National Republican., 1876-05-30
THAT BAD LITTLE MAN, CHARLES JAMES
FAULKNER.

citizens, that the thing is over, let US lay aside
all elimination and recrimination."
THAT BAD LITTLE MAN, CHARLES JAMES
FAULKNER.
We have been twenty years, more or less,
publishing a paper in the interest of truth,
justice and true religion. Recently we
have resolved ourself into an investigating
committee. Not Star Chamber commit
tee, mind you. We have been inyestigat-
ing with open doors the curious record of
that bad little man, Charles James Faulk-
ner, commonly called the Hon. Charles
James Faulkner, who misrepresents the
State OF West Virginia in Congress. In
that record we have found very many
things that are both strange and instructive,
when read in the light of the present day.
Vanity, Mr.. Faulkner, was always
your besetting sin - sinfulness and in
sincerity the bane, the misfortune,
of your life. This by preface. About
six weeks ago you were in your seat
in Congress. and made what you were
pleased to call a personal explanation. 1t
is due to you to say that more coarse and
vulgar exhibition of plantation manners
never was made in the House Of Repre-
sentatives. Your vanity. however. got the
better of your blackguardism, and found
you making the following boast concerning
yourself: Il have been honored by the
people with many positions of high trust
and responsibility, and, while l boast no
higher purity or exemption from in
eh OH
" ordinary American citizen, yet should
welcome with unaffected pleasure the
most rigid and unspsring scrutiny into
"every personal and official act of my
"life." That reads all very well on
paper, but let US see what the
record says. You were appointed
by Buchanan, Minister to the Court of St.
Cloud. You were Buchanan's accident,
not the peoples choice. Weak, timid and
vacillating as Buchanan was, he had no
love for traitors, and did not, up to the
very last, suspect your loyalty. In send
ing you Minister to the Court of St. Cloud
he conferred upon you the highest public
trust you ever held. And yet you took an
unfair advantage of Buchansn's generosity,
and betrayed that trust in the most shame
full manner. Your flunkeyism as an Ameri-
can Minister was a subject Of ridicule in
Paris. This, however, was a matter
which more Immediately concerned your
weakness in your nature, land forget it;
but the graver fact stares US in the face
that while you were holding the Office of
American @nsf5 Mini Pont IL thsi siess01 G205t asgast
your country.
Yes, you were plotting treason against
your country, Mr.. Charles James Faulkner,
while holding the position of American
Minister to the Court of st. Cloud. 1t is
true, you denied this on your return home,
but Mr.. Seward had the proof of it in his
own hands, and that was his reason for
sending you to military prison. He un-
derstood the selfshness and insincerity of
your nature perfectly.
Il know that man better than you do,"
said Mr.. Seward, in his comical way, to a
friend who went to intercede with him for
what he, not knowing the facts, considered
harsh act. 81 know that man better
than you do" he repeated; and at once
produced papers which proved that he
did. You were released from prison on
making fair promises to prove, by your
acts, that you were really loyal to your
country. Here, again, your insincerity
got the better of you, for very few weeks
later you left your family to take care ofyour
property and hastened to join the Confed.
eratearmy. In that way you prove the lie to
all your promises. Your boast was that
you were willing to fight and die for your
dear old Virginia. Yes, Mr.. Faulkner,
while kind and generous-hearted Union
soldiers were providing for your family
and protecting your property you were
playing cheap rebel on the staff of Stone
wall Jackson. And you served in this
capacity to the very end of the war.
Your greatest exploit however, was per-
formed just after the war, when you made
q solemn promise never to play rebel again,
and swallowed the pure and unadultersted
iron clad oath without even making a wry
face. Your fellow Confederates were as
tonished at the haste with which you per-
formed that act, and said, if we remember
right, that it was dictated by pure selfish
ness. 1t enabled you to get your property
and regain the privileges of a man who had
been true to the Union. A few years later
you turned your back on that dear old Vir-
ginia you loved so well and were so willing
to die for, and, as a lawyer, pocketed a fee
of $4,000 for making plea against her on
f1aH HNrT do rO1I -nso
has too many renegade sons like you, Mr..
Faulkner. You had the audscity to stand
up in Congress and tell us about the ruins
of Harper's Ferry and your Impoverished
constituents" as if this ruin and poverty
had been caused by something the Federal
Government had done. You, and bad men
like you, were the cause of all the ruin and
poverty so offensive to the eye at that place.
Does this simple fact never occur to you,
never rise up and smite your conscience,ss
you pass over these ruins and look your
impoverished constituents in the face?
When you were urging the censure of Gen.
Schenck the other day, as member of the
Committee on Foreign Affairs, for the in.
terest he took in the Emma Mine while
Minister at the Court of ST. James, did not
your conscience upbraid you for your plot
tings while Minister at the Court Of st.
Cloud against the very existence of the
Government that it was your duty to repre-
sentand defend with your life Did you not
feel that you were scarcely competent to
act in the csseH Oh, no Of course you
did not. And that shows that you are 9
very bad man.