The Birmingham age-herald., 1908-01-09
Grover Cleveland Speak, OI
 Duly of Ills Pay
JACKSON DAY CELEBRATED
Morgan J. o'Brien Speaks On < z on In the Democratic Party ar ter Is Read From " eV
 Cleveland.

| New York, January S.-S z on the topic, "Why Is the Def lc Party Divided?' Morgan J. O'L ex-justice of the appellate division of the New York supreme court, who was the guest of the National Democratic club tonight, de- clared that if the causes that have dl- vided the party were summarized it would be found "that they have been due to our failure to stand firmly for democratic principles to preference shown by some for popular drifting sentiment as con- trasted with sound doctrines and to a preference for men rather than a rever- ence for party traditions.
 The dinner, which was primarily in cele- bration of Jackson day, it was also an- nounced by John Fox, president of the clum, was the first of a series at which national and local democratic issues would be discussed The discussions, it was further said, would in fact be educa- tional to decide wisely the future course of the party.
 Ex-President Grover Cleveland, who was unable to be present, sent his compli- ments in letter in which he expressed the conviction that the situation confront ing the people had directed their atten- tion more to their relief from conditions that alarmed and startled them than to the empty satisfaction of partisan su- premacy.
 Ex-Justice O'Brien, after referring in highly complimentary terms to Mir. Cleve- land, and by inference to ex-Justice AL ,1
 ''The aims and principles of the party have been so frequently stated in plat form and public addresses, and so well summarized in Jefferson's first inaugural that 1t is unnecessary to repeat them ,at length, but in passing it is proper to note that whenever the party stood firmly and unitedly for these principles, we have never met with a defeat, and 1t has only been when the party has been divided, because of the hope that success would result from following some shifting pop ular sentiment, or some new and imprac- ticable reform, that we have met with overwhelming and deserved defeat. To ascertain the cause of this we need but look carefully intp the campaigns that have been waged and contrast the men and measures that were successful with the conditions that existed at the time of defeat"
 Saying that he had been informed that one of those invited had declined an in- vitation to the dinner because the speak CTS views on certain public questions were opposed to thos of MT. Bryan, Jus tice O'Brien said itj was just such in- tolerance that had 5been the greatest stumbling block to the success of the democratic party He said:
 q extend to Harry w. Walker the compliments of the season, and I ask him to read, learn, mark aud inwardly digest the statement made by Samuel J. Tilden in a letter written to Daniel Manning in ! 1884, that neither the democratic party nor the republican, for whose future that party is the best sHias ,ntee, is now or ever can be dependent on one man for their successful progress in the path of a notable destiny"
 The letter from Cleveland follows:
 ''I very much regret that am obliged to decline the invitation I have received to attend the Jackson day dinner to be given by the National D Democratic club on the Sth inst.
 q am intensely interested in every ef- fort to revive genuine and effective dem- ocratic sentiment and to restore the dem- ocratic courage, consistency and confi- CONTINUED ON PAGE 7.)