The comet. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1877-1882, 1880-10-09
JERE BLACK ON GARFIELD.

Very Respectfully,
JAMES DUGAN.

JERE BLACK ON GARFIELD.
Ii The Republican Candidate Analysed
Chicago Times.
Il New YORK, September 24.-Tht
II world will publish tomorrow Il re
:. markable letter by Judge Jere Blaci
= to Augustus Schell, from which thu
following copious extracts are taken
The impulses of friendship and tht
II duties of fair political opposition alike
t require me to speak of Gen. Garfield
! Intellectually, he is first among the
politicians of his party; not the sharp
II est or strongest, but the most gifted
n and best cultivated. His private life
is stainless, and in everything uncon'
a nected with politics his behaviour is
= regulated by principles of the sound
= est morality but in public affairs he
: does not act upon his convictions.
9 When he passes into the domain OF
politics his conscience loses grip, and
for his party he is willing to do any
3 thing wrong which will promote their
, interests, or play any card, how false
, soever, which will win them power.
This surrender of his moral and men
tai integrity is the condition upon
which lie holds his high place in the
affections of the party he belongs to-.
Treachery to his country is fidelity to
his faction.
If at any time in the last fifteen
years he had given way to his own
sense Of right, supported the constitu-
ton and laws in spirit of pure justice,
refused to defile himself with election
frauds, withheld countenance from
executive corruption, OF denounced
the forcible installation of thieves in
State offices, he would have converted
himself into a Democrat, and been eX-
PEELED from the Anti-Constitliti
party. This moral prostitution to bad
political purposes is far from being
uncommon. Men naturally good have
yielded to it in all times and in all
countries where there is a party UNI
prncipled enough to demand it and
strong enough to reward it. But Gen.
Garfield's public career furnishes
more striking examples of it than the
history of any individual | have
known.
Let me give you case. After the
war, at time of perfect peace, in the
State of Indiana, where no war had
ever been, certain military officers,
being instructed from Washington
that they were above the civil author
tiles, had kidnapped and were about
| to kill three citizens, for no otfense de-
fined by any law, and without pre-
tense of Il trial by jury. If this could
| be done, there was manifestly no Sc
curity left for life or property. Finally,
it could not be done without fiat vio-
| lati0n of the constitution, which in
express terms forbade it. But the men
who then ruled us with a rod of iron
insisted upon it, and we could not be
certain that the judges, State and ma
tional, might not be subdued by their
intiueneisf: I'd bfe hG" Court Y was great
crisis in the history of our country.
There was place in the argument
which nobody could fill 50 well as Gen.
Garfield, and brought him to help us
in this desperate extremity to rescue
American liberty from the utter des-
truction with which it was threatened.
He responded with noble alacrity, and
made a great argument, in which he
proved not only the continued eXis-
tence but the inestimable value of the
constitution. He demonstrated that
the right of trial by jury at all times
and all places was indestructible, and
that any officer, civil or military,
would violate his oath if he attempted
to put the military above the civil
authority. He affirmed the whole
Democratic doctrine on the subject
and showed it to be inconteslibly |
right. His sincerity was undoubted
for, like the rest of us, he engaged in |
tho a 10 nl, IF
fee or any reward except the thanks |
of true men.
Such were his true convictions. But |
when he came to deal with the same
subject in his political capacity he sur |
rendered everything to his party. He
voted for military despotism and a
regularsystem of kidnapping and muir
der in all the States of the South. In
the same act were other provisions,
which he certainly understood to be
in direct conflict with every article
and every section of the constitution.
In all this he did not transgress. like
others, in ignorance or in passion, He
sinned against light and knowledge,
and on cold calculation of partisan
policy. 1t is an infinite pity that such
a man should not only be false to his
What makes all this very much
worse, is his denuncation of General
Hancock for saying that the military
was cOnstitutiOnally subordinate to
the civil power, and that liberty was
still the inheritance of the American
people,; for these were propositions
which he himself had asserted and
knew to be true. 1t might be expect
ed that the course of man so infiu-
enced would frequently defect from
the straight path, and one great aber-
ration we cannot but remember. Mr..
Tilden was elected in 1876. A false
return was the only resource against .
him.
| do not believe that Gen. Garfield, !
if left alone, would commit an election /
fraud any more than he would steal a (
horse or sheep; but when the mana |
gers of his party demanded his aid i'm :
4 great swindle he could not refuse. |
Under that coercion he went down to |
Louisiana, and there found it absolute \
" certain that the Tilden electors had (
been duly appointed" as a legal and
ull poll, so peaceably conducted that
here was not even a squabble about il
n the whole State and the appoint
nent so made was attested by and re-
'orded upon the certificates and the e
'aths of election officers adverse to the 4
lppointees in all their feelings and @
wishes. There was no earthly excuse S
or denying this. No contradiction of 5
{ could be honest. To count the State n
or Hayes was thing that could be il
lone only by impudent and unmitiga- G
ed fraud r
For time l hoped that Gen. Gar @
ield's share IN that great crime had l.
onsisted in passive acquiescence; and A
am surprised by the proofs recently il
rOught forward of his active assist q
nee in its preparation. His iudg- b
1ent as member of the electoral m
was thing to be expect Il
d, for he must long before that have tC
Onvinced himself that a fraud was as te
God a way as any other of electing a e.
resident. In political game he did OK
OF think that anybody had moral
snse enough to abstain from throw
lg a die which he himself had loaded oil
} win the stake. "