YALE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY 3 9002 07223 9818 . JB "ZgLve!tfefeJ3e?te:, : for the.fou?umig tf 9. ColUgi in, this. Colony^ >Yi&LH«¥Mr^IEIESinrY« - iynsia&iHsr • OUR MARTYRED PRESIDENT. AS A MAN, THE NOBLEST AND PUREST OF HIS TIMES. AS A CITIZEN, THE GRANDEST OF HIS NATION. AS A PRESIDENT, THE IDOL OF FIFTY MILLIONS OF PEOPLE. THE LIFE AND PUBLIC SERVICES OF Gen. JAMES A. GARFIELD, TWENTIETH PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. EMBRACING A FULL ACCOUNT OF HIS EARLY LIFE ; HIS STRUGGLES WITH POVEUTV AND EFFORTS TO OBTAIN AN EDUCATION; HIS BRILLIANT SER VICES AS A SOLDIER AND STATESMAN; HIS ELECTION TO THE PRESIDENCY; HIS ABLE AND PATRIOTIC ADMINISTRATION; HIS MANFUL BATTLE WITH RINGS AND CORRUPTION IN HIGH PLACES. TOGETHER WITH TUB HISTORY OF HIS ASSASSINATION, GIVING ALL THE INCIDENTS OF HIS LONG AND PAINFUL ILLNESS, THE SURGICAL TREATMENT, THE CONSULTATIONS OF THE EMINENT PHYSICIANS, DAILY SCENES AT THE SUF FERER'S BEDSIDE, LAST HOURS AND DEATH, THE FUNERAL CORTEGE, BURIAL, Etc. By JAMES D. McCABE, Aothoe of "The Pictorial History of thf. World," " Pathways of the Holy Land," " The Centennial History of the United States," etc., etc. Embellished with a Fine Steel Portrait and Numerous Engravings on Wood. / NATIONAL PUBLISHING COMPANY: PHILADELPHIA, PA.; CHICAGO, ILLS.; ST. LOUIS, MO.; ATLANTA, GA Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1880, by J. K. JONES, In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D.& Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1881, by J. E. JONES, lo the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. 0. PREFACE. IT is the pride and boast of America that this is a country of self-made men. However humble may be the position of a man, it is within his power, in this land of equality and Republican Institutions, to attain the highest honors within the gift of his fellow-citizens. Our history is full of the names of men who, without friends or fortune to aid them, have risen by the force of their own abilities to the proudest position in the Republic — Washington, Jefferson, Marshall, Clay, Lin coln and their glorious compeers, were all self-made men, and carved out their great successes by their own unaided efforts. Their example shines out brightly to encourage and cheer others who are struggling onward in the road by which they climbed to greatness. No career in all our history furnishes a more brilliant example of this than that of General James A. Garfield, Starting as a poor farmer boy, without money, position, or influence, and compelled to struggle against poverty, he has raised himself to the highest pinnacle of fame. The poor boy that drove the mule team of a canal, boat was elected by his countrymen to the exalted position of President of the United States. His das tardly assassination aroused an outpouring of grief, sympathy and love which showed how strong was his hold upon the affections of the nation. (3) 4 PREFACE. It is but natural that his countrymen should desire to know the means by which this great success was accomplished. To meet this demand the author has prepared this volume, which relates the life of this truly great man. The work is more interesting than a novel, for it is true. It is the story of unconquera ble determination and sublime self-reliance, of lofty purpose and inflexible resolve, of incorruptible integ rity and moral courage of the highest type, of noble effort and magnificent achievement, of a prolonged struggle, crowned by the most brilliant triumphs. The history of the dastardly attempt upon the life of President Garfield is graphically related, and the work contains a carefully written account of the long and terrible suffering of the distinguished patient, with descriptions of the daily scenes around his bed side. The skilful medical and surgical treatment pur sued by the physicians in charge of the case, the heroic firmness with which the suffering President bore him self in the midst of his agony, the firm and devoted conduct of Mrs. Garfield, " the plucky little lady of the White House," the outpouring of sympathy and affection, not only from our own people, but from the nations and sovereigns of the Old World, the terrible struggle between life and death, the final conquest by the Great Enemy, the national outburst of grief, the mournful journey to the grave in his native State, the scenes along the route and at the funeral, are all accu rately related, and constitute one of the most thrilling and fascinating narratives ever written. Nothing in ro mance exceeds in startling tragedy or wonderful pathos this sad episode in our national historv. PREFACE. 5 The work abounds in copious extracts from the speeches and writings of General Garfield, for it is only by an intimate acquaintance with his views as set forth in these utterances that he can be fairly judged, or in telligently appreciated. His record is presented here clearly and without partiality, that all men may see that his life was free from stain, his services hon orable and distinguished, and that his claims to the love and confidence of the American people rest upon a solid foundation of genuine merit and faithful service honorably performed, even at the price of martyrdom. No more truly did the great Napoleon rise from ob scurity to the pinnacle of fame by herculean energy and an indomitable will that carried him over the snow-capped mountains in the piercing cold of mid winter, than did James A. Garfield, by the same in nate, progressive energy, rise from obscurity to the highest position attainable in this the foremost nation of the world. His life, while wrapped like a cloak in romance, had its shadows, its sacrifices, and its mag nificent successes. It is an inspiring, captivating story, and points such a moral as only great deeds can. The young men of the nation should read it, for it may be to them a source of inspiration. The old men of the nation should read it, for it will recall to them holy memories of the great deeds and the great men of our past. Philadelphia, September 30th, 1881. THE PHYSICIANS AND NURSES LIFTING THE PRESIDENT FROM HIS BED FOR A CHANGE. JAMES AND HENRY A. GARFIELD, SONS OF THE PRESIDENT. CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. CHILDHOOD AND EARLY YEARS. 3lrth and Parentage — Rev. Hosea Ballou — Death of James Garfield's Father* — A Western Widow — Jules Garfield resolves to keep the Family to. gether — Boyhood of James Garfield — Brought up to Hard Work— An Industrious Boy — James determines to obtain an Education — A Poor Boy's Struggles — The Village School — James makes an excellent lis tener — Becomes a Boatman on the Ohio Canal — Is Promoted— Wishes. to be a Sailor — A Fortunate Illness — James Garfield makes the Ac quaintance of Samuel D. Bates— Resolves to go to School — At the Academy — A Struggle for an Education — Garfield at the Carpenter's Bench — Becomes » School Teacher — Leaves the Academy — Finds a Friend who helps him to enter College— His Reasons for Selecting Williams College — His Career there — Graduates with distinction. CHAPTER II. PRESIDENT. OF A COLLEGE AND STATE SENATOR. It. Garfield joins the Church of the Disciples — Statement of the Religious Belief of this Church — Reckless Attacks of Political Enemies upon Mr. Garfield's Religious Views — The true state of the Case— Mr. Garfield, becomes a Professor of Hiram Eclectic Institute— Is made President of the College — His life in this capacity — Preaches the Gospel — Growing' Popularity — Marriage of Mr. Garfield — His Wife — Buys a House — Mr. Garfield enters Political Life^Joins the Free Soil Party — Is Elected to the State Senate — Services in the Senate— The Secession Troubles — Mr. Garfield becomes a Prominent Union Leader — His Position in the Senate — A Rising Man — Supports the War Preparations of Ohio — Denounces Secession — Ohio's Situation at the Commencement of the Rebellion — How the State was Armed and Prepared for the War — Growth of the State Militia— Outbreak of the War— Rapid offers of Volunteers- Enthusiasm of the People— Services of Mr. Garfield to the State— Sup ports Governor Dennison'a War Measures — Is sent to Illinois to Buy Arms — Determines to take part in the