Year: 1874

TIE VOICE OF MASSACHUSETTS,


There could be no better illustration of the
tendencies of tho Administration party and
the popular revolt against them than is given
in the result of tho election yesterday in
Massachusetts. Whoever had said few weeks
AGO that Massachusetts would have elected q
Democratic Governor and an Oppose
ton majority of her Congressman
would have been laughed at as an
idiot. But this seems to be pre-
cisely what she did. The politicians who for
80 many years have experimental upon the
party loyalty of her citizens and tested 80 Sc
verely their allegiance to Republicanism have
at length discovered the limit beyond which
they cannot go. The defeat of Mr.. Butler is
the seal of disapprobation set by the people
upon materialistic politics, upon the sharp
and cunning management that perverts
the machinery of an honest party to the uses
of dishonest and corrupt politician, upon
tho self-seeking disposition that uses the
honorable instincts and generous impulses of
the people for tho basest purposes Of self
ACKNOWLEDGMENT in short upOn-not Butler
alone, but upon Butlerism, the bane of our
politics and the ruin of the Republican party.


1t is a fitting and just comment upon the
insincerty- shall we not say the absolute dis
honesty-of our politics and our politicians,
that this morning Henry l.. Dawes, who for
feited the respect of honest men by going into
MIR. Buffers district and unblushingly advO-
eating the election to Congress of that person,
whom he knew to be thoroughly dishonest and
bad-that George f. Hoar, who consented to
the candidacy of such man-that thousands
of Republicans who despised Butler and all
his teachings, and made open confession that
his nomination was disgrace and shame-it
is, we repeat, just and fitting comment upon
the insincerity of all these men that they
will, without exception, amid all the unpleas-
ant tidings which come to them this morning,
read the news of Mr.. Buffers defeat with
feeling not merely of resignation but OF positive
exultatiOn. Not one of these prominent per-
sons has dared lisp a syllable against NOM
ination which disgraced the party. Partisan
shin. the insane idea that the caucus was
supreme, and that there could be no revolt
against its dicta, whatever they might be.
closed their mouths against protest. Not
only that; it led them into a dis
honest and hypocrtical support of
man whom they dlstrusted, detested,
and despised. But one man has ever stood
up in their Conventions, and in manly, con-
scientious way, said in the face of custom
and tradition, and everything else, This
"man is a bad man, and whatever the Con-
"vention may say will not vote for him."
The rest quibbled and pettifogged, and the
party became in its organized capacity quib-
blers and pettifoggers through their influence.


They have sowed the wind in all these
wears. Yesterday they reaped the whirlwind.
The Massachusetts of John A. Andrew and
Charles Sumner had become, through the
Vaccinations of Butler and the dsgraceful
timidty and weakness of men who knew bet
ter than they dared to do, q poor shufiling
community of time-serving politicians, and
yesterday the honest people took the
business in hand, and in a way that
made the eyes of politicians fairly snap with
the suddenness of it said, "StOp" They
said it'hot only to the men who nominated
Butler, but to thOss who truckled to a
sentiment they did not believe in In
the nomination Of Talbot for Gov
ernor; to the men who nominated Aver
and Gooch and Alexander and the rest !;
to all the men who exalted the machine above
the people, the party above the country. And
they said it with great distinctness and such
earnestness as the man who means well u
will not forget in all his future, to Mr.. Henry
L. Dawes. 1t might have been prevented.
Had there been half a dozen Freeman
Clarkes in the Convention of last year !;
had there been the stomach in the party for
protest against the Third Term and against all
the manifold corruptiORs Of Butlerism, this
might not have been.


But it has been, and the most that can be
said is that the party has yet time to reflect
Will iti