The Stark County Democrat. [volume] (Canton, Ohio) 1833-1912, 1876-09-21


swindlers are periodically swelling the
colossal proportions o. their crimes by
taking OUT of the Treasury additional
millions which they claim as the pre-
cous results" of their original fraud,
They have no better title to them than
wolf has to the mutton he slaughters by
moonlight. The legal remedy against
these exactions is SO plain that ignorance
alone could hardly miss IL. But your
officers have found out the way not to
do it. They permit the government to
lie down and be robbed semi-annually,
by a corporation which Tilden would
long ago have disarmed ofits power, and
whose criminal abettors he would have
swept in the penitentiary by scores.
| repeat, that | do not blame you as an
active accomplice in this wickedness.
But yon ought to have come out from
the evil and corrupt fellowship as soon
as you seen how evil and corrupt it was.
You owed it to yourself, to your Church,
and to your country to break of at once
from political associates capable OF such
indefensible conduct. But your accept
ance of the doctrines planted at Ply
mouth by the Yankees blinded your
Judgment and made your conscience IN
accessible to the principles planted in
Jerusalem by the people first called
Christians at Antioch"
You would have us believe that Hayes,
if elected, would reform abuses and give
us q pure administration. Your state
ment, and that ofother gentlemen equal
ly reliable, make it certain that Mr..
Hayes bears an irreproachable character
in all his private relations, l DO not
doubt his possession OF that negative
honesty which it is disgrace to want. |
accord him those tame household vir-
tues which entitle him to the respect Of
neighbors and the confidence of his fam
lily, but he can no more stem the torrents
OF Republican corruption than he can
swim against the rapids of Niagara. His
whole history shows that he would not
even make an effort to do so. He has
been most happily called
A MAN OF TRIED sUBsERvIENCY.
A reformer in these times must be
made of stern material. He must have
no connection with, or be under no obli-
cations to, the authors of the abuses
that need reform, Above all things, he
must not have consented expressly or
impliedly to the commission of the pub
lie wrongs which his duty as a reformer
would require him to punish. When he
comes to oppose wickedness in high
places, the consciousness that he himself
is in pari delicto will make even strong
man as nerveless as infancy.
To show how hard it would be for a
man like Mr.. Hayes to resist the worst
orders of his own party, | Will cite case
directly in point, aud certainly within
your recollection as well as mine.
In the case of Milligan, you made an
eloquent and powerful speech before the
Supreme Court for those free principles
which |, at the sa pe time, supported in
my weaker way. You showed the indie.
structable right of every citizen to legal
trial; you proved that Magma Chata did
not perish on the battle field; you demon
strated by irresistible logic that the Con-
stitution was supreme after the war as it
was before; you spurned with lofty con,
tempt the idea that law was extinguished
by the victory of the forces called out to
defend it; and you closed with that grand
peroration on the Goddess of Liberty
which, if spoken at Athens in the best
days of her fierce Democratic" would
have "shook the arsenal and fulmined
over Greece" These were not the words
of a paid advocate, for you had volunteer
ed in the cause; nor the sudden emotions
of neophyte, for you had readand pom
dered the subject well. You spoke the
deliberate conclusions of your mind, and
| there is no doubt that in your heart o.
hearts you believed them to be true this
| day.
Yet when the reconstruction law was
proposed you suffered yourself to be
whipped in, surrendered your conscience
to your party, and voted against youl
recorded convictions for a measure thai
nullifed everv provision of the Consti
tuition, whereby millions of people were
deprived of rights which you knew to be
sacred and inaienable.
If this was your case. what subserv'
iency may not be expected from MIR
HAYES. when the party lash comes to bt
laid on his back You are bis superior
in every quality that holds man true tt
public duty. You have been carefully
schooled, schooled in the morality Of The
New Testament, you have lived all you
life in the full blaze of the gospel, yor
are gifted wi h logical acumen which
few can boast, and with moral courage fal
above the average. If you fell down be-
fore the Moloch of Abolitionism, anC
gave up all princip pie at once, what act o.
worship will Hayes deny to that grin
idol2
Speaking of reconstruction, and seeing
your broad accusations Of treason, l an
tempted to ask if you are sure that yol
yourself and your as >ociates did not com
NIT that crime.
In March, 1867, the then existing gov
ernment of the Union was supreme al
over the country, and every State had {
separate government of its own for tht
administration of its domestic concerns
That government was entitled then, if il
ever was, to the universal obedience o
all citizens, and you its officers, had taker
special oath of fidelity TO it, Neverthe
less you made a deliberate arrangement
not only to withdraw your support from
it, but to overthrow it totally in ten o
the States; and this you did by military
force. In all the South you leUied ,Ua
against the nation and against the de-
fenceless States, destroyed the free gov
ernment of both, and dsubstituled in thei
place an untempered and absolute des
potism.
Now suppose you had been indicted fo
this; how could you have escaped th'
condemnation ofthe law l know you
excuses, and 1 can understand you
claims to mercy-but what legal defenct
could you have made consistent will
your own argument and the decision o
the court in the Milligan case?
Icannot describe to you how unpleas
ant is the sensati n produced by you
professions Of desire for peace. WIZ
do you not give US peace if you are will
III N -