The Colfax chronicle. [volume] (Colfax, Grant Parish, La.) 1877-1981, 1880-11-06

her safety while that steady hand is on her
helm aud that calm eye looks out upon the
waves.
There il one other thing which you must
not omit to notice. 1 mean the propensity
of our opponents at all times and under all
their different names TO cheat az elections 4
call it the anti Constitutional party, as the
only name that fits them through and
through, but it has a long string of aliases and
many DISCUSSES. In all of them, however, 1t
shows out one plain, broad mark OF identity
that is its utter contempt for the right OF free
suffrage. 1 think that nobody now denies
that Packer was elected Governor OF Pennsyl-
vania and counted out in 1886; nor can 1t rea-
us in Philadelphia has been enormously
swelled by the frauds of every year. In the
Southern States no pretense was ever mace Dy
the Administration party OF a decent regard
for the rights of the legal voter. Under acts
of Congress, which that body had no more
right to make than the Town Council OF
York, nearly all the qualified electors were
forced from the polls. and Others with no show
or color of lawful right were brought up to
stuff the ballot boxes with Administration
tickets. 1t was by intimidation, ruffanism
und false counting that the Carpet bag Gov
ernments kept themselvesin existence for ten
years. But the incorruptible Democracy was
equal to all this. Unawed by influence and
unbribed by gain they elected Tllden ana ut
teriy routed the corruptionists. The major
ity of the white people was 100000, reduced
to 800 900 by the black vote. OF the Electors
duly appointed thnre was clear majority OF
ever elected to any office in this country if
Tilden was not elected Presidentof the United
States.
THE FRAUD OF 1876.
Then came that enormous outrage which
made the name of our opponents infamous
forever. They fraudulently altered the APP
pointment of twelve Electors, enough to give
Hayes majority of one. and on that fraud
they put him in. The corrupt knaves that
assisted him are billeted on the Treasury as a
reward for their crimes, and we, the people.
are taxed to pay them for cheating us out
of our biithright. There was no excuse Tor
this that can be accepted even as "A mitiga-
ton of the crime-no pretense of any excuse
at all that was not founded in perjury and
forgery which aggravated its baseness q
thousand fold. i confess 1 am disappointed
in the effect of this upon the popular mind.
believed that the thunders OF universal
condemnation would break over the heads of
men who had done this thing. But they TOOK
the moral measure of their party better than
1 did. Doubtless there are many thousands
who have determined in their hearts not to
trust such criminals any longer; doubtless
the confidence of many men heretofore act
ing with them has received shock from
which it will never recover; but their organi-
cation is nearly as compact as it was
before and most OF their leaders move with a
step as alert as ever in support of nominee
who made himself especially conspicuous in
the preparation of that great wrong. But the
cheated millions that we had before are with
us still. The immense majority that voted in
1876 for State Independence, honest govern
ment, popular liberty, peace. between the
sections, and equal justice to all men. will vote
again in the same way. To these will be
added the thousands in every part of the
country whose conscience forbids them to
support the particular kind of fraud to which
this Administration owes its existence. Still
further will the great majority be sweled by
enthusiastic love tor the great deliverer who
disinterestedly stood by the cause of liberty
at the time of its EXTREMIST peril. The oil
garchy that prosecuted and sneered at him
then shall painfully feel
What freemen can do when their hearts are
on fire,
For the hero they love and the chief they adj
mire. 5000
Of course we shall elect Gen. Hancock as
surely as we elected Mr.. Tilden, and by a
much larger majority. But the same men
who cheated in 1876 may cheat again in loS0.
They do not appear to have repented. They
have not said or done any thing to show that
they would not commit the same crime over.
What then? can only answer: If you be men,
bear it not. The deliverer who leads us now
has always been true to the people in war and
in peace; and no matter what betides us he is
sure to be tue in the future. Let us also be
true to him in every emergency-for his dan
ger Is our danger, and If be falls by another
fraud our rights will perish forever