Los Angeles herald., 1891-10-20
NO BLOODY SHIRT.
President Polk breaches
Peaceful Policy.
He Outlines the Principles of
the Alliance.
The New Party's Leader rendered a
Reception Last Evening.
A Gathering of Old Soldiers to Welcome
the President of the Alliance-A
Strong Speech on Fra
ternalism.

gray last evening in way that perhaps
has never before been seen in this coun-
try, The Union veterans, members of
the Farmers Alliance, rendered to Ma
ticnal President L. L. Polk of North
Carolina a reception in the corridors of
the Nadeau hotel.
Mr.. Polk served in the confederate
army. As a representative citizen of
the south, and to assure him of their
friendship and fraternity, the Union
soldiers who belong to the alliance con-
ceived the idea of extending to him, as
fellow-members of the alliance and ex-
soldiers once arrayed against each other,
a hearty welcome.
Ats O'Clock the hallway of the hotel,
on the first floor, was crowded with gray
and grizzled veterans. Many of them
were accompanied by their wives. At
the foot Of the stair case stood President
Polk. Upon either side of him rested
the stars and stripe
Gen. H. H. Boyce greeted Presi-
dent Polk, and in brief speech, on be-
half of the veterans, welcomed him to
the city. Col. ]. S. Barbee, a mem
Der of the Stonewall brigade, next made
a few appropriate remarks, after which
! President Polk was introduced. After
thanking the audience for their kind
ness, he spoke substantially as follows:
am proud that l am with you to-
night. stand here and look into the
faces of men whom perhaps have seen
before. 1t may be that in the days
agone you and l looked each other in
the face over cleaning gun barrels
! through the red blaze of war. We at
tended as unwilling guests at the feast
where the war gods held their high carr
nival of blood and of death. Z.
We had fought you like men, as you
will attest, and am here to say to you
tonight on behalf OF the great mass of
the southern people, not our politicians,
1 have naught to say for them, but on
behalf of the brave men who met you, l
am here to say to you tonight, that when
they surrendered, they surrendered like
men. :. God Almighty decreed
on the 9th day of April, 1865, that hence
forth we should be brethren and that
this be one country with one flag. Evil
and designing men came between us,
and you and | have been taught to look
held up by these men. If there
who cannot clasp my hand;
here tonight who is not big
enough and brave enough to
take the PROSTATE Johnny" by the
hand when he has cried enough,
help him up, brush the dirt from his
coat and say to him: Johnny, am
proud of you, my boy; / am proud of
you as an American brother, but you
are in the wrong cause; but ] want to
shake hands with you now, my brother,
and l want to say to you that hence
forth we are going to stand together in
this country" If there be a man in
this audience who had the honor of
wearing the uniform of his country who
cannot do that for US, beg you, in the
name of the coming generations,
in the name of your boy and my boy,
thank God whose young eyes first
greeted the light OF heaven unobscured
by the smoke of battle, your daughter
and my daughter, whose ears first
caught the hallowed sounds of peace I'M
mingled with hoarse laundering of
hostile cannon, beg you, for their sake,
that we shall not entail upon thell
legacy of hate. One of the results of
that war was the abolition of slavery,
chattel slavery. There is not genuine
brave old confederate in this audience
tonight who will not join me in saying
that we thank God for it. There is not
a brave man who wore the blue nor
brave man who wore the gray in the
struggle, that does not say in his manly
heart tonight, let the bitterness, let the
prejudice, let the animosities that
were born of the existence of slavery,
in Gods name, and in the name of the
country, perish with it and forever. /
stand here and claim tonight that /
represent the only organization of men
in this country that has come forward
since the war with the avowed purpose
of accomplishing the grand and God
like work of restoring unity and fra
ternity between the sections.
1t is not the men who fought or who
stood in the bloody angles in the field
of battle who have kept up this I'M
natural estrangement between the Sec
tons. Ordinarily it is the man, north
aud south, who never smelled gun
powder. Ordinarily it is the man who
never heard the whistle OF mimic ball.
Ordinarily it is the man who was invisi-
BILE in war and became gloriously irwin
chile in peace. They are the men who
loaded up their long mouths in 1865 and
have been firing at each other at the
safe distance of from 1000 to 5000 miles
ever since. l note among you the
badge which is the badge of honor
everywhere, the passport to respect
all over the civilized land. | refer
to that Grand Army button. If you won
that button and deserve to wear it. if
you took that flag in one hand and your
life in the other, and offered that life as
a sacrifice in the defence of the flag. I
am not afraid of you. am afraid of
your loud-mouthed politician. One of
the results of that war, as have said.
was the abolition, of chattel slavery.
I have a message for you BOYS in blue
from the boys in gray. They faced YOU
through four long years of terrible war
to defend that institution. One of the
results of that war was the sweeping of it
away They charged me to say to you,
and l trust / may do so with propriety,
that they are ready, willing and anxious
to clasp your hands in fraternal
brotherhood. and to beg your cooper
alton tn ioin the forces of the heroic h1ua