War. (5) 6 CONTENTS. CHAPTER III. THE COLLEGE PRESIDENT BECOMES A BRIGADIER-GENERAL. Hr. Garfield organizes a Military Company among his Students — Is made Lieutenant-Colonel — Is Promoted to be Colonel of the Forty-second Ohio Infantry— Organization and History of the Regiment— A Noble Record— The Forty-second ordered to the field— Joins General Buell's Army in Kt atucky — Garfield is placed in Command of a Brigade — State of affaire in the West— Garfield's first Campaign— An Important Trust — The March up the Sandy Valley — The First Blow struck — Rout of the Rebel Cavalry — Colonel Garfield wins a handsome Victory over Humphrey Marshall at Middle Creek— Flight of Marshall's Forces— Garfield sets the Ball of Victory in motion— A true estimate of the Victory of Middle Creek— A New Dodge— Out of Supplies— The Flood in the Big Sandy— Garfield forces a Steamboat to ascend the River — Garfield at the Wheel — A Thrilling Incident — Garfield wins another Victory — Drives the Rebels from Pound Gap — Is ordered to Louisville — Is congratulated by General Buell in Ueneral Orders— Value of his Operations. CHAPTER IV. FROM SHILOH TO CHICKAMATJGA. General Garfield given a Brigade in the Army of the Cumberland — Joins Buell on the march — Battle of Pittsburgh Landing — General Garfield's share in this fight — Takes part in the Pursuit — The Siege of Corinth — Garfield's Brigade one of the first to enter the town — Is ordered to re pair the Memphis and Charleston Railroad — Successful performance of this duty — Garfield at Huntsville — Detailed for Court-martial duty — A severe illness — Ordered to Cumberland Gap — Placed on the Fitz-John Porter Court martial — Ordered to South Carolina — Battle of Stone River — Garfield is appointed Chief of Staff to General Rosecrans — His duties and servicesin this position — General Rosecrans' quarrels with the War Department — Garfield endeavors to harmonize these difficulties — Rosecrans' delay at Murfreesboro — Reasons for it— Garfield's views respecting it — A stinging letter from Rosecrans to Halleck — Garfield's advice respecting the Reorganization of the Army — It is disregarded — He urges Rosecrans to advance — A Model Military Report — The Army moves off— The Tullahoma Campaign — A brilliant success — It was CONTENTS. 7 really due to Garfield— Advance upon Chattanooga-Retreat of Bragg— Battle of Chickamauga— Garfield's share in it— He is promoted to be Major-General of Volunteers for his conduct at Chickamauga. CHAPTER V. GENERAL GARFIELD ENTERS CONGRESS. General Garfield Elected to Congress from the Western Reserve District- Desires to Remain in the Army — His Reasons for Resigning his Com mission and Entering Congress — Character of his District — Reasons for his Election — Decides to Leave the Army — Enters Congress — Takes a Commanding Position in the House— Appointed to the Military Com mittee — Estimate of him as one of the Leaders of the Republican Party — His Habits of Industry — His Mode of Rest — Mr. Long, of Ohio, pro poses to Recognize the Southern Confederacy — A Brilliant Invective — An Impressive Scene in the House — Delight of the Republicans over Garfield's Reply — It Ensures his Success in the House — Mr. Garfield in Demand as a Speaker — The Inconvenience of being Too Ready an Orator — General Garfield's Account of Congress — Its History — Its Great Ser vices — Its Intimate Connection with the People — How it has become, the National Mouthpiece and Defender — Congress and the Constitution — Congress and the President — Congress and the People — A Statesman's Views. CHAPTER VI. GENERAL GARFIELD S CONGRESSIONAL CAREER. The Wade-Davis Manifesto — General Garfield before the Convention- Moral Courage wins the Day — Triumphant Nomination and Election of General Garfield — Is appointed a Member of the Committee of Ways and Means — Speech on the Constitutional Amendment — A Grand De nunciation of Slavery — Speech on the Reconstruction of the Southern States — Speech on Confiscation — A Reminiscence of the War — Gradual Rise of the Negro — How Garfield refused to surrender a Fugitive Slave — Speech on State Sovereignty — General Garfield as a Temperance Worker — How he shut up a Beer Brewery — A Good Speculation — Gen eral Garfield's Tariff Record— Views of the Iron and Steel Bulletin- General Garfield's Course Satisfactory— To the Protectionists— His Real CONTENTS. Position on this Question— Re-election of General Garfield to Congress —Is made Chairman of the Military Committee— Successive re-elections to Congress— Is made Chairman of the Committee on Appropriations- Debate on the Civil Appropriation Bill of 1872— General Garfield's mode of conducting Public Business— The Salary Grab— General Garfield's Course respecting it— Letter to a Friend— Garfield successfully Vindi- dicates his Course— A Silly Rumor Refuted — General Garfield urges the Repeal of the Salary Bill. CHAPTER VII. GENERAL GARFIELD LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION — IS ELECTED TO THE SENATE. Efforts to defeat General Garfield for Congress — His triumphant Re-election — The Democrats have a Majority in the House — Garfield loses his Chair manship — One of the Republican Leaders — A sharp Arraignment of the Democratic Party — Tbe Democratic Graveyard— Ohio goes Republican — General Garfield nominated for United States Senator — Is the Republi can Candidate for Speaker of the House — A Member of two important Committees — Becomes the Republican Leader in the House — Garfield pours a Broadside into the Democratic Ranks — A Withering Denunciation of Democratic Policy — Reply to Mr, Tucker, of Virginia — Garfield breaks the Democratic Line — Delight of the Republicans in the House — Com ments of the New York Herald — Appeal in behalf of the Loyal Men of the South — Speech on the Judicial Expenses Bill — Speech at Madison Wisconsin^Speech at the Andersonville Re-union— Plain Talking on a Sad Subject — General Garfield is Elected to the United States Senate- - His Arrival at Columbus — Reception at the Capital — His Remarks — Ad dress of President Hinsdale on Garfield's Election — Speech of General Garfield on Democratic Nullification. , CHAPTER VIII. GENERAL GARFIELD'S FINANCIAL RECORD. General Garfield's Appointment to the Committee on Banking and Currency — His Efforts in Congress in behalf of Honest Money — A Formal State- ment of his Views on the Money Question— The Currency Doctrine of .2862 — Definition of Money — Money as an Instrument of Exchange— CONTENTS. 9 Coin as an Instrument of Universal Credit — Statutes cannot Repeal the Laws of Value — Paper Money as an Instrument of Credit — Necessity of Resumption — A Powerful Argument — General Garfield's Speech on the Weaver Resolutions. CHAPTER IX. the credit mobilier and de golyer charges general garfield's triumphant vindication. History of the Credit Mobilier Scheme — The Pacific Railway — Government Aid extended to H. Oakes Ames' Connection with the Road — Congress Investigates the Credit Mobilier — General Garfield's sworn Testimony before the Committee — He denies all Improper Connection with the Scheme — Publishes a Review of the Case — An Exhaustive Discussion of the Case — Testimony in the Matter — General Garfield's Response to the Charges of 1872 — Mr. Ames' Testimony Analyzed — Mr. Ames' Memoranda — The Check on the Sergeant-at-Arms — General Garfield's In terviews with Mr. Ames during the Investigation — Conclusions — Trium phant Vindication of General Garfield — -All the Charges against him — Letter of Judge Poland — General Garfield Unanimously Acquitted of Wrong-doing — The De Golyer Pavement Company — Charges against General Garfield — His Triumphant Vindication of his Course — The Truth established at last. CHAPTER X. THE CHICAGO CONVENTION. GENERAL GARFIELD NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. The Chicago Convention — Description of the Hall — General Garfield a Del egate from Ohio — Cordial Reception by the Convention — Opening of the Proceedings— The First Day's Work— Events of the Second Day— The Struggle between Grant and Blaine— Parliamentary Skirmishing — Proceedings of the Third Day— Report of the Committee on Credentials —The Evening Session— The Fight over Illinois— The Fourth Day's Session— The Grant Lines show Signs of Weakness— Garfield's Mas terly Management of the Ohio Delegation— Nomination of Candidates —Blaine and Grant Presented— General Garfield Nominates John She*. 