Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1885-01-15
a MuewuMp.s oPINloN.


J The Idea of an Independent Newspaper
of Biainc's Post-Election Haranxue at
Augusta.
Had it been Mr.. Blaine's purpose to
destroy the lingering traccs of the illu-
sion. at one time quite general IN the
Republican party, that he was states
man, he could not have gone
about itsin sI1rer way than in his Au-
gusta speech. Had he also wished,
with his reputation as a statesman, to
bury his much better earned fame as q
politician, he could not have done so
more effectively. Whether we consider
his amazing address as the review by a
public man with a quarterof a century's
experience of the most momentous polit-
ical contest with which he had to do. or
as the programme of a political leader
Tor an ultimate reversal of the result of
that contest, it is a wonder of auda-
cious folly and shallow falsehood.
Those who have opposed Mr.. Blaine
election hardly expected that from his
own lips, almost before the verdict of
the people lad reached the remoter re-
gions OF the Union, he would give them
a complete and startling Justification of
their course. Nor could they have inn
agined that candidate, whom a change
of few hundred votes would have
elected, would have made haste to ut
4 teriy break down the confidence of the
intelligent men among his followers in
his honesty, his common sense and his
political sagacity, so that the most zeal
Gus of them would never again dare to
bring his name before a party conyen-
ton.
1t was to have been expected, and
might hava been pardoned, that Mr..
Blaine would seek to explain away the
cause of his defeat, and would shrink
from acknowledging that it was his own
proved vices of mind and morals. Nor
is it surprising that he should have vent
ed his vulgar spite on the cities of New
York and Brooklyn, in which honest
Republicans baked the plans he had
laid to win by the votes of the more ig-
norant Democrats. But it is incompre-
hensible that he should have presented
n statement of the influence of the
Southern States in the late election, and
of the consequences of their share in the
result, which is not only unfounded in
fact, but which is so stale that it has
trils of thinking people. 1t was just
four months before his Augusta Grafton
that he gave to the country his letter of
acceptance, laden with phrases of hon.
eyed sweetness for his beloved brethren
and possible supporters of the South.
Then he declared that ttprejudices had
yielded and were yielding, while a gen.
erous cordiality warmed the Southern
and the Northern heart alike" Then
he asked; ''Can any one doubt that be-
tween the sections confidence and es-
TEEN are to-day more marked than at
any period in the sixty years preceding
the election of President Lincoln?n
Then he assured his countrymen that
Southern Commonwealth were learn
ing to vindicate civil rights and adapt
ing themselves to the conditions of POI
itical tranquility and Industrial prog
ress," and he blandly expressed his be-
lief that eff there were occasional and
violent outbreaks in the South against
this peaceful progress the public opin-
ion of the country regarded them as
exceptional. and hopefully trusted that
each would prove the LAST
All this honey on the tongue of the
aspiring candidate is turned to gall and
NORWOOD by defeat Now he speaks
OF the union of the Southern States with |
New York, New Jersey, Connecticut |
and Indiana-of the voters in South
ern population of 10000 COO with the !
voters IN q Northern population of |
nearly 5000, 000-as ga great National |
misfortune. as introducing into the
Republic the rule of a minority He |
accuses the South of having crushed |
out the political power of more than six |
oil Nd Of h.,
ing transferred it by violence to |
others."s And he declares of this result /
that "patriotism. self-respect, pride, |
protection for person and safety for
country all cry out against it. The /
very thought of it, he exclaims, with
simulated Indignation, '.stirs the blood
of men who inherit equality from the
Pilgrims who first stood on Plymouth
Rock and from liberty-loving patriots
who came to the Delaware with William
Penn Nor does he content himself |
with this incendiary but rather frothy
denunciat;on. He seeks to illustrate"
his meaning by statistics. He declares
that in 1.-The eleven States that COM
prised the rebel Confederacy'' ''the col
ored population, almost to a man, de-
sire to support the Republican party.
but by system of cruel intimidation,
and BY violence and murder whenever
violence and murder are thought neces-
sary, they are absolutely deprived of all
political power He then cites the five
States of Louisiana. Mississippi, Ala
bama, Georgia and South Carolina in
comparison with Wisconsin, Iowa, Min
nesota, Kansas and California, each
group with 48 Electoral votes, and the
former with one half the white popula-
ton of the latter, and says: 1.-The white
men in those Southern States, by usurp-
ing and absorbing the rights of the col
ored men, are exerting just double the
political power of the white men in the
Northern States.
Now, it is perfectly well known to
MIR. Blaine that in the eleven exon
federate States, casting 81 Electoral
votes, there are only three-Louisiana.
and South Carolina-inwhich
the negroes are in majority, SO that
if his assumption were correct that the
negroes are all Republicans, they could
not, had they all voted for him, have
given him more than &c Electoral votes,
or 10 less than New York throws
against him, and four less than are
given against him by Indiana. Com
necticut and New Jersey. He knows,
also, that the majority of negroes in
Louisiana was in 1880 but 29, ZOO in
over goo, 900, or but three per cent; that
the negro vote was divided there, and
that there is not particle of evidence
that there was any intimidation, and
that If he had obtained fhe votes of