The Ottawa free trader. [volume] (Ottawa, Ill.) 1843-1916, 1875-08-21
JEFF DAVIS.

all who had q hand in 1t.
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JEFF DAVIS.
left Davis is not to deliver the address be.
fore the Winnebago county agricultural
society mex; month, after all the blowing on
the subject. Yankee bigotry has prevailed
over Yankee greed. Winnebago county is
mainly settled by down east radicals Of the
most "super.loyal" sort. No county in Hi
nois rolls up larger radical majorites in pro
portion to population. But it is Il notable
peculiarly of your superloyalists that their
love of greenbacks is almost exactly common
surate with their loyalty. The most "loyal'
people we had during the rebellion were the
government contractors and cotton traders.
Nothing was more natural, then, than that
the Winnebago county loyalists should con-
ceive the project of speculation for their
county fair by making show of Joff. Davis,
the same as IN other times they might have
added Barnum's:. "WEatis-it" to their show
as an attraction Davis was duly invited, and
to the immense JOY Of the local agricultural
board, consented TO come. Davis had recent
ly been making patriotic speeches IN Texas
had eulogzed the stars and stripes, and ex'
horted the people to be true to the constitu-
ton and Union. This lie fondly thought had
softened the asperity Of northern radicalism
towards him, and he seems to have really &C
cepted the Winnebago invitation as q token
of the return Of the era of good feeling. Be
sides he had read In the papers how the south.
ern ex.rebels had been received with open arms
at Lexington, Concord and Boston, and he
probably imagined that the people of what
was supposed to be one Of The most intelli-
gent portions of Illinois were striving to i'm.
itate the example of their brethren in Massa.
chusetts, No man was ever more woetully
mistaken. When the acceptance of his invi'
tation became generally known, Davis was
no doubt quickly enough undeceived as TO
the motive, spirit and temper In which the in
vitation had been extended. kilograms from
Rockford showed that "the smaller towns of
Winnebago are up in arms; resolutions OF the
most threatening character are being passed,
indicating most Enthusiastically that if the gen
tleman whom the Winnebago County Agri.
cultural society has requested to act as its or
ator at the appro aching fair, and who has an
nounced his willingness to perform the ser
vice, ventures to trespass upon TIE hositality
of the city of Rockford and the county of,
Wlnnebago, he will be received with cOnsid.
erablv less courtesy than was rendered him
some forty odd years ago by the savages who
then Inhabited thatregion.' Indeed, judging
from the expression of the local press, heI
would be fortunate to escape with no more
emphatic welcome than shower CT ancient
eggs and drapery OF tar and feathers.
Ofcourse, after the fact of such local "patri-
otlc outburst" became the common newspaper
talk and thus known 20 JEFF Davis, 1t was a
useless Formally for the officers of the agri-
cultural society to revoke their invitation,
though they did so, and of course Davis was
ready enough to cancel the engagement,
But the whole affair is anything but cred
table to the people of Winnebago county.
That sort of political Yahooism which made
| it dangerous for man Of obnoxious views
to travel in many parts of the south before
the war, was one of the chief evidences the
northern abolitionists were wont to quote
against the south in proof Of the tendencies
Of slayeholding to barbarism. 1t was reserv-
ed for Winnebago county to show that IN this
sort of Yahooism the north has localities that
can equal the most uncivilized corners of
Arkansas or Texas, for certainly in no por
ton of either of these states, or anywhere else
in the south, tor that matter, would a northern
man, as conspicuous as unionist as DaYis
was as a rebel, now encounter the remotest
danger Of being rotton,egged, o. insuted, or
in the least discourteously treated. On the
contrary, it is notorious that not prominent
northern man who hos visited the south since
the war has failed of being treated with the
most generous kindness. To manifest In re-
turn such a feeling rs the Winnebago county
radicals have shown, Is not only shamed by
the conduct of Massachusetts, in like clrcum-
stances, but is calculated to arouse warmer
sympathy for the object of their bigoted
spleen than he really deserves.
"
Hon Reverdy Johnson, the ableSt const-
tutional LAWYER of this country now living,