10 CONTENTS. man — A Noble Speech— The Fifth Day's Session — Balloting • for the Presidential Candidates— A Stubborn Fight— A Detailed Statement of the Ballots — The Sixth and Last Day — Wisconsin Votes for Garfield — The General endeavors to Stop the Movement in his Favor — He is un successful—The Break to Garfield— The Thirty-sixth Ballot— Garfield v Nominated for the Presidency — Exciting Scenes in the Convention — The Nomination Made Unanimous — Nomination of Vice-President — How Garfield's Nomination was brought about — Platform of the Re publican Party for* 1880. CHAPTER XI. GENERAL GARFIELD SINCE THE CHICAGO CONVENTION. The Nomination unsought by General Garfield — Congratulatory Telegrams — How the News was received in Congress — Scene in the House — Gen eral Garfield notified of his Nomination — His Reply — Returns Home — Reception at Cleveland — General Garfield presides at the Reunion of Hiram College — His Speech on that Occasion — A Glance at the Past — Reception at Mentor — Visit to Painesville— General Garfield addresses his Neighbors — Sunday at Home — General Garfield returns to Wash ington City — His Journey — A Serenade at Washington — Speech of Gen eral Garfield — Adjournment of Congress — Fourth of July Speech at Painesville — General Garfield's Letter accepting the Nomination for the Presidency — Personal Characteristics — General Garfield's Washington Home — The Farm at Mentor — The Garfield Family. CHAPTER XII. ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. The Presidential Election — Garfield Elected — Life at Mentor after the Elec tion — Departure for Washington — The Inauguration — Brilliant Scenes — The new Cabinet — Divisions in the Republican Party — Nomination of Judge Robertson — Resignation of the New York Senators — The Presi dent endorsed by the Senate and people — Promise of a noble Adminis tration — The Star Route Scandal — Illness of Mrs. Garfield — The proposed New England Tour — The President Shot — Scenes at the Depot — Removal to the White House — Heroic Courage of the President — A Brave Fight — Arrival of Mrs. Garfield — Anxiety of the people — Statements of Eye witnesses — Daily progress of the President's Case — Hope at last — The Assassin — His Crime and its Motive — No Conspiracy — Details of the Arrest — Guiteau's Father and Brother denounce him. BR. W0ODWAUD DK. HAMILTON. DR. ItEYBURN. DR. BAUNES. HOLDING A CONSULTATION". CB. AUNMV. DB. BLISS. GUITEAU'S ENGLISH BULLDOG PISTOT THAT HE USED TO SHOOT THE PRESIDENT. CONTENTS. 11 CHAPTER XIII. THE PRESIDENT'S ILLNESS. Second Week of the President's Illness — Alarming Symptoms — Cause of the Relapse — Struggle between Life and Death— A Painful Operation — Loca ting the Bullet — The Induction Balance — Progress of the Case — Hopes of Recovery — Courage of the President — He desires to leave Washing ton — Sympathy of Foreign Powers — Letter from Mr. Gladstone — Another Painful Operation — Another Relapse — Dangers of Malaria — An anxious Sunday — A Period of Danger — Sympathy from China — A New Compli cation — Inflammation of the Parotid Gland — Progress of this Feature of the Case — Incidents in the Sick-Room — The President holding his own— The Surgeons decide upon Removal — An Alarming Relapse — Another bad Saturday — A Fight for Life — A Message from Queen Victoria — Scenes at the Sufferer's Bedside — An Interview with his Children — A Change for the Better — Continued Improvement — Dr. Bliss's Opinions — Scenes in and about the White House — Preparations for Removing the President to Long Branch — Public Prayers for the President — He parts with his Sons — The Preparations for Removal to Long Branch Con tinued — Action of the Pennsylvania Railroad — Trie Cottage at Long Branch — The Departure from Washington — Incidents of the Journey — Arrival at Long Branch — The President in his new Quarters — Success of the Journey— A Change for the Better — The First Week by the Seaside — A Touching Incident — Renewed Signs of Danger? CHAPTER XIV. DEATH OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. Slow Progress of the President's Case — Is Placed in his Reclining Chair- Slight Signs of Improvement — The President Enjoys the View of the Sea — A Change for the Worse — The Chills Return — The Surgeons lose Hope — September the Nineteenth — The Last Struggle — Death of President Garfield — The Brave Battle over — General Swaim's Account of the Death- Scene — Dr. Bliss's Account — Vice-President Arthur Notified — The News Spread Throughout the Country — The National Sorrow — Sympathy from Abroad — Message from Queen Victoria to Mrs. Garfield— The President's Mother Receives the News— The Post-Mortem— The Body Conveyed from Elberon to Washington City— Incidents of the Journey— Arrival at Washington— Conveyed to the Capitol — Lying in State Under the Dome 12 CONTENTS. — The Last Parting of the Family with the Husband and Father — The Funeral Services — The Journey to Cleveland — Scenes along the Route — Arrival at Cleveland — Lying in State in Monumental Park — Sunday in Cleveland — Funeral of President Garfield— The Nation's Last Tribute to its Martyred Chief. GEN. CHESTER A. ARTHUR. CHAPTER I. Birth and Parentage— College Life — Teaches a, Country School — Studies Law — Admitted to Practice — Settles in New York — Marries the Daugh ter of a, Hero — Defends two Fugitive Slaves — Carries his Case to a Tri umphant Issue — Appointed Engineer-in-Chief of Governor Morgan's Staff — An Honorable Record — Refuses to accept Presents for his Public Services — His Record on Civil Service Reform — Made Collector of the Port of New York — Puts a stop to Frauds upon the Government — At tempts to fasten Charges of Fraud upon Him are Unsuccessful— Re moved from Office hy President Hayes — Offered the Post of Consul- General to Paris — Refuses it — Personal Appearance — Nominated for Vice-President — His Letter of Acceptance. CHAPTER II. THE VICE-PRESIDENCY AND THE PRESIDENCY. Elected Vice-President — Inaugurated — Sides with the Stalwarts— Informed of the Assassination of the President — Summoned to Washington — Inter view with Mrs. Garfield — Grief of General Arthur — Incidents of his Stay in Washington — Returns to New York — Efforts to Induce him to Assume the Presidential Office — His Refusal— Noble and Dignified Con duct of General Arthur — Informed of the President's Death — Takes the Oath of Office as President — Message to the Cabinet — Goes to Elberon — Returns to New York — Back to Long Branch — Attends the Funeral Ser vices — Accpmpanies the Funeral Party to Washington — Takes the Oath a Second Time — His Inaugural — Takes Part in the President's Funeral at Washington— Remains at Washington — Appoints a Day of Fasting and Prayer- — Calls an Extra Session of the Senate. THE LIFE AND PUBLIC SERVICES OF JAMES A. GARFIELD. CHAPTER I. CHILDHOOD AND EARLY TEARS. B^rth and Parentage — Rev. Hosea Ballou — Death of James Garfield's Father — A Western Widow — Jules Garfield resolves to keep the Family to gether — Boyhood of James Garfield — Brought up to Hard Work — Au Industrious Boy — James determines to obtain an Education — A Poor Boy's Struggles — The Village School — James makes an excellent lis tener — Becomes a Boatman on the Ohio Canal — Is Promoted— Wishes to be a Sailor — A Fortunate Illness — James Garfield makes the Ac quaintance of Samuel D. Bates — Resolves to go to School — At the Academy — A Struggle for an Education — Garfield at the Carpenter's Bench — Becomes a School Teacher — Leaves the Academy — Finds a Friend who helps him to enter College— His Reasons for Selecting Williams College — His Career there — Graduates with distinction James Abraham Garfield was born in the village of Orange, in Cuyahoga County, Ohio, about twelve miles from Cleveland, on the 19th of November, 1831. His parents were both of New England extraction. His father was Abraham Garfield, a native of Otsego County, New York, but the ancestors of Abraham Garfield had 2 18 JAMES A. GARFIELD. resided in Massachusetts for generations. His mother's maiden name was Eliza Ballou. She was a native of New Hampshire, and was a niece of the Rev. Hosea Bal lou, one of the most distinguished Universalist divines of his day.