Hutchinson gazette. [volume] (Hutchinson, Kan.) 1895-1902, 1896-04-16

By the constitution of this republic
you are a servant Of the American
people and l am one Of your masters
consider you the most unfaithful
servant your masters have ever had
in their employ. l count you traitor
to your country and a scourge to man.
kind.
However much l respect the Office
you hold, the sentiment cannot extend
to person of your character. Great
and good men have elevated the presi-
dency to supreme honor. You have
made 1t the virtual rendezvous OF
bandits, the annex Of an English
pawnshop. and a mandatory of
tramps. By your policy" of destroy
ing money, producing panics, and
bonding people to cOnspiring usurers,
you have brought misery upon more
people than your country contained
when George Washington and his COM
patriots achieved its independence. |
believe that during the last three
years you have outraged and shortened
more lives, If you have not actually de-
stroyed them, than were sacrificed
under the patrlot-martyr, Lincoln, for
union and emancipation. You have
been advertised into a mockery Of
greatness, by men who have made you
their tool, as quack doctor eXalts a
pill, if he knows it is full of poison.
Thus a trusting and innocent people
have been deceived. But millions of
them now comprehend you. They abb
hOr and despise you in proportion to
their awakened intelligence.
Are you almost prisoner in the
executive mansion, surrounded by pO-
licemen and guarded by detectives?
Other presidents have not feared the
people; but your conscience, If you
have such a faculty, might naturally
suggest unusual precautions. No sane
man, however, will do you violence.
We, the people, can soon discharge you
from our service, and we patiently
await that blissful relief.
We are aware, too, that, In theory
at least, your power to blight and tor
ture your country Is the punishment
Of our own fault. | myself am one of
the guilty. AS citizen of the state OF
New York contributed vote to make
you governor, when you first emerged
from the local politics Of Buffalo. God
forgive me! 1t would have been the
greatest sin of my life had 1 known
what l was doing. l had never be-
longed to your party. l was a Repub-
lican. But your managers billed you
as a ''reformer," and the empire state
was in dire need Of reform. To casti-
gate my party l turned to yours, and
found myself standing, the next morn
ing, with those who had given you an
majority Of nearly two
hundred thousand votes. We were
fools and you were made Of our folly.
1t is not necessary to connect pri-
vate life with public character, and
shall barely allude to your early ca
reer. On the Sd of the present month
you had the sectional and malicious
impudence, in a theological gathering,
to intimate that gambling houses
and dram shops" were a special feat
ure Of our new West, and that Western
communities were apt to develop
Into badly regulated municipalities,
corrupt and unsafe territories, and
undesirable states" You advocated
home missions" for the "Christiani-
cation" Of our Western people. Yet
am solemnly informed, by those who
know, that only few years ago your
own personal surroundings in Buffalo
were so terribly in need Of home mis-
slons that they cannot be described in
respectable print. In the great EN-
pire state, however-the state Of Jay
Gould, William NJ. Tweed and your
present associate, Rev. DR.. Talmadge
your Buffalo habitat did not pre-
vent you from being elected sheriff of
Erie county as late as 1870.
l must admit that for the Office Of
sheriff you appear to have been spe-
cially endowed and fatally qualified.
For a third-rate lawyer of low cir
cumstances, the emoluments were
sufficient to suggest honesty" as the
"best policy" and, by contrast with
your previous condition and associa-
tions, the elevation was grand enough
to inspire ambition in even a lay fig
ure made of mud. Your rise must
have been peculiarly inspiring to your
intimates. II one like you could
achieve public office of any kind, what
honor might not be possible to vul-
garity and commonplace! You gained
the reputation Of not overcharging
your county for boarding its criminals,
though your thrift, within the law,
was unusual. You inaugurated a sys-
tenn Of strict personal economy, by
hanging people with your own hand,
and thus saving for your own pocket
the customary fees of subordinate ex-
ecutioners. Your position was pro-
phetic; for, since your duties became
enlarged, you have hanged your par
ty and have nearly hanged your coun-
try.
How you, as an attorney, ever took
the case of high "respectability" and
ultra-virtuous economy" will always
be shrouded, perhaps, to some extent,
in comic mystery. But you appear to
have one intense and paramount vir-
tue-that Of utter fidelity, without re-
gard IN concanuancae IN a cliant ,,,ho