Democratic Northwest. [volume] (Napoleon, Ohio) 1869-1894, 1884-11-13
WASHINGTON LETTER.
From our Regular Correspondent


WASHINGTON, d. e., Nov. 8, 1884.
There has never been an election i'm
the history Of the country whose re-
suits have been the cause of such wild
and chimerical speculation as that of
last Tuesday. The game that the Re-
publican leaders will attempt TO play is
the old one of cooking the returns where
they are now held in obeyance, but they
are all watched so sharply that the
game cannot be successfully played this
time. The Republican papers on the
one hand are congratulating the coun-
try upon the narrow escape of the Gov
ernment in falling into the hands Of a
party that would deprive them of the
power to satiate their thievish propen-
sities, while the Democratic papers are
more than jubilant at the prospect of a
new, honest and incorruptible admin
istratiOn.
About the most sickly of these edi-
torial Illumination is one that appears i'm
a morning Republican paper here,
whose pigeon-headed editor expresses
his great satisfaction that the country
has averted the calamity of Cleveland
and a long list of disasters il train,
among which is the danger of another
rebellion. Yet the fact remains, not
withstanding the apprehensions of this
lunk-headed editor, that Mr.. Cleve-
land has got majority of the elec-
toral votes and will be duly inaugurated
as our next Democratic President on
the 4th of next March, showing that the
majority of the fifty-five millions of
good people of the United States have
no such grave fears for their safety in
the hands of Mr.. Cleveland as they
have u right to expect at the hands of
the hero of the Mulligan epistles.
At the commencement of every new
administration it seems to have become
the custom, if not the necessity, to have
the White House thoroughly renovated,
which here means entirely repainted.
The mansion has been standing about
eighty years and therefore involves the
assumption that its woodwork is COW
cred with not less than 240 coats of
white paint. Since Mr.. Arthur's three
years. of occupancy many radical
changes have been made in the interior
of the huose, the walls of all the rooms
having been subjected to the test of ev-
cry possible hue, and every congruous
and incOngruOus style of carpets and
furniture. The chandeliers in the East
Room, costing $1,000 each, have this
season been reburnished at cost of
81 900 more, while those in the Blue
Room have had rubbing up that took
So, 500 to liquidate, because the whole
business had to be transported to Phila-
delphia where the friction is more az
tistic. All in all the White House is q
tremendous bill of expense, land the sen.
timent is beginning to be pretty freely
distributed among our public men that
the President should be permitted to
live a peaceful, quiet and private life just
like other folks, and not be compelled
to keep open house for the reception of
a continuous stream of Doors and bOres
from all parts of the country and every
where in Christendom besides. Let us
hope that the President to be selected
by the American people to-day, who
ever he is, may make the primal move
for the change.
The outlook for the Patent Office to
catch up with its work, now some
three years behind, is somewhat en-
couraging, from the fact that the COM
plants have become so loud and num-
erous as to be no longer resisted. The
excuse of the present Commissioner
that it was impossible for him to bling
the work of the office up because of the
snarl and confusion existing when he
took possession, will not do. He has
had every possible aid that money and
legislation could furnish to accomplish
this work, and besides this the volume
of business during the last summer has
so fallen off that it has contributed in
no small degree to the opportunities for
setting his forces to work upon this old
business. PHONO.