The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1878-03-26
PRESIDENT HAYES ATTACKED
Senator HOwe's Speech i'm the
Senate.
A severe Arraisnment of the Adj
miniStratiOn.

"
follows:
Daring the past year we have seen here and
everywhere throughout the country small but
active squads of political inquisltors busy with
the work of asserting the Republican party,
into hallowed gamers all those who
avow themselves supporters of the Presidents
policy and pouring unquenchaole fire upon all
the rest. Poles have been set up at all the
CROSS roads and flags inscribed with the Presi-
dents policy have been suspe nded from them,
in convenient jung!es to detect who did and
who did not uncover under the flag. 1t
has happened to me to be advertised quite be-
You'd the pale of my own modesty and seeking
as an opponent Of the Presidents policy, and
have not hitherto answered to the accusation
because did not like to plead guilty for
hoped 1 was innocent, and l did not ike TO
plead not guilty forsI feared | might be guilty.
[ had withheld 10 honest effort to elect Mr..
Hayes. 1t must of necessity pain me 10 be
found not in accord with his views, and it must
pain me still more to find he was not in accord
with mine. My uncertainty arose not from the
fact that was doubtful of my own policy but
because was not sure understood his.
My own policy is very simple one and may
be briefly stated. Toward the states Of the
policy have held toward the states of the
North L demand only that every legally
qualified elector in every state South or North,
Democrat or Republican, black or white, shall
be permitted undisturbed by force and unawed
by fear, to vote at all elections at places pre-
scribed by law and nowhere else, just once and
no more than once; that every vote so cast shall
be honestly counted; that every person chosen
by such votes to any Office shall be freely in
Quoted into it. This is my Southern policy and
the whole Of it. The very head and front of
my offending against the South hath this ex-
tent and no more. 1t was that same sentiment
which as L understand animated the Cincinna-
ii convention, and to this end imperatively de-
manded a congress and chief executive whose
courage and fidelity shall not falter until these
results are placed beyond dispute or recall, and
it was this sentiment which, as L understand
it, inspired the President when in his letter of
accordance he said: "What the South most
needs is peace, and peace depends upon supre-
macy of law There can be no enduring peace
if the constitutional rights OF any portion OF the
people are habtually disregarded." OF course
did not like to believe the President would
abandon any part of this policy, SO reasonable
in itself and explicitly proclaimed both by
himself and by the convention which placed
him in nomination.
Concerning the civil service my policy is not
bit more complicated. 1 would have that
service administered by the best men attaina-
ble and L believe Republican President
should, as the Cincinnati convention declared,
selecd Republicans for all those places where
harmony and vigor of administration require
its policy to be represented. believe as the
President declared in his inaugural address,
that once commissioned the officer should be
s'secure in his tenure as long as his personal
character remains untarnished and the perfor.
nance of his duty satisfactory" Such was the
command of the tenure of office act l strag-
gled for that enactment under the administra.
ton of President johnson, and struggled just
as hard against its repeal under the admiuis-
tration of President Grant, and the 29th of
March, 1869, closed speech against the re-
peal with the words, "In course of years here
after you may see the White House occupied
by man like unto him who has recently retir
ed from it." Am about to witness my own
vindcaton? This is the whole of my civil
service policy.
Until L listened to the message which the
President sent to us upon opening this session
of Congress, was not quite sure whether he
was or was not in accord with these views. He
was elected by party ninety PEE cent of
which am confident hold precisely these views
and do not propose to abandon them whoever
may counsel such abandonment. Still some
things had happened since his Inauguration
not at all in harmony with the policies have
indicated. He had selected for his Cabinet
one man who was not Republican, but q
Democrat. Still the individual was so well
known to me and 1 believed so implicitly in
the moderation of his opinion, in the business
of his character that if 1 could not have ad-
vised his selection I could not and did not COM
plain of it. He had selected one other who,
although not Democrat, was yet not Re-
publican, who was equally at home with all
parties and in all places. By turns he had
been everywhere and had espoused and de-
serted every party. He spoke like an oracle
and his face speech could be fitted to the
vieissitudes of parties as readily as donble-
face satin can be turned to hide the accidents
of society. His critiques upon his political as
sociates always gave him popularity with his
political opponents and he resembled the
prophets in never being without honor except
where he happened to reside. Inconstant in
everything else he has been constant to his
trade, that of politics, he entered upon that
before he was of age and has pursued it since
without variabieness or shadow of turning.
His first enterprise was to reVolutionize the
government under which he was born, That
failed and he fled. He was for short time a
lawyer in Wisconsin, but without clients. He
was minister at Madrid, but did not recon
struct the diplomacy of the world. He was
major general, but perverse history refused to
record his victories. He was newspaper cor
respondent and was unsuccessful. He was an
editor in Detroit and was not successful. He
was transplanted to Missouri and the generous
Republicans OF that state bore him into this
Senate. That elevation did not prove fatal to
him, but his party died-died not in spite of
him, but because of him and under blows
which he inflicted. Having outraged one
party and not yet received absolution from the
other, he denounced both as machiLes Hav-
ing failed as dealer in legitimate politics, he
turned his attention to the contraband article.
In 1872 be helped to lead Horace Greeley ard
B. Gratz Brown to the Baltimore market and
taught the Democracy of that year they should
call nothing common or unclean If it promised
ito beat Grant" For six years he traduced
the Republican party probably throughout
more states, with more rhetoric and in more
languages than any man living. Upon that
illustrious captain who from the 9Th of July,
1863 to the 4th of March, 1877, led the Repub-
lican party, who always led his party to victory
and always lifted his country to renown, at
whose approach but recently the eastern conti-
nent stood up and uncovered, be threw more
Maud than any dredge not worked by steam ever
threw 10 the same time.
He did not fail to learn wisdom from expe-
rience. In 1872 he found it was not easy to
make the country accept his candidate. but it
did not follow he could not make the country's
candidate accept him. So 10 1916 he convened
his disciples once more 10 New York, That he
might be sure of good society. He is said to
have selected them all himself he admitted
to that convention only Shy card" To that
assembly he revealed doctrine quite new ia
the science of politics that the true reformer
would judge parties not by measures but by
men; that platforms were "w0rn out claptrap;'
that reformers were Indifferent alike to all
platforms. but were determined to have for
the presidency no man whose very name is not
conclusive evidence of the most uncompromis-
ing determination of the American people to
make this pure government once more. He
NOuCuSdlcu ulub W tuc COuubry as W Wu6r0
such men were to be found. He was himself
placed at the head of the committee to deter.
mine which one of the political parties hap
pened to stumble upon that man. In due time
the Republican convention stumbled upon
Rutherford B. Hayes of Ohio Some two
weeks later the St Louis convention presented
the name of Samuel j. Tilden.
At length the country was cheered by the
announcement that the committee of revision
appointed in New York had discovered in the
nominee of the Cincinnati convention that man
whose name was conclusive evidence of the
most uucompromising determination of the
American people to make this pure govern
ment once more, and by a happy coincidence
it seems that the nominee of that convention
discovered in the chairman of the committee
OF revision, who had triumphed in no other
business, the very man to master the varied
and implicated interests committed to the
Interior Department.. do not assert that cab.
met officers are understood to be ministers of
the President rather than of the public, and
looking upon these selections as matters of
taste it was not difficult for a Republican to
in them, although quite difficult to
them.
In the selection of Secretaries and their SUBJ
ordinates the President has great latitude for
the exercise of discretion, but in the selection
of governors of states he has no discretion
The people of the states, in the
exercises of their own uncontrolled discretion