The Cairo bulletin. (Cairo, Ill.) 1???-1928, 1908-06-24
CHICAGO GATHERING NOTABLY
DEVOID OF CqATORY-AlL
SPEECHES FALLING FLAT
CUT AND DRIED AFFAIR
Made People Impaticnt end Took Life
Out Of Nominating Speeches---
lnsersol's Mcdel
Grafton

Specldl 10 lhe liLE"tln.
Springfield H., June 23-ThCs
who attended the uepallican nationa
convention in Chicago last week cam,
home impressed vita tht failure Of tn
convention orato?y IN its result.
the convention appears 10 have beef
satisfactory to the great masses of tn,
Republican party ia .iipois ana els
whore b;ut the Ccn:eation speeche!
had nDtning to do With these results
There Were some good speeches, hut
no great ones rh'i sas not wlloll
The fanl. OF the orators; it was due
to the circumstance attending he
proceedings here Mhs but little oc
caSiuH for orat0ry For seyral months
the uomint tion Of u Taft had seem
cd probable aud for two weeks al
least it had bean a fprcgOne conclu
sion With the main result thus set
tied, Doth the Ge'rsutca and the gal
l,iy spectators were impatient for the
ballot They Nerf ia, no mood to lis
ten to lona-Winied speeches, which
everybody knew would not change a
single gete. This lnlpatience was in
creased hy the fact that the Coliseum
in which the convention was held, is
so immense that only fraction of
those assembled there could hear per,
fectly what was said from the plat
form
Most of the orators made the mis-.
take OF not fitting their speeches to
conditions. Instead of five or ten
minutes most OF them insisted on oc-
clIpying from thirty minutes to an
rar.GlleA lleA.HqIntnaiias speeches, fes=
the most part. were ner biographies.
which one might read in the daily or
weekly papers. Men of national repu-
tation, which have moved audiences on
other occasions, made no impression
on the convention, Gov. Hanley OF
Indiana, one of the Chautauqua favor
ties of the country, was a mere Joke"
before he had half finished his speech
The national convention of 1908 was
thus sttikingly different from most
OF its predecessors. Some of the
greatest speeches in the annals OF Am.
erican orGtOfy have been delivered in
national conventions. In 1876 Col.
Robert G.. Ingersoll, of Illinois set the
pace for convention orators. The ma
tional convention of that year was
held in Cincinnati. The Illinois dele,
cation went to the convention shout
ing for Ja'rcs G. Blaine, then in a
zenith of III. popularity. Bob Inger-
soil. then a Peoria lawyer, was chosen
to place Blaine in nomination. 1t is
said that on the night before the nom.
nation Was 10 be made. lngersoll,
being asked what he intended to say,
said re hadn't thought of the matter,
ami then about midnight he sat down
and hurlied!y wrote out the speech
which he delivered in the convention
next day Ii was a marvellous piece of
oraturv, and /; reused the convention
to great enthusiasm. 1t was this
speech thai gave Blaine the title of
"plumed knight Like an armed war
rior, like a plumed knight" said lnger
SOIL james G. Blaine marched down
the halls of the American congress and
threw Lis shining lance full and fair
against the bfazen foreheads of the
Gefamers of his country and the
maigners OF his honor. For the Re
publican party to desert this gallant
leader now, 5 as though an army
snould desert their general upon the
field of battle
The brilliant speech of Ingersoll,
bt wever, failel to bring Blaine the
presidential nomination; there were
conditions and considerations of
availability" that made Rutherford B.
Hayes of Ohio the standard bearer
But the speech of the orator from Hi
nois lived, and has been equalled by
few other speeches delivered since
then IL national conventions.
The power of a speech was illus
trated in the national convention of
1880 when James A. Garfield of Ohio,
who came to the Chicago convention
that year to nominate John Sherman,
made a speech of such rare force and
that the convention ended
the deadlock by making Garfield him
self the nominee for president Again
in 1896, in the Democratic national
convention, William J. Bryan. then al
most unknown. showed what may be
achieved by bit or oratory. Bryan |
there found his opportunity; he hit
with rare good fortune upon the |
psychological moment, and his !
speech carried the convention off its |
feet and made him the presidential |
nominee and gave him that place of |
leadership in the Democratic party |
which he has held to this day
But such results are rare The ora
Al 4. =.