*James Garfield was the youngest of four sons. When he was scarcely two years old his father died, in 1833, leaving his family in straitened circumstances. The *As the connection between General Garfield and his distinguished great uncle is exceedingly interesting, we quote here the following brief biography of the latter : " Hosea Ballou. — An American clergyman, born at Richmond, N. H., April 30, 1771, died at Boston, June 7, 1852. He was the son of a Baptist cler gyman, who was conscientiously opposed to receiving any remuneration for his professional services, and consequently he had so few advantages of education, that in learning to write he was obliged to use birch bark instead of paper, and charcoal instead of pen and ink. At the age of nineteen he joined the Baptist church under his father's care, but, having declared his belief in the final salvation of all men he was excommunicated. He began to preach at the age of twenty-one, and in 1794 was settled at Dana, Mass. In 1801 he removed to Barnard, Vermont, while in 1804 he wrote his 'Notes on the Parables' and ' Treatise on the Atonement.' In 1807 he became pastor of the Universalist church in Portsmouth, N. H. In 1815 he removed to Salem, Mass., and in 1817 to Boston, where he became pastor of the Second Universalist church, in which location he continued for thirty- five years. In 1819 he commenced the ' Universalist Magazine,' which he conducted alone for several years, and afterwards in conjunction with the Rev. Thomas Whitemore. In 1831, aided by his grand-nephew, Hosea Bal lou, he commenced the ' Universalis Expositor,' a quarterly publication, to which he continued to contribute until his death. Among his published works, besides those mentioned, are 26 ' Lecture Sermons,' 20 ' Select Ser mons,' an ' Examination of the Doctrine of Future Retribution (1846), and a volume of poems, mostly hymns, many of which are embodied in the ' Uni versalist Collection' edited by Adams and Cliapin. He preached more than ten thousand sermons, none of which were written till after their delivery. Two of his brothers, Benjamin and David, also became Universalist preach ers. Two memoirs of him have been published, one by his son, M. M. Bal- ou, the other by Thomas Whitemore (1854)." — The American Encyclo pedia, Vol. 11. p. 24u. CHILDHOOD AND EARLY YEARS. 19 support of the family devolved entirely upon Mrs. Gar field, but fortunately for her boys she was a woman of rare energy and excellent business qualities. The friends of General Garfield are unanimous in declaring that it is from his mother that he inherits his capacity for work, and the patience and perseverance he displays in the ac complishment of his ends. Mrs. Garfield was determined from the moment of her husband's death that the family should not be separated, but should be kept together as when the father was living. To accomplish this re quired a hard struggle, but she was a woman of strong faith and courage, and with the aid of her three elder boys managed to gain a frugal support from the little farm left to her by her husband. Young as he was, James was obliged to do what he could in the work of the farm, and in this way learned the habits of indus try which have distinguished his manhood, and laid the foundation of his strong and vigorous constitution. He worked with a will, for he liked it, and even as a child detested idleness. When but a little fellow, it was said of him by the neighbors, that he had " not a lazy hair in his head." The farm was poor, and it required constant and hard work from all the family to get a living out or it. From his earliest years, James was anxious to obtain a good education ; but the prospect before him was dis couraging. He was a poor boy, and without friends who could assist him. Whatever he accomplished in life must be by his own exertions. This conviction became im planted in his mind at a very early day, and gave to him an earnestness of character and resoluteness of purpose 20 JAMES A. GARFIELD. remarkable in one so young. During the summer months he worked on the little farm, and in the winter he worked at the carpenter's bench, his friends thinking it best that a poor boy with his way to make in the world, should be master of some good useful trade. When he had suf ficiently mastered the rudiments of this trade, the neigh- bois employed him in such simple jobs as he was capable of performing, and in this way he was able to earn a little money. All this while he could neither read nor write, yet he was by no means an ignorant boy. There was in Orange a so-called village school, where the villagers met in the evening during the long winters, to read and discuss such books as they possessed and the newspapers that came to them by the mail. Young Garfield was a constant attendant and an eager listener, and in this ca pacity picked up considerable useful information. No one would have dreamed that the illiterate boy who drank in so eagerly the prosy sentences of the county paper, would one day be the brilliant and accomplished leader of a great party, and a candidate for the highest honors in the gift of his countrymen. What a lesson of hope and encouragement does such a life hold out to the young and struggling men of America. The same means by which this man rose to fame, are open to every one who will use them as faithfully and honorably as he did. This constant attendance upon the village school but increased the desire of young Garfield to obtain an edu cation. But to obtain this money was indispensable, and the boy had none. Naturally he began to look about him for some avocation which would enable him to earn w o s I P3 i> > g g iiip ¦¦¦¦Pi I ¦SL- JT-- '¦; GUITEAU, THE ASSASSIN. CHILDHOOD AND EARLY YEARS. 21 money, and so obtain the knowledge he craved The ^hio Canal passed within a short distance of the Garfield farm, and the lad made many acquaintances among the boatmen. From these he learned that the wages paid the canal men amounted to more than he could earn by his labor on the farm or by carpentering, and that they were paid promptly and in cash. He therefore deter mined to become a boatman, and when but seventeen years old succeeded in obtaining employment as driver of one of the boats. Though his position was humble in the extreme, he displayed such fidelity and diligence in the discharge of his duties that he attracted the attention of his superiors, who promoted him to the post of steersman, a position which brought him an increase of wages. He held this position for about eighteen months, working hard, and laying by as much as he could of his small earnings. In the fall of 1848, being dissatisfied with canal life, he resolved to take a step forward and ship as a sailor on one of the vessels plying on Lake Erie. Be fore he could carry out this resolution, however, he was seized with a severe attack of ague and fever, which com pelled him to leave the canal and return to his mother's house an invalid. This sickness proved the turning-point in his life, and as a result of it, James A. Garfield, in stead of burying himself in the forecastle of a ship, be came one of the leading statesmen of the American Republic. Young Garfield's illness lasted three months, and during this time he became acquainted with Samuel D. Bates, a young man engaged in teaching the district 6chool that winter. Bates had recently been a pupil at 22 JAMES A. GARFIELD. the " Geauga Seminary," in an adjoining county, and his conversation aroused in the invalid all the old desire to obtain an education, which had almost died out under the influence of his canal-boat associates. The plan of be coming a sailor was abandoned, and the young man re solved to give all his energies now to the acquirement of knowledge. He had managed with the aid of some friends to learn to read, and could do simple examples in arith metic, but this was the sole basis upon which he proposed to build up the structure of knowledge he meant to rear. It was enough, however, for one so ambitious and deter mined. His mother entered fully into his plans and hopes, and moreover was able to aid him with a little money which she had saved by the most pinching econ omy. With this small capital he started, in March, 1849, for the " Geauga Academy," an obscure institution located at Chester, a small country village not far from Orange. He was accompanied by a cousin and another young man from his village. The young men were too poor to pay one dollar and fifty cents a week for board, in addition to the cost of their tuition, and so they took with them frying-pans, dishes, and other cooking utensils. Upon -reaching Chester they rented a room in an old unpainted frame building, not far from the academy, and during their stay there " kept house" for themselves. From this day James A. Garfield earned his own living, and to his credit be it said never possessed a dollar that he had not gained by honest and faithful toil. He applied him self with ardor to his studies, for his heart was in his work, and failure had become among the impossibilities with him. His industry enabled him to distance his com- CHILDH»X)D AND EARLY YEARS. 