American citizen. [volume] (Canton, Miss.) 1864-1890, 1872-08-24
Address OF the Iowa Democratic and
Liberal State Committees.


against corruption and tyranny under the
.suise of law. Nearly four years of misrule
have brought the Nation to the verge of
bankruptcy, and the time has come III our
public affairs when men of all political par
ties are carefully and conscientiously consid-
ering whether they shall any longer regard
their fealty to the party as paramount to
their duty to their country. As the chosen
representative of two great political elements
of Iowa, we deem it our duty, in the present
crisis, to address to the people of the State
some of the most cogent reasons for a change
in the administration of our State and Ma
tional affairs.
General Grant was elected President upon
the pledge and the platform or Peace, Econ
omy, Honesty of Administration, Impartial
Suffrage, and Universal Amnesty His Ad-
mini>trati on has been tried, and with what
results Let his history. as witten in the
past three pears and half, determine.
lie called to his Cabinet men wholly mex
perienced in public aifairs-men who owed
their high stations to the personal attach
ments of the President, and not to reasons
of state. He dismissed them through
caprice, and supplied their places with men
of ordinary capacity and meXperience, to
whom were intrusted the affairs of great
nation.
Tickle in the choice of his Constitutional
advisers, unstable and uncertain in their
tention, the President has debased his high
place to the low grade OF an office broker
age, and Personal Government-an abso-
lutte monarch in all but the name and the
hereditary character. He has surrounded
through their exalted stations and pecuni-
airy and corrupt influences, to debauch pub
lie morals, and to discredit and question the
motives of those who honestly seek Reform
and reconciliation
He has shown by indubitable proofs that
his personal and private transactions
managed with the same disregard of princi-
pie as his public administration. He has
sought, b. the offer of patronage, to seduce
Senators and other public men, and to quiet
their opposition to his unlawful projects of
annexation.
His subordinates, with his knowledge and
permission, have subsidized and muzzled
large portion of the newspaper-press-the
most effective exponents of public opinion
in advance of the ballot itself
His Cabinet officers, with his knowledge,
have openly sQuandered the public money.
He has abused his office by permitting the
sale of arms from the public arsenals to one
great friendly Power to be used against an
other, in palpable violation of international
law
lie has usurped the war powers of Con-
gress to menace sister Republic, in order
to force the annexation Of territory which
our people did not want.
He demanded from Congress the renewal
of the Bayonet law, by which, in time of pro-
found peace, he could, by his own will, in
any State, suspend the sacred writ of hd5eds
corpus.
He has, for half of the time in each year of
his Administration, to engage in frivolous
occupations, neglected the public business.
He has unlawfully interfered with the do
mestic affairs of the respective States by
sending his entire Cabinet from their official
posts of duty to control State elections, and
to intimidate the people, corrupt them
with money surreptitiously taken from the
Public Treasury.
He has employed the public vessels to as
sist in disorganizing State Legislatures
known to be opposed to his Administration
and TO his corrupt adherents.
He has zeaously attempted to degrade dis
tinguished officers of the army and navy,
who might in some way lay claim to por-
ton of the military laurcis which adorn his
brow.
He has appointed TO office, at home and
abroad, his own relatives, who, by their
immoral conduct ard political corruption.
have disgraced their country and robbed the
people.
He has forfeited the confidence of many
distinguished men in all avenues of life, who
looked at the beginning of his Administra
ton as the harbinger of honesty and peace
He has taken into confidence those whose
highest aim is to put themselves and retain
ers IN power, in defiance and contrary to The
Will of the people. He has selected ad
States Senate through bribery.
He has attempted to obscure his mall
ministratlon by misleading the people in re
gard to the public debt.
lie has kept the financial condition of tn,
country PROSTATE, and at the will and mere,
OF mercenary combination at the none
centers OF the Republic, by the useless ex
traragant, and criminal boarding, in tn
hundred millions of dollars in gold
he has Increased the public debt by tn
payment of large sums in interest to a SYN
dictate upon great loans, long before the pro
ceeds thereof were paid into the Treasury
He had arrogated to himself praise for tn
reduction of taxation, when, whatever re
auction took place. was the work of Con
gress, impeled by the clamors of the over
Durdened and taxridden people.
He has recommended Reform in the Civi
service, but has thwarted reform in that de
partment OF the Government by retaining il
Ofhce and in confidence, relatives, persona
and military friends, who well known
purse.
He has ipstigated his adherents in the Uni
ted states Senate to report that it is not con
trary to public morals to accept brides
thoTgh contrary to law.
de has sought to disgrace and degrad
every senator and every Representative i
Congress who has questioned his policy @
Administration, or who has honestly remor
strated against the abuse which characteriz
and denote his civil career.
he has menaced the civil authority of tn
Nation by constituting shoulder-strappe
military staff officers the only channel G
communication of the Executive with tn
Legislative branch OF The Government
he has debased and destroyed the persona
and official independence of the Nation;
Judiciary, by the arbitrary appointment c
Judges, who accepted the position for tn
express purpose of carrying out the will o
the President.
He has appointed to, and still retains i
ONCE important Federal officers, who col
ruptly obtained seats in Congress- and whor
congress refused to recognize as the law
1nlly-chosen Representatives of the people
He has abused the pardoning power by set
ting at liberty persons whom he knew wer
guilty of heinous offenses, for othe
reason than that they possessed political il
fuence at home.
He brought the country to the brink of
foreign war by laundering instructions civ
en- to our agents abroad, and, by stubbor
persistency, has insisted upon absurd d.
mands finally refused by impartial tr
bunai, composed of the representatives c
disinterested foreign Powers.
He has suffered American citizens to lar
gulsh IN foreign prisons, and permitted tn
confiscation of their property, without a
earnest protest against the outrage.
He has not only permitted the domesti
civil Administration to be managed by in
feriOr subOrdinates and clerks in the mel
cenary absence of the Heads of Depart
ments, but he has allowed large numbers q
the chiefs of our Diplomatic Corps to r,
main at home, engaged in private bushes:
when the exigercies of the public affairs r.
CURED their presence at the Courts to whic
they had been accredited. He has allowed
without protest, important Foreign Mi.
sions to be compromised by their incumbent
lending their names and other influence t
questionable speculations.
He has given his influence to schemes b
which hundreds of millions of acres of til
public lands have passed into the hands
gigantic and oppressive corporations.
lie has been the occasion of open, publ
affront from great and powerful nation ,
Europe-the only real friend the Republ
had in its distress