The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1890-01-21
FEDERAL ELECTION LAW.
MR. PASCO ADDRESSES THE SEN
ATE ON THAT SUBJECT.

The h6pup4lCdu TdLuS IN LQ0 south
During the Reconstruction Period
Chandler Undertakes to Reply and
is Checked With Very Neat Turn.
Futures and Options.
WASHINGTON, Jan. 2O.-After the routine
business Of the morning MIR. Pasco ad-
dressed the Senate on the paragraph IN the
Presidents message relating to the federal
control of elections. He sketched the polit-
ical condition of things at the close of the
war, aud the adoption by the Republican
party Of the reconstruction measures of
that period, by which the work was turned
over to the army officers, agents of the
freedman's bureau, camp followers and
stragglers. The effort. he said, was to build
I'D a southern annex to the Republican
party, and thus to prolong its lease of power.
A POLITICAL ANNEX.
This southern movement was simply an
annex and in no sense party. But it had
turned out to be rope of sand, and the
Republican party, with all its election
tricks and frauds that depravity could de-
wise, lost its power in the south. For this
result it might blame its own conduct and
policy. And now the attempt was to be
made to seize the electoral machinery Of the
states. This power of the general govern
ment over state elections had been spar
ingly exercised in the past. No political
party would have dared, before the war, to
enter on political campaign with plank
in its platform claiming the right to exer-
else control over elections in the states. 1t
was only being inaugurated now.
A SECTIONAL SCHEME.
r. LoI 20 boA 81, ~ Al.
republican leaders had treated the southern
states as inferior to the northern states.
The message of the President, he said, had
contained no syllable in favor of free and
honest election except as to the suppression
Of votes of colored people in the south.
There was no evidence before the country
of any such suppression. None had been
communicated to congress. 1t was simply
a matter of inference. He presented some
election statistics from eastern, western,
and southern states to prove that the ''silent
voter is increasing in every section of
country" In conclusion, he stated that his
voice and vote would be given in favor of
standing by the methods Of election which
had come down from the days of Washing
ton and Jefferson.
CHANDLER TURNS HIMSELF LOOSE.
Mr.. Chandler followed Mr.. Pasco. That
senator, he said, had complained of the
character of some of the citizens of the
south who had come uorth as witnesses con-
cerning the political outrages of that sec
tion, and had also had something to say
about the silent voter. There was one citi-
zen of Florida, said Mr.. Chandler, who will
not come north to testify concerning politi-
cal outrages, and who might be termed "a
silent voter" That man was John Burr, a
colored citizen of Madison county, Florida,
who, in October last, having been to jack
sonville as q witness concerning political
outrages, was killed on his return to Madi-
son county by democrats of that county,
on account of the testimony which he had
given.
Mr.. Chandler sent to the clerks desk and
had read statements published in the New
York Tribune and in the Jacksonville Re
publican, showing bad state of affairs in
Florida. The narrations given in these ex-
tracts, he said, were confirmed by doou-
ments and the reports on file in the depart
ment of Justice, which showed that it was
substantially true that throughout nearly
half the state of Florida United States
laws were defied, and that in Madison
county it was impossible for a marshal of
the United States to serve processes of
United States courts.
CHANDLER DETAILS SOME oUTRAGEs.
Mr.. Chandler also referred to the driving
by masked democrats from his home in
jefferson county, Florida, of j. G. Cole
because he was a prominent republican,
and he read extracts on the subject of that
outrage from articles in the New York
Tribune, the Monticello Fla.) Constitution,
the Gainesville Fla.) Advocate, and the
Milwaukee Sentinel. He hoped that Senator
Pasco would inform the Senate whether he
did not consider such transactions as these
reasons why it would not be wise and judi
cious for the government of the United
States to pass some law for the protection of
republican voters and for fair elections in the
south for representatives in congress. He
also reminded Mr. Pasco of other political
murders and outrages in Florida, going as
far back as 1881. If there was any one
state that needed the benefit of q federal
election law, in connection with con-
gressional elections, it was the state of
Florida. He submitted to the senator (Mr.
Pasco) whether he had not better, under
the circumstances, waive his objection to
national interference in elections, and to
the passage of a national election law that
would, at least, secure elections in Florida
that would be for once in the history Of
the state) both honest and peaceful
CHANDLER's PART IN THE '76 STEAL.
Mr.. Pasco said he would not follow the
senator from New Hampshire through his
ramblings from his scrap book; but he ex-
pressed the belief that the elections in
Florida, since the memorable one of 1876,
were as fair, as peaceful, and as quiet as
they were in New England. 1t was not sur
prlsing that there were some irregularities
there, because Senator Chandler had
been one Of the principal agents in the
Florida election fraud of 1876, and the de-
moralization resulting from that had not
entirely disappeared.
PUT ON THE DEFENSIVE.
Mr.. Pasco's allusion to his course in Flor
ida in 1876 was taken up by Mr.. Chandler,
who denied the charge that he had then
approached the chairman of the state can
vassing committee and had promised that
Ii the state was canvassed for Hayes, the
majority of the returning board would be
taken care of. He denied that statement
absolutely, and declared that the friends of
LII. Hayes had resorted to no extraordinary
means on that occasion.
Mr.. Pasco said that the charge had been
often made aud printed, and that this was
'he first time that it had been denied.
The Senate at the conclusion of Mr..
Fasco's remarks went into executive session,
and when the doors were reopened ad-
lourned.
In the House.
:, WASHINGTON, Jan. 20.-In the House
Inls morning the speaker announced the ap-
polntment of the worlds fair committee, as
follows: Messrs. Gambler of Massachusetts,
NIT OF Illinois, Bowden of Virginia, Belden
l. e