23 petitors, and he soon took rank as the most promising pupil in- the academy. During all this while he earned his own living. He found work with the carpenters ot Chester, and his mornings and evenings and Saturdays were spent in working in the shop. He earned fair wages, and was thus enabled to pay his way as he went. As may be imagined, he had few leisure moments; but work with him was a pleasure, and he had the happiness and encouragement of feeling that he was surely prepar ing himself for a man's part in the great struggle of life. When the summer Aracation came, lie devoted himself steadily to work, and by laying aside his earnings pro vided a fund for the expenses of the fall and spring terms at school. During the winter he taught a district school, and so added to his income. Thus he kept on for several years, teaching in the winter, working at, the bench in the summer, and attending the academy during the fall and spring" terms. He practised the most rigid economy, laying aside all he could of his earnings, for the purpose of paying for a collegiate course, upon which he was now resolved to enter. He had the fortune to enjoy excellent health during this time. He was a tall, muscular, fair- haired country lad in those days, looking a good deal like a German in spite of his pure Yankee blood. Healthy in mind and. body, he was also genial in temper and ever ready to oblige a friend. He was a good wrestler and ball player as well as a good student, and was a great favorite with his classmates and teachers. In 1854, Mr. Garfield determined to leave the acad emy, as he felt that he had exhausted its capacity for imparting knowledge. He was now twenty-three years 24 JAMES A. GAKFIELD. old, and it was important that he should lose no time in entering college, if he meant to do so at all. During the five years ho had passed at the academy and at work, he had laid by a considerable sum of money for the expenses of his collegiate course, and he was confident that his hard studies had fitted him to enter the junior class at college. But even this would require a two years' course at college, and his saA'ings were several hundred dollars short of the amount necessary to defray his expenses. How was he to raise the balance? For awhile this troubled him greatly ; but friends now came to his assistance, and he began to reap in part the reward of the good life he had led. His course at the academy had established for him a reputation for honesty and per sistency of purpose, which now stood him in good stead. A "entleman who had watched his career with great in- terest, agreed to advance him the necessary money, taking as security a life-insurance policy, which Mr. Garfield, being in excellent health, had no difficulty in securing. This loan placed him in possession of sufficient funds to 3arry out his plan. The next step was to determine upon a college. After canvassing the merits of various institutions, Mr. Garfield chose Williams College, at Wil- liamstown, Mass., as the one most suited to his needs. Before leaving home, he placed his policy of life insur ance in the hands of his kind friend, as security for the loan. "If I live," he said, " 1 will pay you. If 1 die. you will suffer no loss." The debt was paid soon ,ifter his graduation, and the creditor has ever since been one of Mr. Garfield's closest and most, devoted friends, reaping a rich reward in the brilliant career of the young £»s DR. D. W. BLISS, CHIEF PHY SICIAN. MRS. ELIZA BALLOU GARFIELD, Mother nf the President. J. STANLEY BROWN, The President's Private Sccreta i 4-11 mffli Mira §fl; ¦¦ «l W»; /'I HI. : *^ tillllW DEATH-BED OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. CniLDHOOD AND EARLY YEARS. 25 man he helped to reach fame and honors. Mr. Garfield had originally intended to attend Bethany College, the institution sustained by the church of which he was a member, and presided over by Alexander Campbell, the man above all others whom he had been taught to admire and revere. But as study and experience had enlarged his vision, he had come to see that there were better institutions outside the limits of his peculiar sect. A familiar letter of his, written about that time, from which a fortunate accident enables us to quote, shall tell us how he reasoned and acted. " There are three reasons why I have decided not to go to Bethany : 1st. The course of study is not so extensive or thorough as in the Eastern colleges. 2d. Bethany leans too- heavily toward slavery. 3d. I am the son of Disciple parents, am one myself, and have had but little acquaintance with people of other views; and, having always lived in the West, I think it will make me more liberal, both in my religious and general views and sentiments, to go into a new circle where I shall be under new influences. These considerations led me to conclude to go to some New England college. I therefore wrote to the Presidents of Brown University, Yale, and Wil liams, setting forth the amount of study I had done, and asking how long it would take me to finish their course. " Their answers are now before me. All tell me I can graduate in two years. They are all brief, business notes, but President Hopkins concludes with this sen tence : ' If you come here, we shall be glad to do what we can for you.' Other things being so nearly equal. thi& sentence, which seems to be a kind of friendly grasp 26 JAMES A. GARFIELD. of the hand, has settled the question for me. I shall start for Williams next week." Some points in this letter of a young man about tc start away from home to college will strike the reader as remarkable. Nothing could show more mature judgment about the matter in hand than the wise anxiety to get out from the Disciples' influence, and see something 01 other men and other opinions. It was notable that one trained to look upon Alexander Campbell as the master intellect of the churches of the day, should revolt against studying in his college because it leaned too strongly to slavery. And in the final turning of the decision upon the little friendly commonplace that closed one of the letters, we catch a glimpse of the warm sympathetic nature of the man, which much and wide experience of Ihe world in after years has never hardened. Repairing to Williams College, in the fall of 1854, Mr. Garfield was admitted to the junior class, his private studies having enabled him to master the freshman and sophomore courses. His life at Williams opened a new experience to him. He was now thrown into the society of polished young students, who looked somewhat con temptuously on the rough Western carpenter and farmer who had dropped among them. His experience from a social point of view was far from pleasant, and he was the subject of many rude remarks and much ruder treat ment. He bore all this with patience, though his high spirit inwardly chafed at it. He had come to colLge for a fixed purpose, and that purpose he kept steadily in view, allowing nothing to swerve him from it. Disregard ing the slights he constantly received, he applied himself CHILDHOOD AND EARLY YEARS. 