The Stark County Democrat. [volume] (Canton, Ohio) 1833-1912, 1875-09-23
4 SPEECH OPA. G. BUELL..
ICon.inled from page 81

ll Rroduce the desired result.
Senator Carpenterin this conversation
accurately represented the feelings of his
marty associates. He was more candid
and outspoken than the majority Of them
on this subject as well as on many 9th
era. Shortly after the passage ofthe Pc.
land law, and before its real scope and
intent had been developed by the pro-
Seedings under it against Mr. Reid ofthe
a Tribune, and myself, Senator Conkling
one day remarked to friend that they
had now new way of dealing with those
fellows--meaning the editors and cores
pondents of newspapers. Senator Ham
lin of Maine, was another entadyocate
Ofthe doctrine that the press was licen-
tious and must be restrained. SO was
Senator Ingals, of Kansas and so were
Patterson of South Carolina; Spencer of
Alabama Dorsey, of Arkansas; Logan Of
Illinois; Sherman Of Ohio, and Cameron
Of Pennsylvania.
DUToEE REPUBLICAN,
o. Was found among the fifty in the Senate
Ito stand up and oppose the press-gag
movement, and that was Mr. Wadleigh
O. Of New Hampshire. The attempt to en-
force the provision Of this law in the case
r , Of Senator Chandler against myself is fa-
Eniliar to you all. Before the law was
ten days old l was indicted under it.
And was indicted under law passed
June 22d for an alleged oflense commit.
February 18th, four months before. |
was indicted in Washington City for an
alleged offense committed in Detroit.
And the offense was that of saying that
Senator Chandler had been taken out Of
the Senate Chamber in state of beastly
intoxication by Senator Sherman of Ohio
when the facts were that another Senator
than Sherman had taken him out on that
occasion, and had misunderstood my
informant. The main allegation was
true, but Chandler was led to believe that
the corrupt Courts in the District of Co.
hmbia would hold me upon the techni-
cal misstatemen; Just referred TO, convict
me of libel because could not prove that
Sherman took him out, and not permit
me to introduce evidence in justification,
showing that another Senator did take
him out. Such was the spirit in which
the Gag Law was sought 10 be applied to
the first case arising under it.
In the meantime had returned from
Washington to my home in st. Louis
The campaign of 1874 was at hand, and
the press of the country, without distinc-
tiOn of party, so fercely denounced the
Gag Law that the managers Of the Re-
publican party concluded not to put its
provisions to the test until after that
campaign was over for fear that it would
prove too heavy an addition to the al
ready. enormous burden that weighed
upon the shoulders Of their party. Fin
ally, after the campaign had been decid
led and after Chandler had been retired
by the people Of Michigan, the revenge
Of the
BEATEN AND MADBENED RRPUB LICAN STATES
gdI MEN
Gould no longer stayed, and they began
proceedings against me in the District
Court for the Eastern District of Missouri
to secure my transfer to the District of
Columbia for trial. The case was brought
before the United States District Judge
Samuel Treat on an application by the
United States District Attorney for Il
Warrant of transfer Samuel Treat is one
of those Judges, exceptional i'll these
times, whose purity whitens the ermine
and whose learning honorS the bench.
He took up the indictment against me,
and, when he got through with it, the
Poland Gag Law was practically dead
letter upon the statute books. His opin-
ion was sustained by Circuit Judge Dill
lon on appeal by the Government, and
was released from custody. have no
time now to recapitulate the tedious de- !
tails of the proceedings Of which the |
foregoing is scant summary. Suffice it |
to say that these two learned and just |
Judges, inspired by that high sense of
duty which sometimes invests the Judi |
eial office with attributes almost of holi- |
ness, interposed their power between me
az citizen and the designs of the con- |
spirators who sought to annihiliate my
rights and thereby to establish pre-
cedent under which the rights of the |
press If the United States might be OBJ
liberated.
But the conspirators ut Washington |
were not to be defeated 80 easily. They |
were fighting for existence, and the Gag
Law was their last hope. So they tried |
again to get ahitch on me with new in
dictment. The Judges had decided that |
a Court in Washington could not take
cognizance of an alleged libel published
in q newspaper in Detroit, and that was
Whatdestroyed the first indictment Then
Mr.. Richard Safe Burglar Harrington and
MI George P Fisher went to work and
drew up new indictment, charging that
| had published this alleged libel in the
District Of Columbia by the act of filing,
in the Western Union Telegraph Office,
in Washington, the manuscript copy of a
special dispatch for transmission to De-
troit. This new indictment was then du-
ly presented and found. by a Washington
Grand Jury,
Az PACKED By MARSHAL SHAFT,
The brother-in-law of Presiden Grant,
and was rearrested in st. Louis for a
new test of the case. There has been no
hearing, as yet on this new case and |
do not know whether there will be or
not, nor do care. The time for Gag
Laws has passed. The Republican party
is too near gone and Grantism is too
near dead to admit of the healthy opera
ton Of the Gag Laws, But they have
had their day at me, and | have stood it
pretty well. Now propose to take my
dayat then, and see ifthey can stand it
as well as did. '--
Now, my friends, we have seen that
the Republican party of Ohio in 1875 has
merely invented few new pretenses and
devised some new shams; but that be-
meath their thin surface are thesame old
greed, the same old lack of scruples, the
same old vacuity of honor, the s2ne old
impudence, the same old hypocrisy and
thesame old yenality which you so stern
ly condemned in 1874. ..... 81
I said at the outset that the canvass in
OHIO this fall had not been surpassed in
Significance by any in the history of the
country. | meant that the result here
this year would be largely the augury of
the result in the Nation next year, and |
am firmly convinced that in