Butler citizen. [volume] (Butler, Pa.) 1877-1922, 1880-07-28
HON. CHESTER A. ARTHUR'S
ACCEPTANCE.

ACCEPTANCE.
Tert Of the Letter Of the Republican
Vice Presidential Candidate.
Following is the letter of Hon. Ches.
ter A. Arthur to Hon. Geo. F. Hoar
chairman of the National Republican
Convention, accepting the nomination
for the Vice Presidency.
New YORK, July II, 1880.
To Geo. F. Hoar, President of the Re.
publican Convention =
DEAR SIR Il accept the position
assigned me by the great party whose
action you announce. Ttis acceptance
implies approval of the principles de-
clared by the convention. But recent
usage permits me to add some express
sion of my own views.
FREE AND FAIR ELECTIONS.
The right and duty to secure honesty
and order in popular elections is mat
ter so vital that it must stand in front.
The authority of the national govern
ment to preserve from fraud and force
elections at which its own officers are
chosen is chief point on which the
two parties are plainly and intensely
opposed The acts of Congress for
ten years have, in New York and else
where, done much to curb the violence
count and wrong to which the ballot and
have been again and again subjected,
sometimes despoiling great cities,
sometimes sitting the voice of a whole
State, and often seating not only in
Congress, but on the bench and in leg
islatures numbers of men never chosen
by the people.
The Democratic party, since gaining
possession of the two Houses of Con-
gress, has made these just laws the OBJ
ject of bitter, ceaseless assault, and de-
spite all resistance has hedged them
with restrictions cunningly contrived
to battle aud paralyze them. This ag-
gressive majority boldly attempted to
extort from the executive his approval
of various enactments destructive of
these election laws, by revolutionary
threats that constitutional exercise of
the veto power would be punished by
withholding appropriations necessary
to carry on the government, and these
threats were actually carried out by re-
fusing needed appropriations, and by
forcing an extra session of Congress,
lasting for months and resulting in con-
cessions to this usurping demand which
are likely in many States to subject the
majority to the lawless will of the mi
nority Ominous signs of public dis
alone subdued this arrogant
power into a sullen surrender for the
time being of part of its demands.
COURSE OF THE REPUBLICAN PARTY.
The Republican party has strongly
the stern refusal of its repre-
sentatives to suffer tie overthrow of
statutes. believed to be salutary and
just. 1t has always insisted, and now
insists, that the government of the
United States of America is empower
ed and in duty bound to effectually pro-
tect the elections denoted by the con-
stitution as national More than this,
the Republican party holds as the car
dinal point in its creed that the govern
ment should by every means known to
the constitution protect all American
citizens everywhere in the full enjoy
ment of their civil and political rights,
as a great part of its work of recon-
The Republican party gave the bal
lot to the emancipated slave as his right
and defense. A large increase in the
of members of Congress and of
the electoral college from the former
slave holding States was the immediate
result. The history of recent years
abounds in evidence that in many ways
and in many places, especially where
their number has been great enough to
endanger Democratic control, the very
men by whose elevation to citizenship
this increase of representation was ef
fected have been debarred and robbed
of their voice and vote. 1t is true that
no State statute or constitution in so
many words denies or abridges the ex-
ercise of their political rights, but the
modes employed to bar their way are
no less effectual. 1t is a suggestive
and startling thought that the increased
power derived from the enfranchise-
ment of race now denied it's share in
governing the country, welded by those
who lately sought to overthrow the
is now the sole reliance
to defeat the party which represented
the sovereignty and nationality of the
American people in the greatest crisis
of our history.
Republicans cherish none Of the re-
which may have animated
them during the actual conflict of arms.
They long for full and real reconcilla-
tion between the sections which were
and lamentably at strife.
They sincerely offer the hand of good
will, but they ask in return pledge of
good faith They deeply feel that the
party whose career is so illustrious in
great and patriotic achievements will
fulfill its destiny until peace and pros
perity are established in all the land,
nor until liberty of thought, conscience
and action, and equality of opportunity
shall be not merely the cold formalities
of statute, but living birthrights which
the humble may confidently claim and
the powerful dare not deny.
THE CIVIL SERVICE.
The resolution referring to the public
service seems to be deserving of ap-
proval. Surely no man should be the
incumbent of an Office the duties of
which he is for any cause unfit to per-
form, who is lacking in the ability,
fidelity or integrity which proper ad-
of such Office demands.
This statement would doubtless meet