Los Angeles herald., 1891-06-08
MONDAY. JUNE 8. 1891.
PRESIDENTIAL POSSIBILITIES.

PRESIDENTIAL POSSIBILITIES.
Senator Pugh, of Alabama, has placed
himself on record to the effect that Mr..
Cleveland is not the right man as the
Democratic candidate for president. He
thinks that his attitude on free coinage
is distasteful to nine out of ten of the
voters of Alabama and of the southern
states generally. He claims, besides,
that the ex-president insulted the peo-
pie of the south in his recent speech at
Buffalo, in which he referred to the ere
bellious hands, that had been raised to
overthrow the government. The Ala
bama senator thought that, in view of
the more than quarter of a century
which has elapsed since the war had
closed, this reference of Mr.. Cleveland
who, were he candidate, would receive
most of his electoral votes from the
south, was in very bad taste, to say the
least. The south would not only have
many electoral votes in determining
the result of the presidential cleo
tion, but it will have many dele
gates in the Democratic national
convention. There is much force in these
views. In the course of the interview
from which we quote, MI. .Pugh expressed
great admiration for Senator German, of
Maryland, giving it as his opinion that
this able Democrat would make stropg
candidate and splendid president. Per
contra, Mr.. Murat Halstead, formerly
editor of the Cincinnati Commercial
Gazette, and now conducting Brooklyn
paper, said to World reporter that, in
his opinion, Mr.. Cleveland would be the
Democratic nominee. He also thought
that the free coinage men would be
found less numerous than the public
supposed. Mr.. Halstead's views have
nota practical value in any degree COM
mensurate with their sometimes great
literary excellence. He is somewhat of
q diIettante politician, though journalist
of marked ability. He is quite as likely
to be in the wrong as Mr.. George William
Curtis, whose speculations on any sub
ject are always readable. 1t was the
latter gentleman who, then as now, ed
itor of Harper's Weekly, predicted that
General Dix would be reelected gov
ernor of New York by 10000 plurality
when, in fact, Mr.. Tllden beat him by a
rousing plurality.
Before dismissing these calculations
of prominent men as to the next Demo-
cratic candidate for president, it is we'll
to note the fact that Senator Daniels of
Virginia has given expression to opin-
ions precisely identical with those of
Senator Pugh.
Blaine's recent illness has stimulate
the interest in his possible candidacy
for the Republican nomination for presi-
dent. Since the prodigious Republican
reverses last fall, a progression back
ward which has been maintained ever
since, feeling has grown up in the
Republican ranks that he is the only
man who can save the Republican party
from defeat, if any one can. Those Re-
publicans who do not desire to see the
magnetic Man. from Maine" the
nominee of their party have been
sardonic enough to affect the belief, and
to sedulously spread tine impression,
that that gentleman is physical wreck
that he is suffering from Bright's disease
of the kidneys; and that, consequently,
his death is only matter of few years.
In the interview referred to above. of a
reporter of the World with Mr.. Halstead,
the latter said that the Plumed Knights
ailments were much exaggerated, and
that he was really suffering from over
work and from an attack of the gout,
which latter he had inherited from his
grandfather. Mr.. Halstead assumed that
the relations existing between President
Harrison and his secretary of state
were of the most cordial nature, and if
the president really believed that Blaine
was the only Republican who could
lead the Republican party to victory
Harrison would place himself at the
head of the Blaine forces and aid in his
nomination. This all looks very we'll
on paper, but still water runs deep.
Senator Matthew Stanley Quay was in
Pittsbnrg, the other day, en- route to his
uOlno III DedVer. Ilo 'pIdCeU ulluSelI Oh
record as to the amicable relations
which exist between Blaine and the
president. He added, however, that all
this did not obscure the fact that Blaine
could get the delegation to the Republi-
can national convention if he desires to
have it, Notwithstanding Mr.. Harrison's
wishes.
In fact, to epitomize the sentiment of
the mass of the Republican party as to
the respective merits OF their states
men, we may adopt the happy express
sion of the Chicago Times, that Blaine
is suffering from swelled foot, while
Harrison's ailment is a swelled head.
The reception given at Albany by
Governor Hill some time ago is said to
have been about the grandest gathering |
Of public men ever chronicled in the
empire state. So wrote Amos Cum
mings, the bright newspaper man and