Litchfield enquirer. [volume] (Litchfield, Conn.) 1829-current, 1880-08-26
From the N. Y. Evening Post.
Wealth in Connecticut Politics.

1t must be conceded that the Connecticut
Democrats succeeded yesterday in supporting
their Presidential candidates by two stout
names at the front of their. state ticket.
Messrs. English and Pond, like their Repub-
lican competitors, are candidates of local
strength. While they are not men OF ntellec-
tual power they are eminently respectable per-
sons who have been successful IN business,
who have good social standing and clean rep
utations. Their nomination makes sub
stantial equation between the Republican and
Democratic state tickets, 50 that in spcchat-
ing on the result in November the effect of
either of these tickets may as well be ignored.
The vote of Connecticut next November will
be secured one way or the other not by the
candidacy of Bgeow aud English, but of Gar
field and Hancock. The way is cleared for
national questions, and on them the contest
will be lost or won. -tl
Nevertheless there are one or two aspects of
Connecticut politics that deserve most thought
full and serious attention. The new names
at the head OF the rival tickets are those of
men who are worth each his hundreds of
thousands of dollars. If this was an isolated
or uncommon fact in the political history of
the state it might be passed by as a political
accident. But it is not an accident. 1t has
become so common there as almost tie be an
invariable law. With the close balance of the
Connecticut parties the politicians are always
seeking some ~eXtraneous means of success
They find it in wealth. With slow but steady
progress the principle has come to be recos-
nized, especially in the Congressional dis
tricts and by the Democratic party, that man
who wants an important nomination must get
it by the promise or implication of liberal
contribution after the nomination is secured.
The result is the free use of money at Con-
necticut elections and a corresponding de-
bauchment of the political morals of the
state.
A good illustration of this evil appears in
the Fourth Congressional district, made up of
Fairfield and Ltchfield counties This is the
district represented in Congress for several
years by William Fl. Barnum, afterward
United States Senator and now the chairman
of heDemocratlc National Committee, Prob
ably no man ever succeeded so well as did he
in organizing corruption In each town was
his band of workers charged with the dispen-
sation of funds on election day. He knew
his men and his men keew him, and after
each election. when it was found that "Bll''
Barnum had run ahead of his ticket all over
his district, men understood the reason why.
Presently the Republicans caught up the trick
and practiced it in the Congressional election
OF two years ago, when comparatively OBJ
scure candidate for Congress ran ahead of
Governor Andrews in the Governors own
town. where his well deserved popularity was
unquestioned. In every small town Of the
district it has now come to be the fact that a
venal band of from twenty to fifty electors
offer their votes. to the highest bidder, A
secondary result has been that no man of mod
crate means can afford 10 run for Congress or
even for state Senatorship. We have been
told on good authority that the Democratic
tIf1 n ria H..
would give Democratic majority of about
two thousand votes, was refused two years
agorby-a reputable Democrat on the plea of
his inability to bear the necessary expense, F."
and it is now an evident fact that both parties
| in the district are seeking candidates not who
| have good name and ability but who will
''bleed" most copiously. What is true of the
| Fourth Congressional district is also true
to somewhat lesser degree of the whole
state. -.ls.., ...
| All this which every intelligent voter in
| Connecticut knows to be a fact, is a most dis
| reputable and scahdalous state of affairs We
trust that the time will come when the indie.
pendent voters 10 Connecticut will be numeri.
cally strong enough to insist that something
better than long purse shall be qualifca-
ton for office, and when we shall find more
men OF the type of Hawley or Wells or Ferry
or buckingham coming to the front. AS it is
now, the fact of general and comprehensive
! bribery at important elections is notorious,
and it is no small stigma on the good name of
| a New England commonwealth that the crime
I is stimulated bya moral cowardice in CON-
mnnities which prevents alike the prosecu.
tion of the briber and bribed. A little whole
some law and some independent voting will
! go far toward remedying an evil that every
good citizen in the state sees, feels and under
stands, yet too often hesitates to reb uke.