Buchanan County bulletin. [volume] (Independence, Iowa) 1869-1891, 1876-08-11
INDEPENDENCE, IOWA, FRIDAY, AUGUST H. 1876.

be the Rebels next time" This was
the talk, and the talk in earnest-as
was the talk of the same men in
1861. They mean it. They talk it
over coolly and seriously. Said they
had already a united South, which
would be nearly enough, and that
their Democratic allies in the North
dare not deny them the little more,
the few more voters, that they would
need. This is their idea to.day,-to
gain by legislation. by means of dip
lomacy and trickery, what they failed
to gain by means of force. I believe
it; l know it. All their expressions
suggest it, and all their actions prove
it. What else do they mean? Why
is it that the State of Missouri has
issued to every former owner of
slaves in that State certificate for
$1,000 for every slave, payable when
the General Government will pay it?
This very thing, the total amount of
the value of their emancipated slaves,
is now estimated as part of the
State debt in Missouri! I used to
think that this was a Republican
falsehood, the certificate matter
But it is an actual fact, and these
certificates, and all certificates or
showing of losses sustained through
out the State, are being saved up as
carefully as money against the day
when the Democracy, and the Rebel
element ruling it in the National
Government, shall have attained to
power. If Missouri will do this
thing, and hold out this promise to
pay for all emancipated slaves, why
will not all the Southern, all worse
Rebel States do it; and will they not
do it?
THE CONFEDERATE HOUSE.
When these things came to my
knowledge, I could not do less than
halt for further developments, watch
ing suspiciously every movement
made thereafter which l could see
had tendency toward drawing the
Democracy North and South nearer
together,-a union which l could see
would inevitably put the old Rebel
clement at the head of, and virtually
in control of, the party. [Applause.
Events have eliminated rapidly since
then, and I had not long to wait to
see the whole programme. The
Democratic House soon gave me light
enough. Cheers.
For some time l have been ready
to answer the question: "Have you
left the Democratic party?" I have.
Great applause And 1 am often
asked now: "Is it so? Will you
vote for Hayes and Wheeler" 1t Is
SO; and will work for them as well
as vote for them. Renewed applause.
My Democratic friends ask me tor
my reasons. There are plenty of
them, and all of them cannot be told
in these few remarks. And it is not
necessary to tell all. First, let me
say that my abandonment of Dcmoc-
racy was not caused, as has been
charged by the press OF that party,
because of the Currency or Tariff
question. I have no objection to
those planks in the St. Louis platform.
But my reasons ale as l have already
indicated, and will now state further.
The Democrats who press me for
my reasons may know them. On the
road the other day l met an old DEM
ocratic friend, ,-one of the Van Buren
County Democrats whom Dave She
ward, in his screed in the paper the
other day, said never had any faith
in my Democracy after l went into
the war. Applause Quite excit-
edly he wanted to know if it was
true, the report that l had really left
the Democratic party. I answered.:
cit is a fact" He asked the reason
for it. l told him they were quite
plenty and sufficient, and, as we had
plenty of time, I would tell him some
of them. Something of what have
already stated here was first said, and
then said that the first thing didn't
like in the Democratic House was
the appointment of Fitz Hugh, the
Sergeant at Arms of the Confederate
Congress, as the Doorkeepcr of the
House, and the displacement of Union
soldiers-many of them crippled in
the WARMTH the ex-members of the
Rebel army. [Great applause. He
wanted to know if they didn't have a
right to do this. I answered that
they had, but that also had the
right to disapprove and denounce it.
Another thing 1 didn't like was Ben
Hills Rebel speech, and its bold ut
terance of treason, and l didn't like
the Rebel yell in response to it all
over the South, for I had heard that
yell before, and knew what it meant.
Great cheers. They tell me-the
Democrats-that am "scared of Ben
HILL" l don't think l am; ! don't
think I was "scared of" any of the
Hills when met them in the South;
l do not remember that l was.-
[Great cheering.] Then l told my
friend how, worse than all of the
many bad and unblushing acts of the
Democratic House, l esteemed as in
famous the act of appointing to the
Clerkship of the leading Committee
Of the House the man Hambleton,
who named his son John Wilkes
Booth, after the assassin of President
Lincoln. Immense cheering. This
outrageous act, in tuckling to the
Rebel element, the Northern Demo-
Gratis dare not disown; and, for all l
know, this man is still the Clerk of
that Committee. The little child, SO
dishonored by it's name and the sig
niticance of it, had the good sense,
thank God, to die. Applause.
BEN HILLS SPEECH.
That speech of Ben Hills, and the
record that the Democratic party has
made in regard to it, would have
been enough of itself to send any
man who cares for his country out Of
all fellowship with it, and the party
IN whose name, and by one of whose
leading members, it was made. Hill,
in that speech, defended Anderson
Vile and the atrocious treatment
of the Union prisoners in the South