The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1908-01-05
BY SAVOYARD.


In 1867 the Democratic party was on
the verge of despair. The south was
PROSTATE. The west solidly Republic
can. New York was a doubtful state
and New Jersey Democratic. Kentucky,
Maryland and Delaware were also
Democratic. Ohio was a traditional
Wing, Abolition, and Republican state.
and nobody dreamed that the very first
streak of dawn was to come to the
Democratic party in the then Empire
state of the then great west. Ben
Wade, president pro tempOre of the
United States senate, was a candidate
for a third term in the senate, and it
was the general understanding that
Clement L. Vallandigham was to be
his Democratic competitor. r. B. Hayes
was the Republican candidate for gov
ernor. He had been a soldier of the
war and a prominent member of the
congress from Ohio. What a lapful
of successes came to him. At his belt
were the scalps of Thurman and Allen,
and Tilden, and, / believe. Pendleton.
Every state exulted when Allen G..
Thurman ran for governor of Ohio
in 1867. The issue was whether
the word white should be strick-
en- from the suffrage clause of the
constitution of the state of Chase
and Wade and Giddings. On the night
of election il was ascertained that ne
gro suffrage was beaten by more than
so 900, and it was some twelve hours
before the Democrats ceased to jubilate
over what was very nearly conceded
as a Democratic victory on the state
ticket. However, some of the remote
precincts of the western reserve came
up with votes enough to elect Hayes
by some 1000 plurality; but the legisla-
ture was Democratic, and every Demo-
cratic heart in every state exulted
when Allen G.. Thurman was chosen
Ben Wade's successor in the United
States senate. He took his seat in 1869
| and served until 1881.
Henry B. Anthony, whose physical
resemblance to Thurman was notable,
| succeeded Wade as president pro TEN.
and served four years, when he was
succeeded by Matthew Hale Carpenter,
whom Judge jeremiah S. Black pro-
ncunced the greatest lawyer who ever
spoke the English tongue l am not
much of a judge of a lawyer but l
am very nearly persuaded that Carpen-
! ter was the greatest orator / ever
/ heard. His voice was perfect, he never
raised ii above a conversational pitch,
and yet it was distinct to the occupant
| of the remotest niche of the farthest
gallery, and the music of it was so
seductive and the vocabulary of his
| speech 50 simple, and yet so rich that
to employ the eulogy of Ben Johnson
pronounced on Francis Bacon, Your
! only fear was that he should make an
end"
| About 1872, or 1873, congress perpe-
| trated what was known as the salary
| grab" My recollection is that Carpen-
| ter supported it; but some weeks ago
Z aI~rs.i r,Sr, no r,-saff iva.
| about him in which it was narrative
| that Carpenter voted against it. How
ever that may be. he defended it on
/ the stump, and made a most audaciOus
! speech in one of the Wisconsin coun-
/ ties, then inhabited by staid Puritans
/ from New England, that cost him his
election. He was himself a VermOnter,
and in one of the first cases in which
he was ever retained his adversary was
Senator George F. Edmunds.
Carpenter was a Douglas Democrat,
| later war Democrat, later yet a Repub-
! lican. Had the south adhered to Doug
| las. how different might have been our
history, Had the south not gone rabid
! in 1S93-97, what a different story might
/ be told! When the south goes out to
Denver next July. she ought to put
| the thinking cap in the suit case. It
will be needed.
| Thomas W. Ferry of Michigan sue
| ceeded Carpenter as president pro tenn
pore of the senate. Dom Piatt de-
clared that Dick Merrick. a great law
yer of that day. was the only man in
| America who could wear chin whiskers
/ shave his upper lip, and stay virtuOus
/ He was writing of and concerning
| certain chapter in Ferry's life at that
time. We all recolIect what great
big load of responsibility it was sought
/ to put on Ferry-that he should count