curious eyes-have
never been spread before the public, and
they never shall be, by any act, direct OF
indirect, of our ours. Yet their contents.
written years ago by Senator Nesmith, il
exposed in 1860, after his election to the
fSenate, would have damned him before
the people, and if published now, would
damn him now. He may rest assured, dc
what he may in hismalicious spleen against
us, that we shall never SO degrade oursel1
as to copy his bad, faithless, t%reacherou'
or infamous behavior. If what he say
be true of us now, it must have been true
in the years when the Senator and our
self were close friends, and he must have
known it. What excuse can he now ofel
for having known us to be SO intolerably
bad in character, and yet not only a~ssociat
: ing with us SO intimately, but desiring anC
beseeching for a renewal of that intimacy
even after it had been. broken off by our
own act. The Senator's letter reflect
upon himself most everely-not upon us
The people of Oregon know both tn
Senator and ourself tolerably we'll. Moth
ing either can say of the other will avail
much with them if they know it to b
false. No defence either of us may max
will avail if they know it to be specious
1t would be folly in us to undertake tn
impossible task of convincing the peopl
that the man who is widest known as tn
/" biggest blackguard in Oregon" is not
BLACKBOARD ; that the Senator who desert
!. ed from his party, as he had in forme
: years deserted from the army, was faith
!. full to his duty, pledges or oaths tina
the man who betrayed party and friend
!, for an office, and who almost perjure
himself in the attainment Of it, wonl
now hesitate to lie, UNANIMOUSLY and war
tonly, to break down the character an
impair the influence Of one who knows
his peridy, his treachery and corruption
: and who means to l~egitimately use ths
knowledge in en~deavoring to prevent tia
Senator from being reelected to the hlg
place which he has SO disgraced and di
honered. It would be madness in us
engage in the task of building up fl
Senator Nesmith a good or decent chara'
ter, or to satisfy this people that he W;
anything better than a deserter, a traltc
politically and socially, a calumniator an
liar, and we shall not essay the task. 3
. has chosen his time, the medium an
manner, to assail us. We propose
~select our W time to show him up--n
!, only as an individual, but in the rotte.
!, ness and corruption and incompetent
, which he has displayed as a Senator fro
Oregon. For the present we have doE
with him as a subject.
---e
AN IrEN.-In the Presidents Mesa!
there is a deal of specious, plausible ia
'. about the freedom restored to the people
the South. The fact is there has never be'
so much painful suffering imposed up1
nearly that whole people as now, and ty Il
direct action of President Johnson. |
Ivermits his Cabinet butcher. Stanton,
/ Cypress, harrass, and Outrage that unhapI
is people in every way which a 6end incasrna
- -