The Unhappy Opposition

The following nddress of Hou. J. P. Dolliver, temporary cliairman of the reent lowa republican conventinn is ricli, witty and truthful. You never will reret readlng it, even if yon disagree wlth lie views expressed : Gentlemen op the Coxvention- Out f the abundaiice of my hemt I thauk you br the honor wbich your favor has conerred upon me. It bnilds up a mau's potica! coustitiition to take a Vont view of lie flghtlng strength of tlie republiean arty of lowa. It any of you have friends liat are botkered with pofltlcal dyspepsla; vho iind trouble in seleotlnjj i'rom the )rinted bill of fare of republiean politics, advise you to bring tliem here and let hem look in the face of this magnilieent sseuibly. Bef ore me and around me I ee many of the leaders of all the great owa catnpalgus. Some of thein enjoyed heir lirst hand to hand contest with the cmocratic party belore the youngest of s weie boni. I salute the veterans of lie republicau party of lowa. We who re younger in the service bow in kumble ratltnde before the leaders of politics in state that for twentj'-flve 3'ears has not eeded a ehange bad enough to ask for it. 'he demócrata of lowa are the farthest einoved froui office of any part of the hunan race except our greenback brethren. n this fortúnate state the republiean par? y, never without able leaders, has never uft'ered trom any monarchy, regency or ther despotisms wbatsoever. Your coneutions have always been deliberative, 'our nominations representative, your :ampaigns popular, and your ballot-boxes oo full for utterance of straight rapubli:an tickets. Consequently, a democrat las not been seeu on the streets of an lowa ity after 9 o'elock on election night for a quarter of a centuiy. The music of the elegraph office bas been their annual elgy of grief. They look upon a bulletin)oard as an enemy of free government, and accept the iirst half of Fraukliirs maxim, " Barly to bed," wlien tlie returns are coming in. It is understood that the purpose this year is to combine the capital of the democratie party with what stock in trade reniains unsold of Gen. Weaver's political business. The plan has no terrors for the republicans of lowa. The time has passed in this state wlien a selfconstituted little board of political trade - a mere bucket-shop, can get together in the sixth district and cast lots for the people's ollices like a court house ring stealing land at a tax sale. The republiean party ;ers tliis campaign against the iield witli :he most conlident assurance of success. the first act of the democratie party is to ile .1 scheclule iu bankruptcy. Aiready Jieir propeity is out of their own uaoie. Their national Standard is in the hands of a man whose name is notdiselosod by the democratie national record. Four years ago his name conld have prudently been used as au alias inider which to travel incognito, all over the known world outsidc of Búllalo. Toelegt him president wouid be like lending money to a stranger on the train. It takes the clieek of the democratie managers to play the whole American people for suckers. 1 than God that we belong to a party that saves the crowns of its public honor for the brow of its actual leadership. With the democratie party nominations are made not so much to represent the party as to disguise it. In its long struggle lor existence the men who have made the liistory of the party go to the wall. It is the only party that ever existed whose candidates and platforms never throw any light whatever either on ils management or its faith. In tact, modern demócrata of the practical school have no creed except the path of office. All the important democratie principies are unfit for use. They have been Ie ft outin the field just where they were used last, with not even a bunch of swamp grass thrown over them - in sunshine and rain, until rot and rust have done their fatal work. It is true they talk piously of the need of reform, and with an inexcusable libel acense the Integrity of the republican civil service. They work thei r favorito classical allusion to the Augean stables for all there is iu it. These tuey assert, must be cleaned out. Yet, from the general appearance of the crowd that is on hand to do the business, the average citizen is likely to conclude that their intention is to steal the fork rather than clean out the barn. It is true, they preempt all sides of the taritf' question. They piofess to settle that issue by a jargon of words without precedent in ihe anuals of nonsense and confusión. Yon mlgkt as well try to nt the hundred-headed dog of the ancient fable with a straw hat as to place a candid and Intelllgible tariit platform uiuler the feet of the democratie party. They approach that question, and nearly every other, like a man emptying hard coal ashes in a ölgh wind, witli their eyes sluit and their backs to the subject. What must be the thoughtsof a man like Mr. Thomas A. Hendrieks as lie sits iu his law office and looks at the top shelf of his lrbrary and counts the long row of dusty Congressional Globes from 1850 to 1880, from the fugitive slave law to the resumption of specie payment? Dean Swift used to say. that censure is a tax a man pays to the public forbelng eminent. It is not thefaultof Mr. Ilendricks that the Congressional Record connects him with all the blunders and treasons of recent politics. It is the tax a man pays to his generation for the luxury of haviug been an eminent democrat. Víctor Hugo, somewherein the masterpiece of prose fiction, relates a singular dream of Jean Valjeai1, in wliich the unfortunate man is carried back to the streets of his native village, and there in the midst of the gloom and ashes and dust of things is iuterviewed by a gentleman who solemnly asks him : "Where are jou going ? Do you not know you have been dead a long time ?" 