The Valley Virginian. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1865-1895, 1892-06-02
Dark Horses.


cessful Presidential nominees are rattle,
more apt than otherwise to be men O.
second rate rather than first rate stand
ing before the country, that, in short
men hardly if at all previously thought
of for that high honor are very often
chosen to fill the greatest place in the
gift of the Republic, is an idea that can
not stand the test of historical investi
cation. During more than half centu-
ry of our national existence under the
Constitution, during more than half the
100 years from George Washington to
Benjamin Harrison, the Presidential
Office was filled by men of the foremost
fame Washington himself, John Adams,
Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, John Quin-
/ cy Adams, and Andrew jackson were all
men whose names, long before their
nomination. were known throughout the
length and breadth of the land. They
were all leaders of men, representatives
of great ideas or of vast achievements
They were natural candidates of their
parties when they were not, what is still
better, natural candidates of the people
irrespective of party; as were Washing
ton and Monroe, the latter at least for
| second term aud the former for as many
terms as he would consent to accept.
This enumeration brings US down to
1886. In that year Martin Van Buren,
was nominated by the Democratic party
and elected. Of him it must be said that
he did not certainly belong in the same
rank as those who had preceded him.
He was neither great statesman nor a
warrior. He was not even great party
leader. But neither was he in any sense
q dark horse" His case was one of
which there have been so few, though
we might naturally expect that there
promotion from the second Office to the
first. Martin Van Buren, was Vice Presi-
dent during the second term when Ans
drew Jackson was President, and it was
"Old Hickory's'' friendship that, more
than anything else. elevated his lieuten-
ant and protege. But Van Buren, was
a very prominent public man in 1882,
and far more prominent in 1886. Jacks
son had four years been doing every>
thing to rescue the Presidency from
a disregard undesired by it's incumbents
and undersigned by the Trainers of the
Constitution. He had constantly, al
most SYSTEMATICALLY, consulted the Vice.
President on every chief measure of poll
cy, and had taken pains at an early date
to let it be known that Andrew Jack
sons choice of successor was Martin
| Van Buren,.
This list completes the half century.
! The dark horses have made their tri-
umphant entry within later times. Let
us continue to cali the roll and see where
they come in. William Henry Harrison
was, of course, not a party leader. That
distinction was divided, among the
| Wings, between Webster and Clay. But
| General Harrison was exceedingly popu-
lar. In that half rude time a successful
Indian fighter was a hero whom the peo-
/ pie delighted to honor above all Others
Their applause was to be won in the
field rather than in the forum. Old men
yet delighted to tell of that log cabin
and hard cider campaign in 1910, when
the cry.
Tippecanoe and Tyler tool
| sent mems hearts on fire.
1t was in 1884, when politics had be-
come mass Of intricable confusion by
reason of Harrison's untimely death,
Tyler's ''treachery,"r Websters refusal to
resign from the Cabinet and consequent
utter Wing decentralization; when the
Mexican War was looming up and fore
ing the slavery question to the front;
when the Democrats were divided over
the Tyler questions; it was in that dark
and troublesome time, fifty-four years
after the adoption of the Federal Con-
stitution, that the first really clark
horse was suddenly brought forward
and made a race in the Democratic Con-
vention that left Martin Van Buren, be-
hind ana made a race at the polls that
polls that eclipsed the long cherished
ambition OF. Henry Clay. James K. Polk
had probably never been thought of for
that high honor by any considerable
number of people until bis name was
sprung upon Convention which had
already been adroitly trapped by Van
Buren's enemies into adopting, for the
first time, the two thirds rule that has
since cut such figure in Democratic
Conventions and seems likely to repeat
the process next month.
Polk was not renominated. No dark
horse ever was, or probably ever will be.
His successor in his party's nomination
was Lewis Cass, who earned a place in
the New York Sans picture gallery of
perpetual candidates by the constancy
with which his name was kept before
the public. Zachary Taylor was not a
dark horse but a war horse. Franklin
Pierce was the seond Presidential dark
horse, and in truth the last one up to
date
James Buchanan was the foremost liv-
ing Democrat in 1856. Abraham Lincoln
and General Grant were respectively one
of the most and absolutely the most
prominent candidates for the Republi-
can nomination in 1860 and 1863 The
terms in question has often been applied
to Hayes and Garfield, but with only
partial exactitude. The former was in
eyerybody's mind as the most available
second choice in the spring of 1876. 1t
has often been said, and truly, that all
those memorable days in the Convention
Of 1880, when the struggle ragged between
the Grant and the Blaine forces, with
| Sherman third in the race, and the dead
| lock growing more hopeless, Garfield
| electricity was in the air. waiting only
for g favorable moment for it to be con-
sentrated into thunderbolt. In 1884,
Grover Clevelands nomination was all
but assured when the Democratic Con-
vention met; and in 1888 Benjamin Har-
rison's friends went to Chicago in such
strength and confidence that then, as
now, they feared little except the appari-
ton of the man from Maine
A modern compilation Of engineering
maxims states that horse can drag, as