Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1884-09-25
THE. WITTIEST YET.
Address of Mr. ]. P. Dolliver in tn
Iowa Convention.
The Annual E'EIegy OF Griep, for the
Hawkeye Democrats-An Emin.
ent Man Who is Dead aud
Doesn't Know 1t.
[Chicago Tribune.1

temporary chairman only o few minutes be-
fore he was called to the chair. 1t was de-
hvered with such telling effect that it car
ried the convention by storm 1t is filed
with effective shots. Mr.. Dolliver has rapid
" developed greatly as a speaker, and is
now recognized in Iowa as the leader of the
young Republicans. He has been invited to
go into the national campaign, and in few
days will take the stump in West Virginia,
and later in the canvas will speak in Ohio
and Indiana:
Gentlemen of the Iowa Republican Con-
vention: Out of the abundance of my heart
thank you for the honor which your favor
has conferred upon me. 1t builds up a mans
political constitution to take front view of
the fighting strength of the Republican party
of Iowa. If any of you have friends that
are bothered with political dyspepsia, who
find trouble in selecting from the printed bill
of fare of Republican politics, l advise you
TO bring them here and let them look in the
face of this magnificent assembly. Your
conventions have always been delihsrative,
your nominations representative, your cam
paigns popular, and your ballot boxes too
full for utterance of straight Republican
tickets. Consequently, Democrat has not
been seen on the streets of an Iowa city alter
O'Clock on election night for a quarter of a
century. The music of the telegraph Office
has been their annual elegy of grief. They
look upon a bulletin board as an enemy of
free government, and accept the first half of
FrankliE's maxim, ''early to bed, when the
returns are coming in.
The first act of the Democratic party is to
file schedule in bankruptcy. Already
their property is out of their own name.
The national standard is in the hands of
man whose name is not disclosed by the
Democratic national record Four years
ago his name could have prulently been
used as an alias under which to travel incog-
nito all over the known world outside Of
Buffalo To elect him president would be
like lending money to stranger on the
train. 1t takes the cheek of the Democratic
managers to play the whole American peo-
pie for suckers. l thank God that we be-
long to party that saves the crowns of its
public honor for the brow of its actual Lead
ership With the Democratic party nomi-
nations are made not so much to represent
the party as to disguise it. In its long strug-
gle for existence the men who have made
the history of the party go to the wall. 1t
is the only party that ever existed whose
candidate and platform never throw any
light whatever either on its management or
its faith. In fact, modern Democrats Of the
practical school have no creed except the
oath Of office. All the important Democratic
principles are unfit for use. They have
been left out in the field just where they
were Esed 'ast, with not even a bunch Of
s-ramp gra2s thrown over them-in sun and
rain, until rot and rust have done their fatal
work
1t is true they talk piously of the need Of
rsform, and with an inexcusable libel ao-
clse tie integrity of the Republican civil
service They work their favorite classical
allusion to the Augean stables for all there
is in it. These, they assert, must be cleaned
out. Yet from the general appearance of
the crowd that is on hand to do the business
the average citizen is likely to conclude that
their intention is to steal the fork rather
than clean out the barn.
It is true they preempt all sides of the
tariff question. They profess to settle that
issue by jargon Of words without prece-
lent in the annals of nonesense and con-
fusion. You might as well try to ft the
hundred-headed dog of the fable with a
straw hat as to place candid and intelligi-
bic tariff platform under the feet of the
Democratic party. They approach that
question and nearly every other like a man
emptying hard coal ashes in high wind,
with their eyes shut and their backs to the
subject.
Mr. Hendricks is placed upon the Demo-
cratic ticket-not to recall the history of the
Democratic party. No thoughtful Demo-
crat wants that remembered He is on the
ticket for the avowed purpose of reviving
the superstition that surrounds the electoral
count of 1877. With characteristic stupidity
the Democratic managers still think that
the American people have never slept well
since that celebrated question of mathe-
matics was up for settlement They seem to
be afflicted with sort of intellectual shift
lessness that keeps them from the under
standing that the fraud issue died at Gin
cinnati in 1880 by the hand of Thomas A.
Hendricks. The Indictment Of an alleged
momentouS outrage cannot be dismissed for
want of prosecution and the papers in the
case left under the dust of eight years with
out losing interest to the travelling public.
With all due respect to Col Villas, of Wis
consin, say the statute of limitations does
run The descendants of Cleopatra might
as well bring suit against the estate Of
Mark Antony as for the Democratic
managers to parade the venerable
gentlemen who were caught between the
wheels of the electoral commission. In
truth, the American people, remembering
tne long years of political rapine that have
given the south to the Democratic party.
and finding in Mr.. Tilden and Mr. Hen
bricks tire immediate and responsible bene-
ficiaries of those years of felony against the
ballot box i'll the SOUTH have never, to any
visible degree bewailed their memorable
failure TO catch the rail of the hind car in
1871 For one thank the Democratic party
for the fraud issue Miserable and useless in
itself it affords the country a proper occa-
sion to recall that strange decade from 1859
to 1876 during which the Democratic party
upon the ruins of the rebellion contrived
their infamous conspiracy against the civil
rights of the people that in ten states has
left the ballot box fraud and the election
day farce. Laboulaye, the great French
Liberal, now dead just after the civil war
in the United States, took occasion to say
that 'the Republican party of America
holds in its hands the future Of civilization" ="
That was true then. 1t is true now. 1t Is
more certain that the Republican party
shall have future than that it has had q
history.
Now and then you find a Republican who
enjoys the momentary Importance that be-
longs to the kicker and the scratcher. The
shortest road to celebrity nowadays is to ad-
N6TIlSc your COLSClSHCS III lnC newspapers
There are Republicans who treat their con-
science as if it were the stock in trade Of
baking powder factory. They solemnly pro
test that everybody's conscience has alum in
it except theirs They adopt the doctrine Of
Matthew Arnold and insist that in order to
be safe na,ion must furnish he remnant
with complimentary t.ckeSs and a front seat.
They would have the country govern itself
by the advice of persons whose names, if
may borrow phrase from your good friend
Gov. Carpenter, are written in the herd
Look of high political grades.
Only last month a convention was held In
New York parlor, in which the only cre-
dentials called for by the committee were a
written pretense of holiness, and the only
creed required of the membership was
believe in the communion of the saints of
Beacon hill and Franklin square" Let them
commune. l trust they will stick together
till they get thoroughly acquainted with
each other have curiosity TO see the
effect of genuine Democratic candidate on
an unusually sancdfied nostrl. This cam
l.. to uhrrr fn aV