Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1888-01-04
A Forced Confession.

Speaking Of the Free Trade banquet in
Boston last week, the Boston Journal says
Of two distinguished Mugwumps, Mr.. |
James Russell Lowell and Mr.. George
Curtis, that s'their enthusiasm for
Cleveland Is again unbounded. and they
leave no doubt of their awakened zeal or
the influence which inspired it, Mr.. Cleve-
land has the Free Trade recommendation
in his recent message to thank for their re-
newed support. Mr.. Lowell was the
presiding genius at last evenings dinner,
and his speech of welcome makes quite
plain the reasons which keep him Mug
wump. Only an extreme Free Trader, re-
joicing in the Presidents Endorsement of
his views, would speak of him az the ''best
representative of the higher type of
Americanism since Lincoln and follow
up this extraordinary sentence with the
most fulsome praise. There sre some
millions of his fellow-countrymen who
will not agree with Mr.. Lowell and ac-
cept his estimate of Americanism as their
own. They are men who are grateful to
Grants memory and proud of Garfield's
fame, and they will look on Mr.. Lowelfs
bold comparison as something almost akin
to sacrilege."
Mr.. Curtis's letters more moderate. 1t
commends the message rather than the
man who wrote it, but it speaks as I'M
mistakably as the words Of Mr.. Lowell OF
confirmed and increased Mugwump zeal.
He, as well as his cO-laborer. no doubt sees
his way more clearly to a strenuous sup
port of Mr.. Cleveland in the next cam
pagn that if his Free Trade declaration
had been less final and explicit. His po-
sition, as well as that of Mr.. Lowell. in
pledging their loyalty anew in this sig
nificant manner, and at this particular
gentleman has any place in the Republican
party or the slightest sympathy with it,
and exposes the real cause of their with
drawal in the campaign of 1884. Mr..
Lowell and Mr.. Curtis do not stand alone.
They have certain Mugwump following,
which, like them, has now no place in the
Republican party, from whose ranks it
came. Their original detection occasioned
no laments; their present purpose to re-
main aloof should cause none. Mr.. Cleve-
land has won a title to RepubH AN graft
tude by his unmistakable defining of the
issue, and the Mugwumps who ostenta
tiously indorse him, following in the lead
of Mr.. Lowell and Mr.. Curtis, are men
whom the Republicans can spare"
Cleveland has not only unmasked him
self as Free Trader, thus indicating the
trend of his party, but he has done the
Republicans special service by exposing
the Mugwump leaders in all their naked
ness, which was sought to be care
fully concealed during the cam
paign of 1891. 1t was charged by Repub-
ican editors that these men were Free
Traders and that that was the real cause OF
their cooperation with the Democrats.
These men then had the opportunity to
acknowledge or to deny the charge.
They did neither. They allowed them
selves to be misunderstood by large
portion of their countrymen. They al
lowed it to be denied in their behalf that
they had really gone over to the Demo
Gratis on the plank of Free Trade. They
had not the chivalrous courage of honest
opponents. They preferred to draw their
daggers in the dark, having dipped them
in the poison of calumny to make their
secret thrusts the more deadly. But their
cowardly conceament is at an end.
Cleveland has stripped from them their
disguise, and the Boston banquet was
fitting place for their unpatriotic confes-
sion