1 hav sometimes thoughtthat if Mr. Hcudriek could once get hiiuself enlightened by ai appropriate visión and wander back in hi dreams to the familiar scènes of his pub lic career, he would need no assistance to enable him to hear more than one voice solemnly askiug the same questions : "Where are you going ? Do you not know you have been dead a long time? " Mr. Hendricks is placed upon the democratie ticket - not to recall tLe liistory of the democratie party. No toughtf ui democrat wants that remembered. He is on the ticket for theavowed purpo9e of reviving the superstition that surroimda the electoral count of 18T7. With charaoteristic stupidity the democratie managers still think the American people have never slept well since thatcelebrated question of mathematics was up for settlement. They iM'i-m to be aftücted with asortot intellectPual shiftlessness, that keeps them from understanding that the fraud issue died at Cincinnati in ISsO by the hand of Thomas A. Ilendricks. The indictment of an alleged momentous outrage cannot be missed foi' want of prosecution, and the papers in tlie case left under the dust of eight years, without losing interest to the traveling public. With all due respect to Colonel Villas, of Wisconsin, I say the statute of limitntion does run y The descendant of Cleopatra might as well bring suit against the estáte of Mark Anthony, as for the democratie managers to parntle tbe venerable gentlemen whowere caught between the wheels of the electoral commission. In trutli, the American people remember the long years of political rapiñe tHat have given the South to the democratie part}7, and Onding In Mr. Tilden and Mr. Ilendricks the immeiliateand responsible beueficiaiies of those ycais of felony against the ballot-box in the south, have never, to any visible degree, bewailed their memorable failure to catcli the rail of the hind car in 1877. For ono. I lliank the democratie party for the fraud ispue: miserable and useless In tself, it affordi the country a proper occasion to recall that strange decade from 18Cfl to 1870, during which the democratie parly, upon the ruins of the rebellion, contrived their infamous conspiracy against the civil riffhta of the people, that in ten states has left the ballot-box a fraud and the election day a farce. La Boulaye, thegreat Frencu liberal, now dead, just after the civil war in the United States, took occasion to say that " the republiean party of America holds in its hands the future of civilization." That was true then. It is true now. It is more oertal n that the republlcan party, sball have a future than it bas had a bistory. Now and then you tind a republlcan who enjoya the momentary importance that beiongs to the kicker and the scratcher. The shortest road to celebrity now-a-days is to advertise your conscience In the newspapers. There are republicana who treat their conscience as if it wcre the stock in tradeof abaking-powderfaetory. They soleranly protest that everybody's oonscience bas alura in it excent tbeirs. Tbey adopt the doctrine of Mattliew Arnold and insist that in order to be safe the nation must furnisli the retnnant with eomplimentary tickets and a front seat. They would hve the country govern itself hy the advice of persons whose ñames, it' I may borrow a pbrase from your eood frieiul Governor Carpenter, are written In the herd book of high ]olitical grades. Only last nionth a convention was held in a New York parlor, in which the credentials cal led for by tlie committees were a written pretense of bolineas, and the only creed requlred of the membersbip was " I believe in the communion of the saints ot Beacon II i 11 and Franklin Square." Let then) muñe. I trust they will stick togethertul Lhoy get thoroughfy acqoainted with each other. I have a curiosity to see the effect of a genuine democratie candidate on an unusually sanctified nostril. This campaign will last long enough to show to 2very sensible man's eyes, that no possible oombination of tight pants nnd hay fever can defeat the anxious will or the real conseience of this country, the republiean millions of America. Be notalarmed. The deuiocí atto party must disapponr before tlie question of reorganizing tlie republican party can ar'sj. Until the last Bourbon caiieus has adjourned without day, and the last Bourbon platform taken its place amoiiir the curiosities of literature, the republican party will remain where the provldenoe of God placed it - the masler of the situation. The republican party made a new era for American affaire. James Buchannn's administration is as distinctly a part of ancient history as the Babylonish captivity. Every footstep of the national