Knoxville daily chronicle. [volume] (Knoxville, Tenn.) 1870-1882, 1882-08-24
PUBLIC SPEAKING
BY VIM. Rule. Candidate For Congress.
Last Night.
A Large and Attentive Audience Listen
to Him.
L. C. Houk's Record Shown Up In a
Glaring Light,

l.. y. RECORD SHOWN Up IN u
GIaring Light,
To the Utter Discontinue and Disgrace
of the Little Boss,
According to announcement in the city
papers and notice given by the eircu-
lation of DODGERS a large crowd of
representative citizens of Knox
vile was assembled Tuesday night, in
front of the courthouse, to hear a
speech by VIM. Rule, Esq, editor of the
CHRONICLE, and candidate for Congress in
the second district of Tennessee. Music
was furnished by the colored brass band,
and the crowd was gathered at an early
hour. Without any preliminaries the
speaker took the stand and spoke in sub
stance as follows:
FELLOW CITIZENS: Recent events seem
to have made 1t necessary that | should ad-
dress you this evening. few weeks ago,
while L was absent attending the funeral of
my old mother, my competitor made what
he called speech from this stand,
made up principally of abuse
of me and my friends Last
Friday night he gave repetition of the
same thing, with very little variation. l
requested division of time, which request
as many of you know, was arbitrarily re
fused. | promised then to address you on
future occasion, and am here tonight to
keep my promise. | thank you, one and
all, for your presence here.
[ have resided in this city and in a few
miles of it, all my life; was born within six
miles of this courthouse. My father be-
fore me was born also in Knox county
Everything have and am l owe to the peo-
pie of Knox county. | have been a resi-
dent of this city for more than quarter
of a century; came to town green country
boy; was met with open arms and have
since been honored with positions of trust
But [ am not here to speak of myself. II
is unnecessary to announce that l am can
didate for Congress-; nor is it necessary to
give my views on the political
questions of the day. l have been
connected in some way with the public
press for 20 years or more; for more than
IL years in an editorial capacity, and have
had occasion to discuss every question be-
fore the people. My views are well known.
While in the heat of political strife, | may
have said and wrote things should not
have DONE but am not here to make any
apology. 1t is not necessary.
I1egret that the circumstances are such
that L cannot speak to you IN way more IN
accord with my tastes than is necessary.
My competitor aud myself belong to the
same party. We agree, l suppose, on all
the great political questions. Tue Issues on
all political questions are not SO sharply de-
fnd as they were few years ago. Four
years ago we were all divided Oh the cur
rency question. Now we have the best
currency we ever had aud as far as | know,
every body is satisfied. And, if elected, l
would oppose the reopening of the ques-
ton IN such a way as to disturb the country.
AS to the tariff, if called on to vote, l
should sustain the old Wing doctrine of
protective tariff. Am also in favor of in
ternal improvements, at the expense of the
general government.
My competitor has been in Congress for
three years, and has record,
which is public property. 1, as one of his
constituents, have right to criticise it, and
you have right to know of it. Upon this
L propose to speak for a short time. In the
first place | will refer to his position on the
claims question. Judge Houk has tried to
create the impression that we have
never had a member in Congress
before who looked after the
peoples interests, at all. He comes before
the people and makes great claims of what
he has done. He claims that all who have
received payment for government claims
since he was in Congress, have received it
through his influence alone. Now, there is
not one word of truth In this claim. If
there are any in this audience who have had
claims, they know that it is impossible to
get the payment, unless the claim is prop
erly made out before. {Here he explained
at some length the modus operandi of get
| ting claim through, how it must be in
vestigated thoroughly by appointed agents,
and If the proof is sufficient you get the
money; if not not yon don't.) 1t is
piece of hypocrisy. Judge Houk is
| attempting to perpetrate a fraud, pull
the wool over the eyes of the people and
claim credit, when he is entitled to none
whatever. There are another class of
claims, requiring special act to secure
their payment. In the three years of his
Congressional career, Houk presented as
many as 600 of these claims, at least, and
in the three years secured the passage of
one bill If he keeps up at the same ratio,
the people will have to keep him in Con-
gress 1900 years to secure the payment of
these 600 bills. Now, all these claims and
boasts of his are to deceive you. 1 am
willing to give him all the credit he is en-
titled to.
But, there is another question When
you elected Houk in 1873 aud 1880, you ex-
pected him to attend promptly to his
duties; be present In his seat, and when
| any important measure comes up, vote for it.
Did he do it ? The Congressional Record
| contains faithful report of the proceed
lngs of Congress every day. At the last
! session of the 46th Congress, there wre
1D7 roll calls How 0ftan do
he answered to roll-call The Record shows
that he answered only Is times out of 1877
In other words, the man paid $1,000 to
look after your interests in Congress was
absent during the entire session more than
six-sevenths of his time. Now, would
you permit such a thing in ordinary busi-
ness transactions? Most certainly, No.
Now, 1 have stated nothing but facts
about these things. 1t is matter of pub
lie record, If | have misrepresented him
all he has to do is to bring up the Record
and prove the contrary. He can't do it.
The charge was made by me weeks ago,
| and his organ in this city said in answer to
1t that the most active members of Con-
gress are those least often in their seats,
but that is too absurd to talk about.
Now, this Is bad, but it is not half as
strong as the reasons he gives for this ab-
oSAANN- - A4N SONA<
we would condone the short-coming. But,
if he states, in excusing himself, what is
known to be willfully untrue, he adds the
sin of falsehood to his many short comings
What does he say about it ? He doesn't de-
ny it. He pretends to account for it in sucka
way that everybody knows he is attempting
to deceive the people. He says he spent
two weeks going to Baltimore to court
bright eyed girl, whom, he says, he made
Mrs. Houk But more. He says he went
to Nashville to help elect United States
Senator. What are the facts? In the en-
| joyment of his honeymoon he went to the
capital of his State, to the most public no.
tel in the city, and lay there for two weeks
Gagged up in his room, with his bright-eyed
wife, as he says, in a state of beastly intoxi-
cation. Now let him deny it. have made
the charge time and again before. He had
| the effrontery, on some OCCASIONS to deny