The Valley Virginian. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1865-1895, 1884-10-02

and audacity of the devices resorted to by
the Democratic party to win success. Not
even the mule frauds of Barnum OF 1876,
or the attempt to steal the electoral vote
of Oregon or to purchase those OF Florida
and South Carolina, nor the Morey letter
forgery of 1880, surpass it in mendacious
venality and brazen wickedness. MI.
Blaine has been the target of all their pois-
oned shafts. His great prominence in
public life and the eminent services he
has rendered the, country in the field OF
national legislation and diplomacy, seem
to have only whetted the appetite of his
maligners, stimulated their inventive ge-
MUS, and flooded the country with lie after
lie, in such rapid succession. that 1T has
been a task to refute one before another
was conceived. SANDER, like death, loves
shining mark, and the higher and brighter
the representative of people the more I'M
ceasing anu INSCRIPTIONS the effort to assai
him. Mr.. Blaine has been before the country
in public capacities for thirty years, as ed
itor, as member of the Legislature, speak
er of the House Of Delegates of the State
of Maine, member of Congress from that
State and for three terms speaker of the
House of Representatives, a represen-
tative in the United State Senate from
Maine, and Secretary Of State under Gar
fields administration, and in each and
every position met the responsibilities and
discharged the duties imposed with rare
ability and singular success. His whole
public career has been one of signal
triumph. Not until 1876, when his nomi-
nation for the Presidency seemed almost
assured, did the malignity of his political
foes manifest itself. Then it was that the
| first batch of the Mulligan letters was
spread broadcast over the country, and so
| ingeniously were they selected, both as to
the letters themselves and the time Of their
issuance, that opportunity was not given
to counterfeit the evil influence they were
designed to have. "a falsehood travels
seven leagues while truth is putting on her
boots, - was never more conspicuously il
| Illustrated than in this conspiracy against
Mr.. Blaine. 1t was met as promptly as it
was possible to meet itand SO effectually
| that even his enemies were ashamed OF
their cowardly assault, when the calm in
politics came. This wasevidenced in his I'M
| impaired usefulness IN the House of Repre-
| sentatives and the United States Senate ,and
the flattering compliment paid him by that
august body in confirming his nomination
as Secretary of State, without a refer
ence of it to a committee. No high
Ell testimony to his character, his en-
inent fitness for the great trust, could have
been given than this act, by the unanimous
voice Of every Republican and Democrat
| in the Senate. 1t proclaimed that there
was no stain OF blot upon his name or rep
utation and that he was the proper person
to stand at the head of the Garfield admin
istration in representing this country be-
| fore the powers of the world. North and
South, and especially in the South, and
particularly in Virginia, the Democratic
press from that time to his nomination for
| the Presidency seemed to vie with each
other in sounding his praises. beth as a
| great statesman and friend of the South,
and that he above all other Republicans,
| would be the choice of the Southern peo-
| pie for the Presidency. 1t is fresh in the
public mind, how every Democratic jour-
nal in Virginia strained itself in fulsome
eulogy and culled the English language
| for the most expressive words to present
him as the ideal Republican of the land.
Even here in Staunton he was introduced
to public audience, in a public speech,
| by Gen. Echols, the most prominent and
| influential Demo GRAFT in the county at the
time, as an eminent statesman whom the
people of Virginia delighted to honor, and
the Sentiment was echoed by popular ap-
plause and strains of music. 'sIf we are
to have a Republican President give us
| Blaine. because he is the friend Of the
South and of Virginia, sounded out from
| every corner of the Commonwealth until
| the Chicago Convention of 1884 confirmed
the choice. Everything charged against
him now was known then, and known, too,
to have been the resort of desperate parti-
zanism to injure prominent public char
| acter for party effect, and was condemned
| and repudiated by every fair-minded man
| in the State.
But no sooner was he the authoritative
representative of the Republican party in
a great national contest, than the flood
| gates of SANDER and detraction were opened
and every falsehood. every foul calumny,
rolled under the tongue of every one of
his Democratic traducers as sweet NOR
sci. Not only was the exploded Mulligan
letters of 1876 reproduced, but another
batch of the same nature given to the pub
lie by band of conspirators, in the hope
of influencing the public mind to similar
result to that which followed their sudden
precipitation in 1876. But that powder
had been burnt. 1t was incapable of serv-
ing a like purpose. The mine was sprung
too soon, even had there been anything in
them that had not already been discounted.
Instead Of damage they have proved an alb
solute benefit in explaining anything ques-
tionable in the first letters, taken in their
isolated relation. Instead of evidence to
convict they clearly and completely acquit
and in this the conspirators overreached
themselves.
Then came the disgraceful assault on his
family hearth-the foul calumny upon the
honor of his wife-the fiendish attack up
on his domestic relations, where peace and
purity and love and virtue have presided
from the day the solemn troth of two de-
voted hearts was plighted in the sight of
God and man. Even the tomb was invaded,
and the shaft which commemorated the
brief existence Of innocent childhood, with
ghoul-like ferocity defaced to blacken the
name Of the honored father and mother.
that partizan ends might be subseryed.
Every form of calumny and every class
of falsehood have been invoked to faint the
reputation of Mr.. Blaine both as public |
man and private citizen, but all the nicely
woven webs of venomous hatred and party
desperation have broken at the touch, and |
he stands to-day the ideal statesman of |
the times, the cherished character that re-
fleets the aspirations and inspirations of |