The Somerset herald. [volume] (Somerset, Pa.) 1870-1936, 1884-09-10
A WESTERN SPEECH.
Delivered at the Iowa Republican
State Convention by Chairman
Dolliver

It builds up mans political con-
stitution to take a front view Of the
fighting strength of the Republican
party in Iowa. A Democrat has
not been seen on the streets of Iowa
CITY after 9 o'clock on election night
for a quarter of century. The mu'
sic of the telegraph Office has beer
their annual elegy of grief. They
look upon a bulletin-board as ar
enemy of free government, and ac
cept the first half of Franklin's max
i'm, early to bed, when the returns
are comingin.
The first act of the Democratic
party is to file a schedule in bank
ruptcv. Already their property il
out of their own name. Their ma
tional standard is in the hands of 8
man whose name is not disclosed by
the Democratic national record
Four years ago his name could have
prudently been used as an alias un.
der which to travel incognito all
over the known world, outside of
Buffalo. To elect MIN president
would be like lending money to q
stranger on the train. Modern Dem
ocrats of the practical school have
no creed except the oath OF office
All the important Democratic prin-
iples are unfit for use. They have
been left out in the field just where
they were used last, with not even q
bunch of swamp grass 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 reform, and, with an mex
cusable libel, accuse the 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
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. 1t
is true they pre-empt all sides of the
tariff question. They profess to set
tie that issue by jargon of words
without precedent in the annals of
nonsense and confusion. You might
as well try to fit the hundred-head
ed dog of the ancient fable with a
straw hat, as to place candid and
Ineligible tariff platform under the
feet of the Democratic party. They
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.
Now and then you find a Repub-
lican who enjoys the momentary i'm
portance that belongs to the kicker
and the scratcher. The shortest
road to celebrity nowadays is to ad-
vertise your conscience in the news.
There are Republicans who
treat their conscience as ifit were the
stock in trade of a baking-powder
factory. They solemnly protest that
everybody's conscience has alum in
it except theirs. They adopt the
doctrine of Matthew Arnold and in
sist that. in order to be safe, the ma
ton must furnish the remnant with
complimentary tickets and front
seat. They would have the country
govern itselfb the advice ofpersons
whose names, if | may borrow a
phrase from your good friend Gov
ernor Carpenter, are written in the
herd-book of high political grades.
This campaign will last long enough
to show to every sensible mans eye
that no possible combination of
tight trousers and hay fever can de-
feat the anxious will of the real con-
science ofthis country-the Republi-
can millions of America.
The people of this country like
brains-nervous matter under the
roots of the hair. In James G.
Blaine they find man the scope of
whose faculties is perfect horizon
"a man who knows the size Of this
nation-a man who knows the his
tory of this nation-a man who
knows the strength of this nation
a man who knows the rights of this
nation-a man who comprehends
with serene faith the mission of
the Republic and its sublime desti-
ny in the midst of the nations and
the ages.