The herald and mail. [volume] (Columbia, Tenn.) 1873-188?, 1876-11-03
WHAT IS GRANTISM.
| A TrueDennItiOn of the SsdIOus, Corrupt
and DIsgrncefuI System.

A True'DennItiOn of the SsdIOus, CORRUPT
md DLsgrnceGuI System.
From speech of Gov. Chas. 5. May, OF Michigan
NJ Cleveland.
Fellow Citizens--Whas is Grantism--
this new word in our politics? 1t is a
word of baleful import-a word OF
shame, a word of national humiliation.
1t is word that means under this ad-
ministratiOn every department of our
government has been disgraced and dis
honored. Do l speak too strongly ?
Look at the recOrd--the plain but damn
ing record which all men know. | said
disgraced every department. Was | not
right? What one has escaped? The
state department, the great foreign de-
partment of the government, has been
disgraced under this administration by
the displacement of Charles Sumner and
the elevation of Simon Cameron; by
the appointment and retention of pub
lie swindlers as the representatives OF
our country at foreign courts; by
wasteful and criminal extravaganza, in
robbing the treasury for the benefit of
the camp followers of the party.
The treasury, that great department,
organized by the genius of Alexander
Hamilton, and once presided over by
statesmen like Albert Gallatin and that
great son of Ohio in the war times, Sal
mon p. Chase, has been dishOnOred and
disgraced by Boutwell, and Richardson.
The navy, first organized by the true
patriot, George Cabot, under Washing
ton, and in more recent times adorned
under the administration of Polk by the
eminent and cultured historian Bancroft
the navy, which carries the flag to
every sea, and which has thundered for
American liberty in all our wars-this
great department, under Grant, has been
intrusted to the dishonest hands of a
man who is thought by a great majority
of his fellOw-citizens, upon good evi-
dence, to be no better than public rob
Der.
And the war department-what shall
1 say of that a? The great department
which, with the navy, and more than
the navy, holds the honor and safety of
the country in its hands--the depart
ment organized by Henry Knox, of revo-
lutionary fame, and since filled by Mar
shall. and Monroe, and Cass, and Marcy,
and Stanton--this great department has
at last come to be held by a man mean
and base enough TO reach out his hand
from his luxurious palace in Washington
and rob tie poor common soldiers on our
bleak western frontier at their mess ia
bles, rob them Of their ratiOns, the poor
privates whose protection and comfort
ought to have been dear to him What
more? There is the pOstmaster-general-
ship with Creswell and his frauds, and
the interior department with Delano
and his public infamy, and there is the
attorney generaisbip, that great law Office
of the government, given into the weak
hands of a man like Williams -" Ian
daulet Williams" as he is calIed--the
man who cOnnived at fraud, and rode
about in a carriage stolen from the gov
ernment. This was Grants choice of a
successor for Pinckney and Writ and
Evarts And more than this, he sent
the name Williams to the senate to fill
the exalted and spotless Office Of Chief
Justice of the United States To that
had it come at last, under Grant-Wil
liams as successor to John Jay and John
Marshall and Salmon z. Chase.
And during all this drcary and dis
graceful chapter in our political history
Gen. Grant has steadily stosd by
these recreant public officials, giving
them his confidence and protection,
while he has just as steadily frowned
upon and turned out honest men. Hoar
and Cox, at the beginning, and Bristow
and Jewell in these latter times-all
these men bad to leave his cabinet be-
cause they honestly tried TO do their
duty and reform abuses, while he has
clung, with all the stubbornness Of his
nature, 10 such men as Delano and Rich
ardson, and Belknap and Robson.
Whenever the honest wrath of people
has driven base public servant from
power because he himself was shamed
into resignation, there Grant has been
with his words of energy and his letters
of confidence. You know that this has
been so. They call it standing by his
friends. Well, that is a good trait, if n
mans friends are decent people and fit
to stand by. But how comes it that
Grant has never made the mistake to
stand by an honest ard fearless public
officer in the discharge of his duty?
How comes it that when the people turn
out men for dishonesty, Grant immedi-
ately rewards them
We thought in Michigan two years
ago that we had at last god rid of lack
Chandler. The people were tired Of his
political rule, of his coarse, demagogue
ways and his bad notoIiety in the coun
try, and with the help of his own party
they rose up and overthrew him-cast
out of the senate and into private lie,
as a useless and dilapidated demagogue.
But Gen. Grant, true to this way of do
ing business of which l have spoken,
reached forth his presidential hand and
lifted him out of the political gutter and
put him in his cabinet to ornament his
administration and give him sober coun-
sci in regard to his great duties