The Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1877-1885, 1881-04-29
THE END OF DAWES.
III 4a4N y O4 A@A W A0'
From the New York World.

Dawes is not such an utter don
key as he seems to be. He
knew what he was about when
he declined to give the name of the person
who had informed him of the persecution
of Southerns for Republicanism' sake. 1t
would really have been better for Dawes TO
let this terrible story Of the burning Of
factories" and the murder of ''em-
ployes" in Mississippi go after he had once
told it, without endeavoring to hitch it on
the tale of Heath in Louisiana. In that
case it is true that everybody would sup
pose that Dawes invented the whole story
for temporary use in the senate debate
But that supposition would have been con-
siderably less discreditable to Dawes in
tellect, and not less creditable to Dawes
morality than the truth as ii is now coming
out with the assistance of the clue I'M
wisely furnished by Dawes himself
When Dawes, frightened by the exposure
in Boston, transferred the venue of
his outrage from Mississippi to
Louisiana, and gave up Heath as his
informant, Senator Jones promptly tele-
graphed to the judge of the district in
which the plantation of this victim of an
unreconstructed community was situated
to learn the facts of the cas-. These facts
are to-day made public; and everybody
who reads the report of them and compares
them with the tale told by Dawes in the
Senate will see that Dawes exaggeration,
garbling and absolute fiction amounted in
the general result to sheer invention, or, as
Horace Greeley would have said, to "a
naked lie." If Dawes had been composing
professed fiction, and anybody had pro-
duced these facts as the basis of his ro-
nance, it would have been universally con-
ced that the facts did not in the least affect
the validity of Dawes claim as an inven-
tor. The plantation" with all its FAC
tories and the 1900 or 400 men with their
families" of Dawes romance, came down
to q farm of $50 acres, which, with all the
buildings upon it, was assessed at W, 500,
although Dawes victim Of intoler-
ance had contrived to get it
mortgaged to the extent of something
over $12, 900. Nobody had been murder
ed" A mill had, in fact, been burned,
but the belief of the neighbors of the own
er and mortgagor is that he set 1t on fire
himself in order to collect the insurance
which he had succeeded in etfecting for
more than its market value. The insur-
ance was $1,000. The appraisers esti-
mate of the value of the mill was $1,400.
So general was this belief, that the grand
Jury was only restrained by a lack OF posi-
Dawes outrage for arson. The judge of the
court was of the opinion that the evidence
would have justified an indictment. and it
is expected that an Indictment will be
found at the next session of the grand
jury. What Dawes will do under the ex-
posure remains to be seen. 1t is of more
importance to know what the people of
Massachusetts will do about 1t. If they
like to be represented in the senat by a
man who is capable of converting the
burning of a mill by man who has insur-
ed it for more than its value into ''po-
Ii teal" outrage and the incendiary into a
martyr to the principles of the Republican
party, and basing on these fabrications an
abusive indictment of an American state,
there is no more to be said about them.
But Dawes reputation in the senate and
in the country is established. No state
ment pretending to be a statement of fact
and supported only by the testimony OF
Dawes win henceforth have the least
weight upon the opinion of that body or
pnblic opinion