Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1876-01-21
Owe OF THE REW4RDED y.

1t is well known that the democrats
have driven Union soldiers from the Off
ces n and about the House and filled their
place with ex-Confederatcs. 1t is also
known that they selected for chaplain a
man who had to leave Connecticut on ac-
count OF his rebel procivi,ies. And IL
now comes to light that a man has been
appointed Secretary of the Ways and
Means Committee. who had SO much ad-
miration for the assassin who murdered
President Lincoln that he has child
named for that most infamous murderer.
The following IS taken from an editorial
article upon this subject in the New York
Tribune, which we commend to the at
tention of all who desire to know what
| kind of men the democrats reward when
they have the power.
The democratic party chooses for the Govern
ment places in its gift men whose venom is proof
against kindness, who cannot forget 10 hate, and
who in cold blood and with forethought and de-
liberation glory in the work of murder and give
posthumous honor to an assassin. Here was one
man ia all the South-let us hope in the name OF
humanity there was but such-who three
years ago, in 1872 or 3, the war having been
seven years closed, the cen who forsook the Gov
eminent ard took up arms against it having been
pardoned and restored to the privileges they had
forfeited. and OF reconciliation been opened
who at such time and under such cireum-
stances gave to his own helpless child name for
that child to bear through all its future life, and
bearing it to show to all the world its fathers
dying hatred for government that had pardoned
him his kissing maligny to the memory Of a
great ard tender hearted man, who had never
harmed him, and his reverence for an assassin
whose name only survives by its nfany. Think
of it for moment! What kind of man must he
! be who bowers his just born child with the name
Of John Wilkes Booth :: Does i; in the coolest Of
blood, with deliberaion and not upon impulse.
! Seven years after the commission of the murder
which sent thrill Of horror through all the South
as well as through the North murder so horri-
BILE that in the very white heat of the war, when
the passions of men were at their angriest pitch,
no decent man anywhere did other than denounce
it as most infamous crime-this man calmly
fastens on his own poor lpless infant the muir
derers name. This was not idiocy: though it
seems incredible that it should be done by a
person of ordinary intellect and intelligence. 1t
was just dull brutality; beastly cruelty. The man
who could approve Of the assassination of Mr..
Lincoln would he just such monster as to curse
his own flesh and blood with such a christening
and make his child the instrument for carr wing
over TO the next generation the badge of his ia
theirs shame. Poor child, TO be thus fathered
and thus handicapped for life.
! And now, there being such man, such pa
triot, such citizen, and such father, where do
we find him Ask Mr. Morrison, Chairman of
Ways and Means, leader of the democratic party
in Congress. lie found him and appointed him
clerk of his Committee, where he draws pay from
the Government he so loyalty supports Ask Mr..
Michael c. Kerr, the democratic Speaker of the
House, who made Mr.. Morrison the leader of the
House and gave him the opportunity TO appoint
this man. Ask The democratic party, which elect
ed Mr.. Kerr and Mr.. Morrison, and which is re-
sponsibe for their acts and for the appointment of
this representative democrat. Who is this man,
who within three years has recorded at the bap-
tisma font over the head of his infant son his
revcrent regard for President Lincoln's assassin
Is he of the sort that the democratic party chooses
out for its honors and emoumentsi Is this what
we are voting to bring in when we aid in securing
a democratic victory If so, let US know it ana
have q fir understanding We have held the re-
publican party responsible for its appointments;
we do the same with the democrats. This man is
not Mr. Morrison's or Mr. Kerr's exclusively. He
is the party's. 1t must carry him. He is not con-
spicuous, TO be sure. He is only clerk of com.
mittee. But there is not any place obscure enough
to shelter such man where he can draw Govern
ment pay. lie atronts Justice he shocks common
decency. The man who applauds assassination
would be an assassin himself if he dared. There
is no fitness, no propricy, no sense in his being
anywhere where the eye of self-respectng ci,i-
zen may light on him, much less in any public
place where the nations gorge rises at sight or
sound of him,
Mr.. Morrison, neither you nor your Speaker
nor your party can afford to appoint to Office
man who seven years after Mr.. Lincoln's murder
christened his own son with the murderers name