progresa for thirty years has been dogged by democratie barking and biting at the heels. The tears of democratie statesman have fallen upon the tornbs of every aboininination that this generation has put away. That weighty organization of opinión, beginning at the grave of John Qalncy Adanis. and moving steadlly forward with the divine líate of slavery In his heart, and the divine oath of loyalty upon his lips, until at last the nation wás lifted out of political barbarisin and joined in holy bonds unto liberty forever - that is the republican party. And if anybody supposes that the democratie organization, or the recognized exponents of the democratie faith bore awy creditable part in the achievements of this generatioD, he ought to connect himself with a library association. Called to defend the national unity, the republican party out of the wrath and malice of civil strife gave to the luture au undivided country. Called to profeet public liberty. the republican party found the slave power Wated on all the thrones of office and opinión, and left it smitten to death on the field of battle without a civilized friend in the world. Called to restore the fallen fortunej of trade and Lndustry, the republican party has given good blood to the veins of American business, the homes of American labor and the mendicant compelition of English cities. Called to preserve the commercial good name of the nation, the republican party has eteadily exalted the public faith, and left it permanently secure from the folly of mauiacs and the threat of demagogues. Granderthan any victory in the civil war I count that silent moral victory of 18GS, when the American people, under the leadership of the great soldier of the rebellion, chose rather to suffer affliction with people who pay their bilis than to eijoy the convenience of the dead beat for a season. In the face of such a record the marvel is not that the democratie party fails, but that itexists. The history of this generatiou is an obituary notice both of men and doctrines. Yet even here in Iowa, there are men who have got themselves galvanized into the belief that the time has come in the coune of humane events for the procession to tuin out and let the corp:-e uku the road. It is even hintet that this is the year for the young men o the country to cast their lot with lliedem ocratic party. I venture to say that no young man - no man not yet hardened b; the search for office - not yet fallen int that most humilating of all pftganlsm, tb idolatry of biimmer-worship- not yet lus to a fair prospect and au honest stake i society - L'an look without shaine on th only vital thing left in the democracy o Iowa. Every scliool-house in Iowa open iuto therepublican party. A young ma can not get into the national democratie party without leaving his history of the United rttateson the outside. IntbeMark ages they had a custom of (lisposiug of obiioxious doctrines by burning up the books that contained them. They answered a man's boc-k with kindling wood. If this were a dark age yon would see the democratie managers out with an oil-can picking up copies of the history of the United States In the interest of reform aud fiee trade. The young men of the country are faithftil to the republican party, not only because of the service of the party and age, bu because the ard of the party is to-day in the hands of u min who bears the grandest brain ever covered by au American liat, and tne best lieart ever wraped up in an American vest. Tlie people of this country like brains- nervous matter under the roots of the hair. In James G. Blaine they find a man the scope of whose faculties is a perfect horizon - a man who knows the size of this nation - a man who knows the history of tliis nation - a man who knows the strength o! this nation - ¦ man who knows the rights of this nation - a man who comprehends with a serene faitli the mission of the republic and its sublime destiny in the midst of the nations and the ages. Not in v.iin lias this great state, correct in its opinión, upright in its consciencc, lald at the feet of Blaine the royal tribute of its allection. He stands to'day 8t the very opening of the campuign, at onccastaudurd bearer and victor. Mr. Cleveland, as his letter infornis us, believes in Providence, and has the grace tosay In elosing, that in his opinión, " the Supreme Beiag will always bless honest humane endeavors in the conscieiitious discharge of public duty." Iowa believed that before Mr. Cleveland ever thought ot such a thing. God's l'rovidence, 3'ou may bc certaiu, never identified the names of Blaine and Logan in the eternal reputatiou witli the most splendid pages of American history- the one as 1 statesman, the other as a soldier, only to see thein defeated by a person who at the age of thirty-four deserted a learned profesión to bccome the hangmat) in a back couuty in Xew York. I beg pardon gentlemen. 1 have squandered your time without knowing it. Th work of this convention is simple and easy. No man, who knows the record of republicaii conventions in Iowa, doubts that it will be rapidly and wisely done. Thankingyou again tbr the embanasing distinction you have "iven me, I sit down, the obedient servan t of the convention's pleuare.