27 with energy to his studies, and made a reputation that not even those -who affected to look down upon him could afford to despise. In 1856, two years after his admis sion, he was graduated, bearing off the honors of his class in metaphysics, a distinction which is regarded as among the highest within the gift of the institution to its gradu a ting members. This, high honor was an ample reward to him for all the slights he had endured while struggling for it How his classmates would- have smiled had they been told that the man they affected to despise was one day to become a leader whpm they would gladly and en thusiastically follow in one of the greatest contests that ever marked the history of the country ! CHAPTER II. PRESIDENT OF A COLLEGE AND STATE SENATOR. Mr. Garfield joins the Church of the Disciples — Statement of the Religious Belief of this Church — Reckless Attacks of Political Enemies upon Mr. Garfield's Religious Views — The true state of the Case — Mr. Garfield becomes a Professor of Hiram Eclectic Institute — Is mada President of the College — His life in this capacity — Preaches the Gospel — Growing Popularity — Marriage of Mr. Garfield — His Wife — Buys a House — Mr. Garfield enters Political Life — Joins the Free-Soil Party — Is Elected to the State Senate — Services in the Senate — The Secession Troubles — Mr. Garfield becomes a Prominent Union Leader — His Position in the Senate — A Rising Man — Supports the War Preparations of Ohio — Denounces Secession — Ohio's Situation at the Commencement of the Rebellion — How the State was Armed and Prepared for the War — Growth of the State Militia — Outbreak of the War — Rapid offers of Volunteers — Enthusiasm of the People — Services of Mr. Garfield to the State — Sup ports Governor Dennison's War Measures — Is sent to Illinois to Buy Arms— Determines to take part in the War. While attending the Geauga Academy, Mr. Garfield made a profession of religion, and joined the Disciples' Church, a new sect which had spread with great rapidity in Ohio, under the influence of the eloquent preaching of its founder, Alexander Campbell. The religious belief of the Disciples is thus stated by the Rev. Irving A. Searles, pastor of the South Side Christian Church, Chi cago : — 1. We call ourselves Christians or Disciples. The term " Campbellite " is a nickname that others have ap- PRESIDENT OF A COLLEGE AND STATE SENATOR. 29 plied to us, as the early Methodists were called " Rant. ers." Good ta#b forbids the use of nicknames. 2. We believe in God the Father. 3. We believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God, and our only Saviour. We regard the divinity of Christ as the fundamental truth in the Chris tian system. 4. We believe in the Holy Spirit, both as to its agency in confession and as an indweller in the heart of the Christian. 5. We accept both the Old and New Testament Scriptures as the inspired word of God. 6. We believe in the future punishment of the wicked, and the future reward of the righteous. 7. We believe the Deity is a prayer-hearing and prayer-answering God. 8. We observe the institution of the Lord's Supper on every Lord's Day. To this table it is our practice neither to invite nor debar. We say it is the Lord's Supper for all the Lord's children. 9. We plead for the union of all God's people upon the Bible and the Bible alone. 10. We maintain that all the ordinances of the Gos pel should be observed as they were in the days of the Apostles. 11. The Bible is our only creed. The Christian Church numbers about 500,000 com municants in the United States. Since the nomination of General Garfield for the Presidency, some of the more reckless of his political op ponents have endeavored to show that he has no religious 30 JAMES A. GARFIELD. belief. Commenting upon this, the Philadelphia Times, a iournal unfavorable to the Chicago nominations, said re cently : "Some of the more reckless organs have assailed General Garfield as a religious heretic. While the theory of our government is that the religious belief should not hinder or promote individual advancement in public trust, it is none the less true that this is a Christian govern ment, and that no man could reach the Presidency who was not what is commonly accepted as orthodox in his faith ; and because General Garfield is not an adherent of one of the several leading religious organizations, he has been accused of unbelief. Such a charge against him is wholly without foundation in fact, and without even plausible ground to give the semblance of sustaining it. " General Garfield is a religious follower of Alexander Campbell, as are a number of prominent men of all politi cal convictions in Western Pennsylvania, West Virginia. Tennessee, Kentucky, and Ohio. Campbell emigrated to this country from Ireland, in 1 809, and located in Wash ington county, Pennsylvania, near Bethany, West Vir ginia, which subsequent!}' became his home, and where be founded a college over which he presided until his death at an advanced age. He was a Presbyterian minister, but ia 1810 he and his father seceded from the Presbyterian Church and organized a new society at Brush Run, Penn sylvania, called "Disciples of Christ." They have been popularly known as " Campbellites," because of the name of their d'stinguished founder, who was one of the ablest theological disputants of his time. The first point of dis pute raised with the Presbyterian Church by Campbell PRESIDENT OF A COLLEGE AND STATE SENATOR. 31 was in rejecting the entire Confession of Faith, and declaring that, the Bible should be the sole creed of the new church. Subsequently the Disciples accepted bap tism by immersion, and that, with the free interpreta tion of the Scriptures as members shall choose for them selves, sums up the whole faith of the followers of Alex ander Campbell. " The Disciples of Christ now number nearly or quite half a million of people, and they command the respect of all religious denominations by the simplicity and liber ality of their faith. They have no ordained ministry, but, like the Quakers, all teach when so moved by the Spirit. So far from being unbelievers, the}' cherish and teach the utmost sanctitv for both the Old and New Testaments as the inspired word of God. and the divinity of Christ is one of the fundamental truths of their religious system They simply accept the Bible as their creed, rejecting all the creeds of men, and allow the widest latitude of belief in the interpretation of the Holy Word. They adminis ter the Sacrament on every Lord's Day, and exhibit their opposition to bigotry and intolerance by permitting us to join them, as none are invited and none debarred. To assume that, the believer of such a religious faith is at war with the Christian religion, is to make bigotry one of the cardinal attributes of Christianity ; and those who assail General Garfield because of the choice he has made of his church will harm only themselves." Mr. Garfield was now twenty-five years old, and was about to begin the world for himself in a newer sense. As the result of twenty years of hard work he had his collegiate education, his diploma, his books, his clothes, 32 JAilES A. GARFIELD. good health, a clear conscience, and a debt of four hun dred and fifty dollars. Ilis task now was to find some employmeuL that would support him, and enable him to discharge his debt. To go back to the carpenter's bench was not to be thought of. He had qualified himself for a higher place in life, and must now take it. Ilis con nection with the Disciples' Church now shaped his destiny as much as did his own inclinations. All his family were members of that church, which had a very large following in Ohio. In the county of Portage, not far from where the Garfields lived, the Disciples had a struggling college, called Hiram Eclectic Institute, which undertook to fur nish education and religious training at the lowest possible price. It was natural that the young talented Disciple, who had just been graduated with distinction in an east ern college, should be attracted to this struggling school. He went to Hiram, and was made Professor of Latin and Greek. It was no easy place into which he had fallen. The college was poor, the professors were poor, the stu dents Ave re poor, and the salaries paid were small, as were tlie tuition fees received. Plain living aud high thinking was the order of the day at the institute; and there was much hard labor to be done on the part of the new pro fessor. It was done with characteristic energy, and from the first told well upon the success of the college. At the close of his first year Professor Garfield was made president of the college, and his field of labor was thus widened. In this capacity he not only taught and lec tured, but preached also. ' According to the cioed of the Disciples, any person having the power, was eutitled to preach, and the presi- MBS. DB. SUSAN EDSON-ONE OF THE PBESI- DEN^'S NUKSES. PRESIDENT OF A COLLEGE AND STATE SENATOR. 