The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1901-01-20
PORTER AS a DEBATER
HOW HE ONCE OUTMANEUvERED
FRANKLIN LANDERs.
The Latter Thought He Had MIR. Por-
ter. but He Counted without
His Host.

albert G. Porter was perhaps as bright
mind and as shrewd a politician as the
State of Indiana ever boasted," said Rob-
ert A. Brown, clerk of The Supreme Court
"and withal he was a polished. courtly
gentleman. He was a wonderful mixer
with the so-called common people, and had
a smile that undoubtedly made him Gov
ernor OF Indiana, and yet will venture to
say that he wore out twice as many pairs
Of kid gloves as General Harrison ever
owned. despite the fact that by some the
latter has been called the kid glove poll
tician. 1 call to mind an incident that
showed Governor Porter's marvellous alert
ness on all occasions and his power of
turning seeming defeat into overwhelming
victory.
I'm the campaign of 1880" continued Mr..
Brown. when Garfield was running for
President, Mr. Porter was the Republican
candidate for Governor and his Democratic
opponent was Franklin Landers. The joint
debate was more in vogue in those days
than now. and Landers thought he was a
pretty good debater, so he challenged Mr..
Porter to a joint debate. Tho event was
not scheduled to take place in any one
town or city, but the debaters moved about
from place to place. giving them an oppor-
tunity to be heard by different crowds.
After one of the debates had been held in
Richmond the entire party was coming
over to Indianapolis. from which place they
intended to go to Frankfort the following
day and engage in another battle Of wits
and argument.
CAUSED ALARM.
sE. H, or Ed Wolf, of Rushville, was
pretty close to Porter at that time, and he
circulated about among the Landers crowd
all the way over to this city. Ed became
struck with a peculiar air of satisfaction,
IL not of positive delight. that rested on the
faces of Mr.. Landers and his friends He
began to grow uneasy and made inquiries
as to the reason for this new-found JOY
Wait till we get to Frankfort and you'll
find out what we have in store for YOU,
said one of the Landers crowd, incautious-
w. Wolf went at once to his chief and told
him of the circumstances he had observed
and of his fears. Find out what ii is they
have up their sleeves said Mr.. Porter. Ac-
cordingly Wolf proceeded to ingratiate him.
self with a certain follower Of Landers
with whom he had some acquaintance. By
a method that had better be guessed than
stated plainly Wolf soon had his man in a
communicative mood and drew out of him
the secret of the joy which seemed to ami
mate the breasts of the Democratic debater
and his followers. Armed with his infor-
nation he went straightway TO Mr.. Porter,
and the latter, after listening TO what
rlxp
sententiously, Let me think over that for a
while
"Well. the debate opened at Frankfort the
next night, and Landers wore an air OF ex-
traordinary confidence. / must add that IL
was the practice for debaters in those days
to take turn about in opening an evening
argument On this occasion 1t happened to
be Porters turn to set the ball to rolling.
In his graceful, plausible, winning style OF
speech, he began the discussion something
after this fashion: Fellow Citizens, La
dies and Gentlemen. i desire TO appeal to
the Democrats who may be before me to-
night not to continue to vote the ticket
simply because their fathers before them
voted the Democratic ticket. Your action
should be controlled by your judgment
rather than by blind adherence TO preee-
dent. 1t is not always consistent to do
the same thing to-day that we did yester-
day. We are all prone to make mistakes.
If our actions tomorrow should be con-
troIled by those of to-day. we would con-
tinue repeating our mistakes Of the past
and soon our progress and development
would cease. I desire to give you
an excellent illustration of how men
can make mistakes and afterwards
profit by such eros. When l was
mere beardless STRIPPING, my con-
stituents did me the honor TO send me 70
Congress. At that time was imbued with
the old Democratic idea that slavery was
right OF course, we have now all OF us
got away from that folly. We are now
all patriots. But, just to show you how far
wrong young man. or an old man either,
for that matter. may go. / will tell you
frankly that made speeches In Congress.
opposing the abolition of slavery. Think
Of 1t, / was convinced that IL was fixed
institution and that there was no use in
trying TO overthrow it. Now. in order to
let you see exactly how inconsistent I my
self have been. I want TO beg your indulg-
ence while 1 read you extracts from some
OF the speeches I made in those days, which
now, of course, realize We're erroneous to
the last degree.
READ FORMER SPEECHES.
las he said this Mr.. Porter reached out
his hand to Ed Wolf, who gave him a copy
of the Congressional Record containing the
| speeches to which he referred. And Porter
actually read copious extracts from these
| fiery addresses I'm favor Of slavery You
| should have been present to see the ex-
rressions of amazeaent. stupefaction and
/; disgust on the countenances OF the men N
| the Landers crowd. I watched Landers
pretty closely to see how he would be az
| fected by this tremendous coup. and YOU
| can imagine that understood thoroughly
what the Democratic candidate was doinc
| when he rapidly turned over the pages ol
| a voluminous manuscript which he took
| from an inside pocket and rather impatient
| " removed three or four sheets, repiacine
| the remainder where he got It. The flank
| movement which LanderS was contemplatI
1ux Ma 70 suddenly spr1nE those pp6-
<4o = ccnE<1cln4r. but Porter Wes 6tfI<