The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1889-06-28
SIMON CAMERON.

There are not many as great men as
SIMON CAMERON in century, and there are
still fewer who are so long and so steadily
great. The old men of to-day cannot re
call the time when CAMERON was not a
prominent figure in public life, nor can
they think of him otherwise than as an old
man. For more than ninety years he was
soiourner on earth; for more than
seventy years of that time he was known
| beyond his neighborhood and for fully half
a century the name he bore was one of the
most familiar to the American people. And
during all that period he was recognized as
possessing one of the finest intellects of
the country. Always pronounced parti-
san, a radical in politics. and given to party
changes, he maintained reputation for
uprightness and justice and for fair fight
ing; and what is remarkable, when we take
into account the time when his power was
greatest and the corruption that was prev
alent in official circles, the character for
personal honesty which he established in
his youth, was ever maintained.
All attempts to blacken his name
when great ones were falling
all around him, were failures, inspired by
partisan malice. His politics during the
latter half of his life was of the radical
variety, but his honesty and integrity and
devotion to purpose were conceded by those
who had no sympathy with his cause or his
methods The record which he left is some
thing for all those who bear his name to be
proud of, and the historian of the republic
will place him among the foremost men pro-
duced by this great nation.
SMoN CAMERON was born in Ian
caster county, Pennsylvania, March s,
1899. At nine years of age he was
left an orphan and without friends to care
for him. His first employment was devil
ing" in printing office. Learning the
printing trade he served as a compositor in
Harrisburg, and at the government printing
Office in Washington. In 1922 he returned
to Harrisburg, and became editor of the
leading Democratic paper Of Pennsylvania.
In 1882 he was president of a bank, and
soon thereafter was at the head of two
railroad companies, and adiutant- general
of the State. In 1915 he succeeded Mr..
BUCHANAN as United States Senator, and
remained in the Senate till 1S49, acting with
the Democrats. In 1856 he affiliated with
the peoples party" which was after
wards merged with the Republican party,
and in 1857 was reelected to the Senate for
the term expiring in 1863. In 1860 he had
considerable support for the Presidential
nomination. In 1861 he resigned his seat in
the Senate to become LINCoLN's secretary
of war, which Office he surrendered the
next year, when he went to Russia as
American minister, returning to this
country the following year. In1S66 he was
again elected to the Senate, beingre- elected
in 1872. His term would have expired in
1879, but owing to his age and having a de-
sire to place his son J. DONALD CAMERON
firmly in his seat, he resigned in 1877, hay
ing first arranged that "DoN'' should be
his successor. After leaving the Senate
CAMERON led a quiet life, though occa
sionally travelling, one of his jaunts a few
years ago being across the continent, when
he spent few days pleasantly in this city