Year: 1878

we have been permitted to see In the East


In Massachusetts he has appeared as an
extraordinarily foul-mouthed ignoramus,
with the loud voice of demagogue, but
curiously lacking in the tact which men
of that bad profession ought to have
to make them measurably success
full. A demagogue should at least
know how to fatter the people he addresses;
that is his most necessary art. But kear-
ney had so little tact that he thought 1t
Aattery to an audience Of Massachusetts,
workingmen to take off his coat and speak
to them in dirty shirt. He ought to have
known that though the novelty OF this act
might for the moment attract little ap-
plause the very men who shouted
lost respect for the speaker who
condescended to so low and palpable an
artifce When he flung of his shirt collar
with the explanation that he could afford
only two clean collars week, even General
Butler made haste to disown him, and in
stead Of applause his ridiculous boast
elected shout of derisive laughter Mr.
Kearney's theory seems to have been that he
could most forcibly impress an American
audience by proving to it that he was
the poorest, the dirtiest, the most ignorant
and the most profane person in it and, the
people of Massachusetts, being what they
are, on the whole self-respecting, respect
able, desirous of information, and prefer
ring vituperation, as Mr.. Wendell Phillips
has taught them to like it, mixed with wit
and humor and devoid OF ruffianism,
Kearney's audiences have grown smaller
instead of larger.


And now comes to US the opinion of him
held by his California allies. A HERALD
correspondent in San Francisco reports
elsewhere conversation with Mr.. Knight,
the secretary of the Kearney organization
for California, in which he gives
with free hand but in good
and respectable language, an account
of the so-called "Great Agitator,
hich, judging from his course here. we
believe to be not far amiss. Kearney,
his associates in San Francisco say, really
ruined the "Kearney movement" out
there. He gathered about him only the
rude and ignorant )" he repelled decent and





demanded that Kearney should take
back seat" says his associate. Mr..
Knight, "but he put ignorance, bar
barism and mob rule on top, and
the intelligent and self-respecting fled
away from him, and decent law-abiding
people looked on with horror" Meantime
Kearney sought only "to be the god of the
sand lot" That we judge. is fair and
accurate account Of the celebrated Kearney
movement, which resulted, as Mr. knight
regretfully says, in defeat where he ex-
pected success.


1t could scarcely have resulted other
wise. Kearney ''pooled the issues" as he
puts it; he collected together the whole
ignorance. brutality, vice and barbarism of
the State and pitted them against the re-
spectacle and industrious people, and
these walked up to the polls and beat him.
They beat him SO easily that it is now said
twenty-five thousand voters out of q total
of one hundred and fifty-fve thousand
stayed at home, and yet the Kearney
men form less than third of
the Constitu tional Convention. Pooling
the issues" seems o simple and effective
device, but it is one open to both sides. If
a man like Kearney could really carry an
election in any State society in that State
would already have gone to pieces. Some
Of the details of his California attempt give
one O grotesque idea of his lack of brains
and judgment His favorites were picked
from the lowest roughs. His principal lieu
tenant and fellow agitator, ''whom he used
to exhibit in the sand lots with dirty face
and uncombed hair, to show that he
was honest" was not even citizen;
some of his candidates for member
ship of the Constitutional Convention were
made citizens but few days before the
election. And now come grave charges
that Kearney and his favorites have mis-
used or kept for themselves the money OBJ
tained from working people for the use of
his party; charges which he will have to
refute before he can expect oven men rs
rough and ignorant as himself to listen to
him.


The country is not in prosperous con-
dition the people are dissatisfied, and
with reason. They have right to seek
remedies for the prevailing depression Of
industry. But when a man advertises for
doctor he is pretty certain to hear from
every quack in the neighborhood, and SO it
is in these times the country is overrun
with political quacks who urge their
patent nostrums upon the people. or
these Kearney is the worst example,
but there ere great many others,
less profane, less boisterous, but not
less ignorant than he, and these people
for their own purposes exaggerate the dis
tress and depression, and, like Kearney,
avoid facts in their discussions. 1t is CON-
monty asserted by the greenback-labor ora
tors that three millions of people are unem-