The Sunday herald. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1866-1887, 1882-12-24

now HANCOCK WAS DEFEA TED.
The value Of the Garfield Dorsey CORE
spondence TO the publisher of it seems slight
indeed to the public at large it is very
great. This may be said in no mere partisan
spirit; it is highly important to men of all
parties to know how political campaigns are
carried on, where their money is applied,
what they have to contend against in Sc
suring an expression of the popular will and
best Judgment. The Garfield letters reveal
q sickening state of affairs. They reflect not
SO much upon the since murdered man, who
was an impressionable being, the creature
Of his surroundings and circumstances, as
upon the party organization which put him
forward and supported him. Throughout
these long epistles back and forth there is
not one word about principle, honesty, the
public interest, or any hint Of appealing to
reason or intelligence. 1t is a constant tall,
about expediency, men, means, trickery,
lodges, partisan advantages, preiudices that
may be worked upon, double-dealing here
and there, and above all constant appeal
for money, money, money Everything is
upon the lowest and most groveling plane,
without one elevated or redeeming senti-
ment. Whatever point is lost or feared for,
there is only one remedy suggested pour in
more cash, and all will he we'll Garfield is
like the daughters OF the horse-leech, crying
"give give" while at his end of the line
Dorsey is not only calling upon Brady aud
the star Route funds, but assiduously after
the New York stock -iobbers and monopolists
who wanted judges appointed and other ia
vors done, or men like Levi p. Morton who
wanted to buy big Offices in advance-a we'll
understood method of Republican campaign
ing since Grants day.
The letters leave no room for doubt, it
there was any before, that Indiana was
bought outright, the expression about
hiring men to watch Democrats " being
an easy euphemism to express the buying
of voters, it being well understood that
each OF these selfappointed watchers would
be venal eleotor expected to vote and
work for his employers. But would it he
believed that the pious candidate of the
Republican party was using the religious
creed, of which he was not only an exponent
hut an eXhorter, as a fulcrum TO hoist him
into a worldly political office If this was
not a dissertation of religion and the sancti-
ties of the pulpit, then we know of none.
Repeatedly in his letters does Garfield speak
of the work among the " Disciples, ;" as he
calls them, aud the committee to which he
writes evidently does not disdain the sug-
/ geston.
| What became OF these vast sums so dis.
! gracefully raised and so disgracefully spent
will probably never he fully known, nor
even why SO much OF it went in apparently
mysterious ways, as for instance the tens of
thousands to Johnny" Davenport to sup
! press an alleged forgery, the Morey letter, on
which public opinion is slowly swinging to
the late conviction that it was only too
genuine. 1t is sell-evident that ten thousand
dollars could not possibly be spent in the
very start of the Morey letter investigation
!
jury. Enough is known, however, TO repel
all honest and thinking men from the rotten
hulk of a party which in its decadence uses
such means as these to succeed. Publicity
and a shortness of funds would evidently
have proved fatal to it at any time during
1850. Secrecy and corruption, under the
party dictatorship of a Dorsey, narrowly car.
ried it through. 1t is not necessary to refer
back to George Washington as standard OF
comparison. Can any one imagine General
Hancock writing such letters in the
heat of the campaign as those of his COM
petitor-begging for money as his only hope
asking how the 90 Disciples - were doing, So
liCiting personal enemies Gas Grant and
Conkling We're to Garfeld) to attend his
meetings and indorse him, and studiouslv
Ignoring throughout one word of scrupe
conscience, patriotism, or the great principle,
on which the campaign was supposed to b,
fought! The mere suggestion of such dick
ering in connection with him is absurd. 1
is not only more honorable for him ant
his party to have failed in 1850 than to hav,
succeeded as the Republicans did, but W,
believe that it will conduce to a greater anC
more permanent triumph of the Democratic
party and its tenets hereafter. The hear
and intelligence of this people are sound an,
the reckoning between raScality and honest,
ing for being deferred.