Butler citizen. [volume] (Butler, Pa.) 1877-1922, 1893-02-03
lanes @. Blaine.

leader, orator, historian, legislator, states
man, great in all these, he was greatest OF
all in a national career which rested solely
upon the unshaken loyalty and devotion of
the crest mass of voters in the Republican
party. .
IL is now sixteen years since the close of
General Grants term as President fouId
Mr.. Blaine the most conspicuous leader In
the party which had fought the war. saved
the Union and was directing its destiny.
There were several men, though not many,
whose national services had then been
greater. There was at least one, John
Sherman, whose eventual place in history,
though without his great dominant person
ality, will equal his; there were three or
four whose political sway and power, bas-
ed on unouestioned control OF the Repubh-
can party in great States, was superior to
his own; but no one doubted then, and no
one has at any time since doubted, that
the rank and file of the Republican party,
the plain people who vote its ticket, sup
port its principles and elect its candidates
with no hope or desire of personal reward,
felt.for Mr.. BLAME personal loyalty and
regard displayed toward no other man.
This love never lost This loyalty was
never shaken. 1t was as faithful in defeat
as it was enthusiastic in victory. 1t was
as much at his command in private life az
in pnblic station. 1t was manifested in
eyery conceivable way and survived every
possible assault and attack. No public
man in all our history to whom it has not
fallen, as it did to Washington and Lincoln
to pilot the nation through dangerous war,
has ever had more unquestioned personal
allegiance from great masses OF his fellow
citizens,-pot even Henry Clay with whom
Mr. Blaine has been constantly compared
and whom his career at many points re-
sembled.
To the organized political force of his
party he never strongly appealed, through
most of his life he had the opposition of
those to whom politics was a trade, and
their support at the very close of his career
was due less TO their personal regard for
him than to their opposition to President
Harrison. The Mugwump portion of the
Republican party had for him as little
sympathy and support as its trained and
organized forces. Extremes met in mu-
tual opposition to him Of elements and ic
fluences on all other points opposed TO each
other. His personal support lay neither
with those who scheme and organize in
politics, nor with those who scheme with
out organizing, neither with the practical
men of the machine, nor with independents
but with that great body of voters on
whom the safety of the Republic rests, who
filled the army in the war, and who in
peace must be right or all is wrong with
free institutions.
The support of this great mass of voters
which for quarter OF century has been
as plain as the sun in the heavens, is not
to be lightly explained by personal mag
netism." All but an infnitesimal share of
them never saw him. 1t has better e1-
planation and higher reason. No leader
in Congress in cur day or in any day SO
filled public eye and reused public enthusi-
asm by his method of debate. The man
ner no less than the matter of his speeches
when he returned to the floor from the
Speakers chair. swept all before him and
his audscious brilliancy completed the
rout which his powerful argument began
Yet more, in the twenty-five years since
he became Speaker, no American of his
day, or any day, go frequently expressed
the underlying belief and conviction of
the Republican voter. taken on the aver
age aGd in the mass. in the city and in the |
country, through all the land from ocean
to ocean, and in all stations and conditions. |
1t was Mr.. Blaine who first discovered,
ten years after the close Of the war, that
the day for repressive Legislation was over |
and defeated by his ruling as Speaker the |
extreme enactments proposed for the reg
ulation of Southern elections When an
inevitable political res ction in 1874 sue
ceeded financial panic in 1873, it was Mr.
Blaine who most nearly expressed the in
dignation burning throughout the ranks of
the Republican party at the return to in
fuence and power in the Congress of the
Union of the men W had left its halls TO
destroy the Government. When an at
tempt, nearly successful, was made to use
this Indignation to give the great soldier
of the war third term in the Presidency
and to violate sound constitutional pre-
cedent in the interest of an unscrupulous
and despotic control of the machinery OF
the Republican organization, it was Mi.
Blaine, and for season Mr.. Blaine alone
who discerned that the great mass of the
party was opposed to this policy. and who
did his country and its constitutional rights
the inestimsble service Of giving this cause
3 Leadership which won its success at the
price of his own defeat.
After this great service Mr.. Blaine be-
longed less TO himself than to his party and
to the nation. No nomination in our his
tory has been more distinctly the work and
command Of the average voter than his in
1884. 1t had its fatal opposition in his own |
party; but II ever the great mass of honest |
and candid voters in the Republican party !
passed their deliberate verdict Of truth and |
confidence on the character of q public |!
man, it was done in their command for his |
and in tho vote they gave him |
after canvass Of slander and defamation
matched indeed in our annals, but match |
ed only in the assaults on the motives OF
Washington and on the patriotism Of
Lincoln.
Even defeat left Mr.. Blaine no less the |
leading American of his day. There grew
through the nation, independent Of party |
lines and of sectional difference a profound |
appreciation and admiration of the man
who. as every great question appeared,
voiced unerringly the sentiment and CON
viction of great masses of his country, who
said what they thought and who thought |
what they said In 1888, as before, he again
expressed the dominant sentiment OF his
party, and sounded the keynote of its CAM
paign; but a greater work, and one trans
cending party lines, was now shaping itself
in his masterful hands.
For twelve years, from the Pan -Ameri-
can Conference, which Garfield approved |
and his successor hesitated to support, TO
the reciprocity treaties of the past two
= ears, James G.. Blaine was the first of liv- |
ing Americans To zee the duty and respon-