33 dent of the college was expected to deliver a sermon every Sunday as a part of his official duty. President Garfield preached with great eloquence and effect, and his fame spread through the Campbellite settlement. It was this fact that gave rise to the story that he had been a minister, a story which he has taken occasion to deny publicly on several occasions. Garfield's purpose was to be a lawyer, and he had not swerved from it at the time he used to talk of religion and a future life to the little congregations in the Disciples' meeting house in Northern Ohio. The new president was only twenty six years old, probably the youngest man that ever held such a posi tion. He carried into his new office the remarkable energy and vigor and good sense which are the main springs of his character. He soon doubled the attend- vnce at the school, raised its standard of scholarship, strengthened its faculty, and inspired everybody con nected with it with something of his own zeal and enthusiasm. At the same time he diligently prosecuted the study of the haw, the profession he had marked out for himself, but which he has never been called on to practise to any extent. He Avas also an omnivorous reader of general literature, and his remarkable memory enabled him to retain what he read. The life at Hiram was peaceful and pleasant to the hard-working president. Hiram is a lonesome village, three miles from a railroad. It lies on a high hill, and overlooks twenty miles of cheese-making country to the southward. It contains fifty or 'sixty houses clustered around the green, in the centre of which stands the homely red brick college structure. The people were very proud of their college 3 34 JAMES A. GARFIELD. president, and he soon became well known throughout Northern Ohio. He was frequently called upon for pub lic speeches, and these added greatly to his reputation and popularity. Mr. Garfield's place in life now seemed won, and he felt at liberty to marry. During his attendance at the Geauga Academy, he made the acquaintance of Miss Lucretia Rudolph, a pupil, and the daughter of a farmer in the neighborhood. The acquaintance ripened into af fection, and the young people entered into an engage ment to be married as soon as the lover should be able to assume the responsibility of such a step. In 1857 Mr. Garfield and Miss Rudolph were married. The mar riage was one purely of loAre, and the choice was a wise one. Miss Rudolph was a refined, intelligent, affectionate girl, who shared young Garfield's thirst for knowledge and his ambition for culture, and had at the same time the domestic tastes and talents which fitted her equally to preside over the home of the poor college professor and that of the famous statesman. Mrs. Garfield is a quiet thoughtful woman, and much of her husband's prosperity has been due to the gentle influence she has exercised over him. She has grown with her husband's growth, and has been, during all his career, the appreciative companion of his studies, the loving mother of his children, the graceful, hospitable hostess of his friends and guests, and the wise and faithful helpmeet in the trials, vicissitudes, and successes of his busy life. Immediately upon his marriage, Mr. Garfield purchased a cottage, fronting upon the college green, and here the young couple began their married COLONEL A. F. ROCKWELL. GENERAL D. G. SWAIM. Colonel Rockwell and Gen. Swaim have been in attendance on the President ever since he was shot. View Of the Capitol at Washington, the Scene of General Garfield's labors tor the past sm«en years. PRESIDENT OF A COLLEGE AND STATE SENATOR. 35 life, poor and in debt, but with brave hearts and bright hopes for the future. Two years after his marriage, General Garfield's polit ical life began. His sermons had attracted great atten tion to him, and the people of his district began to think that so eloquent and forcible a speaker could do them good service in other capacities. In 1859 the Anti- Slavery party of Portage and Summit counties nominated him as their candidate for State Senator, and elected him by a large majority. He had taken part in the polit ical campaigns of 1857 and 1858, and had become well known as a vigorous local stump orator. Young as he was he took a leading position in the State Senate as a man unusually well informed on the subjects of legisla tion, and effective and powerful in debate. He seemed always prepared to speak, and always spoke with great eloquence and force. He did not resign the presidency of his college, as he thought a few Aveeks spent at Colum bus during the winter would not materially interfere in the duties of that position, and his associates were anx ious that he should not sever his connection with them. His most intimate friend in the Senate was J. D. Cox, who subsequently became a major-general of volunteers and Governor of Ohio. During the session of 1860-61, when the States of the South began to secede from the Union, General Gar field's course was outspoken and manly. He declared his belief in the right of the general government to coerce the seceded States, and spoke eloquently in favor of the prompt and vigorous exercise of that power. The Union, he maintained, was meant to be perpetual, and the gov 36 JAMES A. GARFIELD. ernment should prevent its disruption at any cost. He urged upon the State of Ohio the necessity of preparing to support the general government with all its resources, and avoAved his willingness to do his part in behalf of the Union should the controversy end in war. His elo quence and energy ranked him among the foremost of the Union leaders, and drew upon him the favorable at tention of the entire State. Concerning his service in the Senate, Mr. Whitelaw Reid, the accomplished author of " Ohio in the War," says : " Senator Garfield at once took high rank in the -legislature. . . His genial, warm-hearted nature served to increase the kindness with which both political friends and opponents regarded him. Three Western Reserve Senators formed the Radical triumvirate in that able and patriotic legislature which was to place Ohio in line for the war. One was a highly rated professor of Oberlin College; another a lawyer already noted for force and .learning, the son-in-law of the president of Oberlin ; the third was one village carpenter and village teacher from Hiram. He was the youngest of the three, but he speedily became the first. The trials of the next six years were to confirm the verdict of the little group about the State capitol that soon placed Garfield before both Cox and Monroe. The college professor was abundantly sat isfied with the success in fife which made him a consul at a South American port. The adroit, polished, and able lawyer became a painstaking general, who, perhaps, pftener deserved success than won it, and who at last, profiting by the gratitude of the people to their soldiers, rose to be governor of the State, but there (for the time PRESIDENT OF A COLLEGE AND STATE SENATOR. 