Democratic Northwest. [volume] (Napoleon, Ohio) 1869-1894, 1888-05-31
THE OLD FIGHT AGAIN.
AND ALL THE ELEMENTS IN FAVOR
OF cLEvELAND,s REELECTION.

Two weIghty Facts-A United Democracy.
Enthusiasm for Observation-Disclosures Deep
Game and How 1t Disgusts the Favor
Ite sors"-HIstorIcal Precedents.
Here are two little facts for "our
friends. the enemy" to wrestle with: No
president renominated has ever been de.
feated unless commercial revulsion had
come 10 the meantime; and the united De-
mocracy has only been beaten twice since
the constitution was adopted. These are
only precedents, they may say, and pre-
cedents may be overthrown. Well, let
us take few more facts. In the first
place, It is now evident that Mr.. Cleve-
land will enter the campaign with the
hearty and enthusiastic Endorsement of
his party, while If Mr.. Blaine runs he
will enter it only at the end Of ma
neuver which many Republicans have al
ready denounced as a disreputable trick,
with a certainty of leaving the sup
porters of some other gentlemen in very
ugly temper.
How could it be otherwiseH Mr.. Blaine
issued his Jones letter, which was under
stood by every honest reader to be an Of
fetal notice to the ''favorite sons" that
they could take the field; and take it they
did with a grand rush. Now the Blaini.
acs propose to put the laugh on them, to
announce in the true Rip Van Wrinkle
style, that I'VE don't count that swear off
zis time" and that Mr.. Blaine only with
drew in Pickwickian sense to give the
other candidates room to slay each otherl
So Mr.. Blaine is to be credited with hay
ing told nice little political fib, and the
other fellows are to be laughed at for hav-
ing believed him. A man can take defeat
and smile; but to be defeated and laughed
at-ah, that is what will hurt!
"But we won't nominate Mr.. Blaine"
you say. Won't you, though, with
nearly three-fourths of the delegates al
ready chosen from the controlling states
known to be for him2 True, many south
ern delegates are for Sherman; but what
does a southern delegation amount to in
Republican convention? Flanagan, of
Texas, will be there, perhaps, and Malone,
of Virginia, and few other ere
formed rebels" like Longstreet, Mosby s.
Co.; and Flanagan will repeat his immor
tai query, "What are we here for if not
for the ofices?" and when the New York
delegation points out, as it will be able to
do, that New York money can be had for
Blaine and Blaine only in the campaign,
we all know how the southern stampede
will turn If you really think Blaine will
not be nominated, just ponder this ques,
ton: Can you name single convention,
state or congressional, in which there has
been tussle between Blaine and anti
Blaine, that the Blaine faction has not
completely downed the other fellows,
wiped the floor with them? Even in Vir-
ginia the once all powerful Malone could
not create a respectable diversion in favor
of Ohio's senatorial iceberg. The conven-
tion will nominate Mr.. Blaine, and in that
act will fix upon him the stigma of dis
honesty; they will say, in effect, our man
was only playing one of his Mulligan
tricks when he wrote that Florence letter,
and we knew him too well to believe him.
A few Republican editors attempt to
draw consolation from the fact that JEFF
ferson, jackson and Harrison were re-
nominated and elected after defeat. Let
us see about those precedents In 1895
there was no organized party supporting
jefferson; as soon as the Demo -Republi-
can party was organized it elected him
And jackson was not defeated by the peo-
pie in 1924; he obtained more electoral
votes, the votes of more states and many
more popular votes than either of the
other three candidates. He received 1885,
S72 votes to 105, ,321 for Adams, and yet
the latter was made president by pecu.
liar hugger mugger in the house of repre-
has never boasted and which patriots gen.
orally have tried to forget. The people
were so indignant over it that they gave
jackson more than two-thirds of the elec.
oral votes in 1928. The Republicans are
quite welcome to any consolation they can
draw from that precedent. In 1885 Van
Buren, beat Harrison; the great panic of
183740 produced the usual results and
Harrison was elected in 1910 Now, if
there had been panic in Cleveland's first
term-but the Republicans are compelled
to admit that all their prophecies Of 1884
have been falsifed
The American people in 1884 voted for
change. and there is no evidence that
they have repented There is every rea-
son to believe that they will insist on
maintaining the new regime until Mr..
Clevelands policy IS fairly tested. The
problem is simple one in the Rule of
Three" II with Mr.. Cleveland untried.
with 1000 federal oficeholders working
against him, with the usual cry Of dan
ger to the business interests, with per,
sonal defamation of Mr. Cleveland and
Mr.. Blaino's prestige of success, they were
still unable to elect the latter in 1884, how
much will they fall short in 1888 with all
these forces neutralized or working the
other way?
Shcrman's Little Boom.
Visitor at residence on X street, Wash
inotoN n ~ lin oraaf a1orml-What