Reporter and farmer. [volume] (Webster, Day County, Dakota [S.D.]) 188?-1946, 1897-07-15
TILLMAN'S GRAFTON.
Delivered at Abba, Iowa, July
Fourth.

lima to deliver a patriotic address at
their Fourth of July celebration, and
the manner in which he abused their
hospitality and forced the audience
to listen to a southern populistic
TRADE is told in the following article
from the Abba Republican:
Ordinarily it is not good form to
speak ill OF a guest, especially
of your own choosing, but when that
guest will utterly ignore the rules
that govern gentlemen and violate
every obligation he owes to the host,
a conservative criticism is not map
propriate.
The great and untamed one-eyed,
pitchfork Tillman Was solicited by
our committee On speakers to be at
Abba at our celebration, and he ac-
eepted the honor, much to the de-
light of all, who believed him to be
a thorough southern gentleman who
c ould talk an hour without insulting
his audience or forcing upon them
his warped political views, tinctured
with anarchy and savoring of treason
but all alike were disappointed, and
Tillman is by nc means a hero in
this community, though a disturbing
element in the senate.
He had an audience Of which such
a man should feel proud, did not his
southern arrogance far exceed his
powers of appreciation. The audi
ence was a large n and patriotic'
who had assembled to hear a patriot
ic speech, believing that they were
to listen to a man Of broad ideas and
gentlemanly instincts.
Be it known that his presence is
due to the solicitation of local and
leading republicans who had full
faith and confidence in the judgment
of the southern fre-eater. In open
ing his speech he spoke of the fact
that he was invited by republicans,
which a few short years ago was
wholly unknown, and then he deli
berately abuses the hospitality ex-
tended to him and grossly insults
those who were responsible for his
presence. At no time did he con-
meet the day we were celebrating
with the Declaration of independence
nor had he a word of praise for those
whose acts we met to commemorate.
His speech, if 1t can properly be
digniied by the name, was a confu-
sion Of abuse and wholesale con-
domination. He began by a trade
of abuse against the immortal George
Washington and ending with a
deliberate insult to our Iowa senator,
accusing him of bride taking. He
denounced the house and senate as
renegades, black-legs and tricksters,
saying that they were but chattels to
be bought and sold by the money
powers, and hat all with the excep-
ton Of himself) were there, not for
the good of the people, but to make
themselves millionaires. lie con-
demned the nation and every exist
ing condition from the slavery days
to the present time, asserting that in
freeing the colored man We enslaved
the white, and there are more slaves
now than before. He called every
one fools who did not vote for free
silver and populism, nor did he
choose his words in ~denouncing them.
His speech was laden with wars and
rumors of vars. w saw the torch
applied to the home Of the wealthy
and The fields ran red with blood.
In fact his TRADE was reasonable,
insulting aud arrogant. He brought
with him the offensive odors of the
slums of southern populism and for