Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1882-08-30
fCon,inued from frs, page. J

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closely balanced than the House, did not de-
pend. a. believe II very probably will de-
pend upon the vote of the Senatorial struggle
in this State. if these transcendent national
| issues were not here to engross and enguif
/ your attention. and you were called upon To
enlist your entire services in aid OF what they
call State campaign you would find arrayed
before you two powers, the republican party
on the side Of the Constitution and the law
and the orderly government Of the State and
| YOU would find a Governor for the second
time, Gsrceion being the first, and Piaisted
| his bad imitator-you would find Governor
| in rebellion against the orderly government
Of the State. (Applause-)
George the Second. was once, it is said,
very much disturbed about the parliamentary
elections. Robert Walpole was his Prime
Minister a. shrewd a one as ever admin
istered the affairs of England, and he said TO
him with native good sense, "four Majesty
need have no fear of the election as long as
wheat is sixteen shillIngs quarter and the
crops are good"
Now that contains a vast deal of political
wisdom, and it contains lesson that is pre-
ciselv opposite here, and now, because this
country tonight. from ocean to ocean, and
| from lake to gulf, presents degree OF pros
peritv more widespread, more general, more
| firmly based and founded than ever before in
| its history.
| Now | do not say that legislation has
brought about all that, out legislation has
aided it, and it certainly has not hindered 1t.
| II you wait for the law to grow crops or spin
cotton or to forge iron and steel you wait for
a long time; but, if you feel that the law is
behind you and above you and around you,
protecting and encouraging you, you raise
| 81 md f,pn he
steel with good deal more assurance of
good prices and fair market, and all that
the law could do, and all that wise ad-
ministration of law has been able to effect
| can be claimed by the republican party, with
out a title of division of the honor with any
other party of the country. Loud applause
For twenty one years past. last March, the
destiny of the United States of America. in
80 far as that destiny can be controlled by
political party, has been in the keeping OF
the republican party of the United States and
if there be a greater chapter of history
written in the annals of human kind | would
like for Governor Plaisted or any other
gentleman supporting him to be kind enough
to point it out. If there be any chapter of
history in which human progress has been so
rapid, in which human rights have been guar
anteed so firmly and enlarged so grandly as
look for it and where to find it. And now,
ut the end of these twenty-one years, in this
blessed year of 1882, we find an opposition
made up of two or three parties; and what do
thew propose to do ? Nothing. The positive
measures. the aggressive policies, the defini
ton of the line and the metes and bounds of
legisl ation have all been taken and pre-
scribed by the republican party, and outside
of it we have had objection and cavil and
bubble and SANDER, and all manner Of honor
able and mean critics, following as camp
followers after a great procession that has
gone ahead, but l challenge any gentleman
to show that in the whole of the twenty
years, the democratic party and its various
side issues like the greenback and labor and
other organizations, has ever proposed a
measure that was able to be materialized in
to the form of a bill or resolve in the
Congress of the United States for the
amelioration of any human woe or for the
advancement of any public good. applause
Whatever may be said of the Republican
party, and that party could be in power 81
wears and not make mistakes would be alb
surd, that a party could have millions of
people and not have dishonest man among
them would be absurd; but whatever NAV be
said of the republican party there is one
thing that never can be truthfully said--it
never can be said that it was not a brave
party it never can be said that it had drop
of towards blood in its whole organization.
(Applause.) Never. When that institution
that represented five thousand millions of dol
lars encased in the prejndices of two centur
les and representing the labor element of
fifteen states and thirteen millions of people
stood in the way of the Union, the republican
party smote it with the sword of justice and
-. nd nj
from that hour to this. never in any crisis
that in these full twenty-one years of the
republican party's majority, never in
one case, has it been unwilling or unable or
afraid to take the responsibility. And, gen.
tlemen, you pirate of the South and of the
wrongs done to it. Why, since Maine was
State, aye, identically since Maine was a
State,-the date serves me precisely-coming
in on top of the great Missouri compromise,
that first wide and deep agitation of the slave
~ question, never, from that hour to this, in
the sixty-two years that have interviewed, has
the feeling between the North and South been
as cordial and fraternal as it is tonight.
(Applause.)
Never has the time been when in every
county and district and settlement of the
South the veriest abolitonist and blacklist re-
publican and the duskiest African could come
and go under the guarantee of this great con-
stitutioual amendment which the republican
party engrafted on the organic Law, and we
have held the faith. We have never compro-
missed the right and, at the end ofthat history
whose first magnificent chapter was opened
in this state under the lead of that Senator,
who, had he been an inhabitant of an ancient
city, would have given his name to the city
and Portland would have been known in
| history as the residence of Senator Fessenden
Maine placed herself the first, or at least
| abreast of the first in that great contest
" hich has fructifed in the magnificent vic
tories have vainly attempted to describe.
| Is il perhaps now in the hour of absolute vic
tory, in the hour Of complete and spotless
| triumph, in the hour we have wrung from the
| civilized world the profits which victory and
success always bring. in the hour when we
have won the respect and fear of our political
opponents,-is that the hour when the Dirigo
State will take a backward step in order to
aid Governor Piaisted in a petty rebellion
against the authority of the State?
Mr.. Blaine was frequently interrupted by
applause, and the approval of the audience
was especially marked while he was discuss
ing State issues and exposing Plaisted's sham
cant and hypocrisy. The trenchsnt blows
dealt at the fusionists, aud the keen thrusts at
His Excellency, the Supreme and only Exec
utive. greatly pleased his hearers. The ar
gument he made was clear, concise and