The Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1860-1888, 1880-02-05
ZACHARIAH CHANDLER.

Ills COn0uc6 During the War and Al6nunc1a-
tion Of Treason Portrayed in Eloquent Lam
gylage
Extract from Hon. T. W. Ferry's Eulogy in the U.
S. Senate.J
President Buchanan was surrounded
by Cass and Cobb, Jacob Thompson,
Toucey and Floyd, Brown and Black
and Chief Justice fancy. Filibuster
Walker was maneuvering in Southern
waters, threatening by his piratical
movements to embroil the nation in
foreign war; the Kansas conflict was
raging with increasing fury, and Abra-
ham Lincoln, then quiet country
lawyer in Illinois, was carefully noting
the situation, and unconsciously bracing
for his herculean labor. Chandler lost
no opportunity to express concern for
manifest disregard for the welfare of
the North and West. Observing this
early, in placement on committees in
the first session of the Thirty-ffth Con
gress, when committees were an
nounced he rose, and, in earnest but
dignifed remonstrance, said: "Sir, we
are not satisfied, and we desire to enter
our protest against any such formation
OF the committees as is here proposed )"
and, on one of his first measures "a bill
to deepen the Saint Clair flats said:
" want to see who is friendly to the
great Northwest and who is not, for we
are about making our last prayer here.
= After 1860 we shall rot be
here as beggars.' Upon the questions
of more general character in the
national policy he, with becoming
reserve, deferred in debate to
more experienced members; but when
measures were proposed which he could
not indorse ne was of such mold that
he could not sit byin silence. His face
was squarely set against the Lecomp-
ton constitution and the acquisition Of
Cuba. His speeches on those projects
are among the most telling protests
raised in the Senate upon kindred
measures. In the fercer debates which
followed, the custom of the duello-
popular at the South, but deprecated at
the North received new life. Menace
and insult had reached their limit.
They were no longer to be borne.
Chandler, Wade and Cameron signed
compact to fight on the first provoca-
ton. 1t certainly was bold step; but
it was efectual. Chandler and Wade
soon had occasion to act upon their
purpose. Stewards irrepressible con-
fiict drew insult, and Chandler took
up his cause. Sumner was smitten
down, and Wade repealed the dastardly
act. Whatsoever may be said Of the
means they employed, the code thence
forth practically came to an end.
Chandler was as ready with words as
with blows. When the John Brown.
raid at Harper's Ferry was under dis
cussion, his allusion to the fury which
sealed the fate of those whose zeal for
human liberty knew no bounds was a
most biting piece of satire.
No one, / believe, ever doubted
Chambers courage to be equal to any
emergency, public or personal. can
recall but one occasion in my long &C
quaintance with him when he seemed
dlsheartened and borne down by the
force of public events. It was when
President Johnson, attempting the re-
moval of the great War Secretary Stan
ton, quarreling with the then.famous
hero of the wal, Gen. Grant, and defying
the Congress of the United States, es-
capped impeachment so narrowly.
Chandler felt that republican Govern
ment was then at stake and impeach-
ment a necessity. Never was there
time when he came so nigh despairing
of the republic as at that event. He,
however, as others, happily learned that
a republic that could survive the tragic
loss of its beloved martyr President,
and live under the misrule of an ignor-
ant accession, has beneath its destiny
divine grasp which gives assurance OF
it's survival of all human devices or hui
man ILL.,
When his Senatorial term expired,
his expectation was that the State he
had honored and served would mark it's
approval by return to the Senate for
another term. Changes, however, of a
partisan character had occasioned the
alienation of many of the supporters of
the Republican party in several of the
States of the Union. The Democratic
party had thus gained the ascendency
in enough OF those States to place the
House of Representatives in their hands.
Michigan was more or less affected, and
some of it's old friends had turned away
from the Republican party in that State,
rs well. The Republican majority in
the Legislature was. in measure, re-
duced. Though he received the nom
ination of his party friends, yet, in the
elective contest, he was defeated, through
the fusion of a few members with his
political opponents. Never did he carry
himself through any struggle with a
loftier crest. He scorned to stoop for
SO glittering prize.
This defeat did in no wise abate his
Il = q 4