The Columbian. [volume] (Bloomsburg, Pa.) 1866-1910, 1875-10-22
MR. .BUCKALEW AT BLOOMSBURY

| Mr.. Buckalew addressed meeting at the
Opera House, Bloomsbury, on Saturday
evening last, October 16th.) From notes
taken by Prof $. N. Walker, Court Report
er, we are able to furnish a part of the
speech, as follows:
GENTLEMEN The Democratic party of
Pennsylvania has presented to us, for our
support, candidates who are most fit and
worthy, in our Judgment, for the places for
which they have been named. Our nomi-
mating convention at Erie was peculiarly
fortunate in its selection of a candidate for
Governor, regard being had to his character
and to his past career; for in private life,
in professional life rs member of the
bar in political life as member of the
| Legislature, and, more recently, in judicial
service in the adjoining county of Schuyl-
| kill, he has shown himself he has proved
himself to be a most deserving, reliable, able
and true man aud suppose that when this
can be said with truth of a candidate even
| for the highest office in our State, THAT of
| Governor, )all has been said that is necessary,
save only that he shall agree with us in
| opinion upon party questions and upon pub
| lie affairs,
| The gentleman who has been nominated
for the second office to be filled by the peo-
| pie this year, Il mean the office of State
| Treasurer is still better known to us; and,
| although there may be those who will criti-
else Col. Piollet for this, that or the other
cause-there may be those who have been
| brought into conflict with him in past con-
tests in our congressional district or else
| where-yet it must be admitted that he is a
man of great energy of character, that he
has been successful business man in the
several pursuits in which he has engaged,
that he has an ambit on and desire for the
approval of his fellow citizens--in short,
that he has all those characteristics which
| will fit him for an energetic, and, if you
choose, an ambitious administration Of the
Treasury. And ofone thing we can be well
assured, and that is that. $50 far as integri-
ty in the discharge of official duty is con-
cerned) he will neither steal any of the
public moneys nor, so far as he can help it,
permit anybody else to steal them. So, gen.
tlemen, the candidates who have been nomi-
mated for our support for State officers, stand
fairly before us as reputable and fit men to
fill the places for which they have been
named. Now, what are the reasons that
| address themselves to men of various
opinions and positions in favor of their
election-in addition to the considerations of
fitness to which / have referred? Why,
mainly and principally, that they are can
didates of Reform-pledged to reform the
administration of the government of the
State; and that reform of administration and
management in our State affairs is now, if
possible, more necessary than in former and
recent years. | do not propose to go into
Details but | refer generally to facts with
| which you are familiar through the public
press, and through other sources of informa-
tion-facts of this character: that legislation
has been loose and reckless and sometimes
prohigate 4; that executive action in its con-
nection with legislation and in many other
| respects, has been open to Just complaint,
and particularly that in the administration
of the treasury of the State, of the finances
of the State, there has been great and no.
torious abuse. | have, lying under my hand,
the official statements of the State Treasurer
for the four years ending in May 1874 and
these statements made up monthly, show
that during those four years, there was an
average surplus, Il c., an amount unused
money not required for current administra-
tive purposes,) of between million and a
half and two millions of dollars, and that
this surplus was deposited in various insti-
tutions, with various depositaries through
out the State, some of them of admitted and
others of doubtful credit and standing, and
that obviously large amounts were deposited
for political reasons with persons, with firms,
and institutions, where no prudent officer of
the State, looking only to the public interests,
would have placed them. One of the reso-
lutions adopted by our convention at Erie is
a resolution strongly denouncing the manage
ment of the State Treasury, and it demands
that hereafter, all the public moneys of the
State not needed for current expenses, shall
be promptly applied upon the Indebtedness
of the State, through the agency of the sink
| inv f,,pI n,,1 hat St,tn
friend Of his, either political or personal,
shall hereafter be permitted to make profit
out of the public moneys-that these enor-
nous balances shall not be made to yield
interest or profit to a high officer of the
State or to his contederates in wrong.
| Three years ago, a gentleman who once
filled high position in the government OF
our State, informed me that his own institu-
ton had for years stately paid to the State
Treasurer, interest upon public moneys de-
posted therein-that the payment of this
interest to the Treasurer, was as much a mat
ter Of course, as the depositing of funds in
the institution when collected by the col
Letting officers in the section in which he
lived. There is, gentlemen, no reason to
doubt that this has been course of conduct,
or rather of abuse, in treasury management
for years. You will remember that in the
fully considered without difference of party
and the Convention adopted the most strn-
gent provisions against this abuse. But,
gentlemen you may make your laws as strin-
gent and searching rs you please, you may
make your Constitution as far-reaching as
you please so that its provisions shall be fit
ted for correcting all abuses of public ad-
ministratoD-to correct or prevent them
and you will utterly fail unless you select
proper men to administer your laws and to
obey your Constitution. Applause.
We have nominated men with special
reference to these objects of reform, to which
| have referred and who if elected, will per-
form their whole duty.
1t cannot be denied, gentlemen, that we
have fallen upon evil times. We know
that industry in all its channels of activity
is more or less paralyzed. We know that
commercial life is disturbed, and all the bu-
, siness transactions of our people greatly em-
barrassed. 1t has now become an absolute
necessity that we shall look about us and
shall come to understand where we are and
whittier we are drifting, But in order to
see clearly where and how we stand, it will
be necessary to ascertain how we have come
into our present position.
Gentlemen, we had four years of waste be
cause we had four years of war, and it is im-
possible that any people snail engage In
; such "a dance of death" without having in
= Aicted upon them most serious and lasting
evils. Now what do we get as the result OF
the great conflict in which we were engaged
Judged to be necessary by us of the North.
ern States and therefore prosecuted to ITS end
with unilinching vigor? Why, we inherit from
that struggle national debt now somewhere
5 above twothOusand millions of dollars We
hardly care to know the exact amount-it is SO
, great that hundred millions above or be.
low given sum is comparatively unimport-
ant. Upon that debt we pay an interest
the rate of which is higher. | believe, than
that paid upon its debt by any other civilized
country in the world. Besides, the interest
. upon our debt is paid not in the ordinary cur
, rency which passes from hand to hand among
the people in business transactions Il mean
greenbacks and national bank notes) but