The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1880-08-14
Maine and Alabama.

LII lace OF the Alabama election the
unwillingness Of the masses of the
Greenback party in this State to
strike hands with the Democratic
party is but natural. If any trust can be
put in Greenback reports of the campaign
the Greenbackers had considerable strength
in Alabama. Their Presidential candidate,
Gen. Weaver, was very confident of success
He has changed his mind since the count,
and now AYERS that ballot-box stuffing and
false counting are Systematically used to Sc
cure Democratic majorities. 81 used to
think Tilden was fairly elected" he says,
''but he was not" Congressman De La
Matyr, who has been stumping down there,
declares that the election was carried by
fraud, and that it is impossible to secure a
fair election in any State of the South. The
National View, the Greenback organ at
Washington, speaks of the result in the fol-
lowing vigorous language:
1t the more conclusively shows the necessity,
II any security is to rest in the ballot at all,
that this party which so unscrupulously falsi-
ties it, should be kept from any larger control
In the country. Wherever Democracy lifts its
uhoCIupulOuo ucdQ lutO COutIOl, lIS opponents
may outnumber 1t two TO one, but they will
nevertheless be manipulated into a minority
by Democratic dishonesty. 1t may please the
press and the politicians to talk about sectional
feeling laid to rest and q unity of interests but
everyone at all conversant with Southern feel
ing among Bourbon leaders can tell you that
never was the spirit Of domination more ram
pant than it has been in the years last past
The slaves have been freed but the element
which made slavery cherished institution is
as vigorous to-day as it was in 1860. 1t is even
stronger, for spirit OF revenge is added to its
intolerance; which only burns the hotter at ev-
cry struggle Of its people to throw off that
dominance. The feeling that has taken hold
OF the agricultural class In the South, impell-
ing them to larger understanding of the
one OF the results of Northern interference.
They fight against all liberality and inde-
pendence, as they fought against the Yankee
Interpretation of the declaration that all
men were born free and equal. The con-
fict between that element and the real dan
trine of freedom and equality is as irrepressible
now as 1t was twenty years ago. That conflict
has in some measure changed ground but it
has lost nothing of its ferceness. 1t is as
determined now as it was in any year of the
desperate war. 1t is a conflict between truth
and falsehood, between inalienable rights and
the usurped privileges of few, who have by
fraud, by force, by every evil MEANS consti-
tuted themselves ruling power. We have
this conflict in our hands. The laws which en-
force its adjustment are as immutable as God.
1t is still an ire sistible conflict 1t rests with
powerful few to decide whether it shall be
adjusted amid the roar of cannon, over heaps
OF dead and dying, under the hot glare of con-
Hagrations lighting up fields red with slaughter,
or whether peaceful solution be reached by
the ballot. The peaceful solution of reason
and the victory of arguments whose strength
lies in their truth, is the victory we hope and
work for. None the less do we see and recog-
nize the other terrible alternative Long con
tinued submission to recognized wrong has be-
come impossible to men in this age They are
as swift to punish as they are to understand,
and patience is no longer the dumb patience of
Ignorance, but the patience that sternly waits
for judgment.
The fact is, the Democrats are making
use of the Greebackvote where, as in Maine,
they can make it contribute to their sue
cess, andsuppressing it where as in Alaba-
ma, it threatens their domination. Some of
the Greenbackers in this State who realize
the situation are 10th to serve longer as
Democratic tools, and they begin to perceive
that miscount in Maine is as bad as a mis-
count in the South. Those who condemn
the Alabama fraud cannot in honesty and
consistency uphold the Maine steal.