Year: 1877

senator MOrtOns


Senator Morton died yesterday afternoon
at his home in Indianapolis, after tedious
illness. at the early age OF ffty-four.
Born in Indiana, in 1928; graduate OF
miami University; a lawyer by profession;
Circuit Judge by election in his twenty
ninth year; tho defeated republican candi-
date in the State for Governor in 1866, he was
elected Lieutenant Governor in 1860, became
Governor almost at once by the transfer OF
Governor Lane to the Senate; and now found
field for his remarkable administrative
and executive abilities in the duties which
fell upon him during the war. In 1860 hc
was not known outside Of his State; but the
earlier years of the war made him known to
the whole country as man Of untiring
activity, of unfaltering determination,
quick as well as far-seeing, and OF unconl-
mon executive capacity. In 1854 he was re-
elected Governor, and in the following year
he was struck down by paralysis He gave
part Of year to the doctors here and in
Europe. but finding that they did not cure
him he abandoned them and resumed his
executive duties; was elected to the Senate in
1867, and Immediately took his place among
the leaders of his party in Congress


He was o marvel Of restless energy. He
accommodated himself with o kind OF
cynical indifference to his crippled body, as
to house badly out of repair, and dragged
it about with him rs snail does his shell.
In the Senate. as also while Governor of his
State, he excused himself from no duties
acted as chairman and member of several
committees; was never absent from his seat,
and was ready for debate at all times. He
always spoke sitting, and though he was
sometimes able to hobble about with the
help of two canes, he was usually carried
into and out OF the Capitol.


Mr. Morton will not take high rank among
the statesmen of the country but he was
an energetic, though not always judicious,
party leader. The general opinion that he
was a bitter partisan does him injustice; he
played the game Of politics with singular
good nature; but he played to win, and ho
never hesitated to change his course or his
mind. Thus he was by turns an infa-
ZIONIST and hard money man; in fact, he





sible position on the financial question.
He was one of the ablest and most vigorous
opponents of the policy of giving the fran
chise to the blacks, q measure at first very
distasteful to the people Of his State; but
later he became one Of the strong
est supporters Of this policy. With
admirable sagacity he foresaw the
danger to the country from a disputed
Presidential election and sought during
several sessions to obtain constitutional
amendment which should provide against
this peril, urging that in such an emer-
gency it was not in human nature that the
party in power should yield to its oppo-
nents. But when the day of peril came he
unhesitatingly opposed the very doctrines
he had for several years asserted on this
question. He was long the most conspicu-
Gus and unfaltering ally Of the carpet-bag
rulers Of the South but he was the first
Senator to adhere to the new Southern
policy of President Hayes.


His most striking quality was the bulldog
vigor and pertinacity with which he at
tackled an opponent; but it is the general,
and we think correct, opinion that he never
showed the larger qualities of leadership. It
is greatly to his credit, considering the times
in which we live, that in all his public life
he was rigidly honest. He lived plainly,
and was avaricious Of power, not Of money.