St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1885-08-08
GRANTS RELATION TO POLITICS


GRANTS RELATION TO POLITICS.
People who wonder that GRANT should
have made the mistake OF entering pOliti-
cal life after his military fame had been as
sured are perhaps unconscious of the fact
that even his military career was the out
come of political maneuvering. The CON
gresham who gave him his cadetship at
West Point did SO under the ~stricteSt Oper-
alton OF the "spoils system" The idea OF
a competitive examination was then I'M
known. The appointment went by favor,
and generally III return for political favors
rendered. Young GRANTS father had
been serViceable to the congressman in his
election, and in return for that service the
lad was appointed a cadet at the national
military academy. The father to whose par
tisan activity the boy owed his opportunity
was in his old age made a postmaster by his
son when the latter became president of the
United States. From the day parti-
sanship puthim in West Point GRANT found
politics doing him good turns all along the
checkered career of his e~ventful life. lie
was a Western politician who paved the
exit Of the young officer out of the army
by resignation when a seyerer fate was i'm
pending. JAMES BUCHANAN was presi-
dent at the time and GRANTS political
friend secured the favor through the inhu-
ence of an army officer by the name of
BUCHANAN and a relative of the president.
Afterward, when GRANT was president,
this same Gen. BUCHANAN was command
ant of the Fifth military district and sundry
-. III =, I,,L, LII, -,a,ar-aI -,
the ground that he was a Democrat. Il
was a Democrat when he was" responded
the president, and TO his good offices !
! owe more than l can tell at a time when l
.needed more friends than L had. He shall
stay" And he did stay. 1t was the poll
ticians, WAsHBURNE and YATES, in Illinois,
who made for GRANT the opportunity of a
new career in 1861. Gov. YATES invented
the office of military adviser to the execu-
tive" having no place known to the law in
which to put him until WAsHBURNE urged
his appointment as a colonel. Thus We
see that the man always had relations &c
politics although never an active politician,
and from these facts we are enabled to
temper what is well known of his subse-
ouent political career. When GRANT en-
tered the presidency it was with the deter
animation to be president himself, and no
to nave the politicians be president through
him. Butt the period of self assertion in the
presidency did not lastlong. The politicians
were too strong for him. The collapse
dates from the time when boutwell, wa
forced into the cabinet in place of A. Il.
STEWART, who was found to be ineligible
under an old law which had slumbered on
the statute book for t-hree-quarters of :
century and which was forgotten by every
body except that reservoir of useless
learning, CHARLES SUMNER. He brought i
to notice out of a mixed sense of vanity and
duty, and the politicians seized upon it to
get control of the treasury department.
From that time on, during the two term.
OF his administration, the government was
simply, in commission, controlled by the
senatorial group, CoSKLTNG, CAMERON,
LOGAN and the other stalwartS.
The calm verdict of history will be that,
In his political career, GRANT was the mar.
tyr of his excessive confidence in i'll
selected and undeserying friends. His
torical events cOincident with his admins.
trations are grouped rs follows: The adop.
ton OF the fifteenth amendment with the
passage of reconstruction acts which now
plague the party which adopted them, witt
the enactment of the civil rights acts which
the courts have declared invalid, with the
settlement Of the Alabama claims, with tht
rise of the Greenback party. with the evo
luton of the Liberal movement. with tn,
origin and abandonment of the civil servic,
reform project, with the happening of tn,
Credit N0bilier, post. trade. naval and Gus
tens frauds, with the passage of the back
pay measure, with the endeavor to annex
San Domingo, with the inception o
the granger movement, with the re
session of the decision on the legal ten
der act, with the attempted Impeachment
of BELKNAP, with the overthrow of civil
rule in Louisiana and with the election OF
Mr.. TILDEN and the fraudulent seating OF
r. 3. HAYES.
Upon these events the opinion of the
country was passed at the time. And ye-
the Judgment of his countrymcn with an
aifectlonate discrimination has accorded to
Gen. GRANT the credit of good intention:
and the blame for bad results TO the oil
garchy of advisers who invested in his famt
and traded on his name. His political his.
tory will not add to his fame. but SO great
was that fame on other accounts that his
political mistakes can never subtract from
it. Fortunately for his renown. the Amer.
can people have unloaded the faiIings of his
administration of the government on tbe
unworthy politicians who schemed gains
his peace and against his place i'm the hearts
OF bis countrymen, and have sent them out