Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1875-07-09
GENERAL ROBERTS, DEFENCE.

We have asked the friends of General
Roberts to refrain from the use OF epithets
and denunciation applied to individuals as
a defence for their candidate for Gov
ernor, and apply themselves to the more
rational attempt of pointing out any mis-
statements in the letter of Col. Smith
which gives them so much trouble. We
have waited for response but none has
appeared. The letter stands unimpeached
in a single line. Not solitary democrat
ic paper in the State has pronounced it
false. The aggressive" candidate is as
dumb as an oyster. His military ardor. so
profusely displayed in his letter of accep-
lance, seems to have incontinently oozed
out with the appearance Of the record held
up to him by Col. Smith. Not blast Of
his bugle has been heard since that event.
The kind of defence which Mr.. Roberts
frie nds undertake to make for him is to
cast fifth and SANDER. The Bangor Com
mercial, Mr.. Emerys paper, appropriate
organ of the candidate who resigned his
commission during the darkest days of
the rebellion. opens the defence with an
article headed "Blaine and his Monkeys"
the first paragraph of which is as follows:
"The simultaneous appearance yesterday morn
ing of Zany A. Smiths letter, addressed to Gen.
Roberts, in the Portland Press, Kennebec Journal
and Bangor Wing, shows concerted movement
and conspiracy on the part Of Blaine and his edi-
torial monkeys to nure the standing of the demo-
cratic candidate for Governor with a portion of
the community, by an attempt to belttle his mill
tary fame"
When our readers are informed that this
is the most decent part of the article from
which it is copied, and that such stuff as
this is all that the home organ of General
Roberts can offer in his behalf, they will
understand the painful predicament in
which he and his friends are placed by
the open letter of Col. Smith.
Silly and weak. however, as this is. it is
much better than language which appears
in the letter published in the Maine STAN
dard this week from its Bangor correspon-
dent. That writer conceives the idea that
he can best defend Roberts by eulogizing
Fitz John Porter. He evidently believes
that they had common feeling in rela-
ton to the war, and that their acts tended
alike after the defeat of Mcclellan. Rob-
erts abandoned the Union cause by re-
signing his position and leaving the army
at critical moment, and Fitz John Por-
ter betrayed the cause by deserving it in
the face of the enemy on the field of bat
tie. But DR.. Jordan says that FITZ
JOHN PORTER, was "ONEOF THE BEST
OF OUR GENERALs"!!
When the friends of General Roberts
are driven to the necessity of holding up
an officer who was cashiered for disobedi-
ence and dishonorable conduct in the field
as "one of the best of our Generals" in
order to relieve their candidate of the
odium attaching to him from his connex-
ion with that same disgraced officer and
his leaving the army when he did to come
home to Maine and associate with copper
heads in their political action, they
confess themselves in desperate strait
they acknowledge the weakness of Rob-
erts as candidate, and announce in adj
vance his most overwhelming defeat at
the polls in September if he is continued
at the head of the democratic ticket.