The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1884-06-19
ed to him, had direct pecuniary value.
THE FOURTH CHARGE.

Fourth. Because he obtained certain
letters, which there is every reason to
believe contained matter gravely compro.
missing him, from a perfectly reputable
witness, MIR. Mulligan, who was the prop.
er and lawful custodian of them, after
having vainly tried appeals to his pity,
by pledging his word of honor to restore
them broke this pledge, retained them
by force, and subsequently read such of
them as be pleased to the House in aid
of his vindication that this conduct, if
not legally criminal, was such as no man
aspiring to be the Chief Magistrate of
great nation ought to be even suspected
| of.
THE FIFTH CHARGE.
Fifth. That both his short service as
an executive officer of the government
and the various efforts he has made du-
ring the past eight years to keep the
public in mind of him, have been sensa.
tional and theatrical. indicating a strong
love of notoriety and an absence of the
settled convictions, the sober judgment
and the steadiness Of character which are
needed to make him safe occupant of
any high or responsible administrative
office; and that the means by which his
"booms" are started and promoted-of
which the manner in which his history"
has recently been heralded and produced
is good example-bear too close an
approach to the advertising devices of q
circus or other public show to make the
candidacy of any person resorting to them
anything but humiliation for the party
producing him.
A PACKER OF CONVENTIONS.
LASTLY, it seems to us empbatically
the duty of the independent voters to
repress in some signal way the rapidly
growing practice of packing conventions
under the personal superintendent of
candidates for the Presidency. 1t is of
comparatively recent date. It is only a
few years since Mr.. Tilden excited the
horror of the Republican press by taking
charge of his own canvass and starting a
"literary bureau" to supply puGs of him
self to the newspapers. Since then it
has grown apace, and it now excites no
surprise to hear that any candidate is
actively engaged in using all his powers
of intrigue, chicanery and corruption to
secure the election of delegates all over
the Union, pledged either openly or
secretly to act under his orders at the
Convention, and, if casting votes for him
will do no good, to cast them in such
way as to enable him to carry out any
bargain or "deal" with any other candi-
date which it may have pleased him to
make. The Nominating Convention has
already, through its size as we'll as for
other reasons, lost nearly all semblance
of deliberative body, but it has not yet
become wholly the product of "subsoiling"
carried on by the various candidates
themselves. In this art of packing Con.
ventions Mr.. Blaine is now the greatest
master in the country. His success would
make this art almost the only one which
American statesmen would hereafter cul-
tivate or would apparently need to cult
vate. It is high time, therefore, that he
aud his disciples were made to understand
that it is not by such little games that
the Presidency is 10 be won.-FTom tic
Eueninq Post, AprI7.