Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1884-09-23
New York Mail and Express.
Mr. Blaine's Defence of His Family

We cannot understand the nature nor de-
sire the society of any intelligent democrat
who does not feel both ashamed and indig-
nant because of the brutal and beastly party
warfare on James g. Blaine that has called
out the letter addressed to William Walter
Phelps
The partisan malignity that has invaded
the sanctities of Mr.. Blaine's family and
sought to reach him politically, while breath
ing false and slanderous insinuations against
helpless non combatants, IS of a vileness so
ghoulish as to be beneath the common cate
gories of mere criminality-from theft to
murder. Macaulay once made a startling
statement with regard to the perils of Euro
pean civilization when he spoke of the sue
cessive dangers to the civilization from the
Northern barbarians and from the Turk. and
warned his readers that in the great cfties of
Europe were millions OF savages fiercer and
less humane than either GOths or Turks, and
ready. if given chance, to Guido either of
the older terrors of Europe in violence, rapine
and destruction.
So, even in this country, where the con-
querers in the greatest of civil wars had not
the heart to hang even single traitor where
magnanimity. manhood and chivalric respect
for all respectable women are too common to
be regarded as virtues where a lone woman
can travel the length and breadth of
this land unprotected, safe and uninsulted;
where in no chance gathering of ordinary
men would any man be allowed, unrebuked
and unpublished. to make SIAN
derous imputation affecting the honor of a
decent family-in this country, of all others,
and in this peculiar campaign. there have
been journalists and politicians vile and low
and dastardly enough to circulate ISLANDERS in
regard to the early married life of Mr.. and
Mrs Blaine-whose domestic life, for over q
generation, has been as open and known to
the world as that of any married couple in
the country.
Not one of the wretches who gave his COW
ardly whispers to the circulation of the vague
and variously stated scandal knew that there
was a word of truth in what he said, as he
said it Not one of these Shiny reptiles could
have known this. What they limited, or sug-
gested or insinuated, should not have been
set or kept afoat moment without clear, ex-
act, overwhelming proof, and not then, with
out some peculiar provocation. If the only
relations sustained by these wretches to soci-
ETY. were as venomous reptiles engaged in Sc
cretng and distlling their poison of scandal
in their furtive WAYS, it would be well to get
the entire species out of their holes and be-
fore the converging wrath of some big as r.
sembly of honest men and have them public.
ly put to death, as monsters beneath human
contempt and incapable of receiving the Di-
vine forgiveness.
Those too partisan democrats who have
| allowed their minds to be soiled and sullied
by entertaining even the passing notion that
''there might be something in the Blaine
family scandal" and who are yet men and
not vipers. will not be able to read Mr..
Blaine's touchingly frank and manly account
of the simple facts explaining his Kentucky
marriage. without first a burning blush of
shame that they allowed the demon of dirt to
enter and foul their minds for an instant, and
then manly sympathy with Mr.. Blaine. No
true husband, no manly man, can read Mr..
Blaines complete unfolding of the facts in
the beginning of his unusually long and
happy married life. without feeling that touch
of noble and true nature that will make
him find in the writer of such a letter. some
thing better and broader than the best and
broadcast politician can be, as such.
| Mr.. Blaine acted after the instincts of a
frank nature, in writing to his intimate friend
and counsellor, Mr.. Phelps. the whole story
of his marriage. and intrusting to the discre-
ton of MIR. Phelps to publish or withhold
the statements that would forever put an end
to the scandal which is now in the courts. so
far as the speech or tolerance of all decent
| people shall be concerned.