37 at least) ended. The village carpenter started lower in the race of the war, and rose higher, became one of the leaders of our national councils, and confessedly one of the ablest among the younger of our statesmen. " When the secession of the Southern States began, national considerations came to occupy a large share of the attention of the Senate. Mr. Garfield's course was manly and outspoken. He was foremost in the very small number (only six voting in the line) who thought the spring of 1861 a bad time for adopting the Corwin constitutional amendment, forbidding Congress from ever legislating on the subject of slavery in the States. He was among the foremost in maintaining the right of the national government to coerce the seceded States. ' Would you give up the forts and other government property in those States, or would you fight to maintain your right to them ? ' was his adroit way of putting the question to a conservative Republican who deplored his incendiary views. He took the lead in revising the old statute about treason, Avith a view to adapting it to the instant exigencies. When the ' Million War Bill,' as it was popularly known at the time, came up, he was the most conspicuous of its defenders. Judge Key, of Ham ilton county (subsequently a noted member of McClel lan's staff), preluded his vote for it with a protest against the policy of the administration in entering upon the war. It was left to Garfield to make the reply. The newspa pers of that day all make mention of his effort in terms of the highest admiration. ' He regretted that Senator Key should have turned from honoring his country to pay his highest tribute of praise, at a time like this, to 38 JAMES A. GARFIELD. party. The senator approved a defense of national prop erty, but denounced any effort to retake it if only it were once captured. Did he mean that if Washington were taken by the Rebels, he would oppose attempts to regain possession of the national capital ? Where was this doc trine of non-resistance to stop ? He had hoped that the senator would not, in this hour of the nation's peril, open the books of party to re-read records that ought now, at least, to be forgotten. But since the senator had thought this a fitting time to declare his distrust of the President and of the cabinet, and particularly of Ohio's honored representative in the cabinet, he had only this to say in reply : that it would be well for the senator, amid his partisan recollections, to remember whose cabinet it was that embraced traitors among its most distinguished rep resentatives, and sent them forth from its most secret ses sions to betray their knowledge to their country's ruin.' " Mr. Garfield was determined from the first to resign his position in the legislature and enter the army. The legislature was still in session when the time for ap pointing the officers of the Ohio troops came, and Gar field did not immediately press his claims for an appoint ment. There was still much to be done in the werk of preparing the State for war, and in this he took an active and leading part. In " Ohio in the War," from which we have quoted before, Mr. Whitelaw Reid thus runs up what was done in this respect, and the part taken by Mr. Garfield : " The State of Ohio, which in the next four years was to contribute to the national service an army of soldiers amounting in the aggregate, according to the PRESIDENT OF A COLLEGE AND STATE SENATOR. 39 figures of the Provost-Marshal General, to three hundred and ten thousand men, had in 1860 a population of not quite two and a half millions. The existence of its ter ritorial organization had only begun a year before the century ; but it was already, and as it seemed was likely long to remain, the third State in population and wealth in the Union. More than half of its area was under cul tivation, and more than half of its adult males were far mers, there being of this class two hundred and seventy- seven thousand oAvning farms, averaging a little over ninety acres to each man. So well was this most impor tant body of the State's producers aided by the natural fertility of the soil, that they furnished each year more than double the entire amount of food, animal and vege table, that was needed for the support of the whole popu lation of the State. In 1860 they exported nearly two million barrels of flour, over two and a half million bush els of wheat, three million bushels of other grains, and half a million barrels of pork. The value of the exports of agricultural products for that year from Ohio swelled to fifty-six and a half million dollars. " Not less industrious and prosperous were the manu facturers of the State. The value of their products for 1860 was over one hundred and twenty-two millions of dollars, an increase of ninety-eight per cent, in a single decade. The city of Cincinnati alone, where Indians were trading wampum and buying blankets when New York had already attained the rank of the metropolis of the continent, manufactured in 1860, sixteen million dol lars worth of clothing, a larger quantity than New York itself produced in the same year. 40 JAMES A. GARFIELD. V " But the wealth of the State and the welfare of her people, so eloquently illustrated in figures like these, may perhaps be more clearly presented in a briefer statement. The assessed value of her taxable property rose in 1860 to nearly a thousand million dollars ; while, by the esti mate of her Commissioner of Statistics, the entire debts of the people would not amount to twenty per cent, of that valuation. Let us not fail to add that, by the benef icent legislation of the State, none of her children were growing up Avithout the free gift of an education that should fit them for the duties of citizenship; that there were published and mainly circulated within her borders twenty-four daily neAvspapers, tAvo hundred and sixty- thre weeklies, and fifty-four monthlies, making in the ag gregate seventy-two million copies ; and that so general was the devotion to religion and the provision for relig ious instruction, that the church edifices in the State con tained sittings enough for the entire population of the State. " The impending war was to have for its essence the spirit of hostility to the existence, or at least to the power of the system of human slavery ; and so it comes .that the position of the State on this subject is not less essential to a comprehension of her great part in the struggle, than is an appreciation of her Avonderful pro gress and resources. The political conservatism which prosperity and accumulating wealth naturally engender, Avas further favored in Ohio by the circumstances of her settlement and geography. Along four hundred and thirty-six miles of her border lay slave States. From these many of her pioneers had come ; many more ¦craia aiaiaavo uraaisssj hoihav m asnoH 3Hi— aovnos xatsoitvtm PRESIDENT OF A COLLEGE AND STATE SENATOR. 41 traced with Kentuckians and West Virginians their com mon lineage back to the eastern slope of the ancient Dominion. In time of war the most effective support to the exposed settlements of the infant State had come from their generous and warlike neighbors across the Ohio. In the long peace that followed, the heartiest friendships aud warmest social attachments naturally went out to those who had been proved in the hour of trial. If her churches on every hillside taught a re ligion which found no actual Avarrant in the Bible for the system of human slavery, they at least had no difficulty in beheving that the powers that be are ordained of God, and by consequence in enforcing a toleration which proved quite as acceptible across the border as the most exhaustive scriptural exegesis. North of the National Road, which for many years was the Mason and Dixon's line of Ohio politics, different views prevailed ; and the people, tracing their ancestry to Puritan rather than Vir ginia stock, cherished different feelings ; but the southern half of the State, being more populous and more influen tial, long controlled the elections, and inspired the temper of the government and the legislation. " In the Presidential contest of 1848, the electoral vote of the State wTas thus thrown for Lewis Cass. In 1852, it was in like manner given to Franklin Pierce. But by this time a change had begun. In the very heart of the conservative feeling of the State, one of the foremost law yers of the city of Cincinnati had for years been keeping up an antislavery agitation. He had found a few, like- minded Avith himself, but society and the church had combined to frown him down. Still, so single-minded and 42 JAMES A. GARFIELD. sincere was he, that, though the most ambitious of men, he resolutely faced the popular current, shut his eyes to all hope of political advancement, and daily labored at the task of resisting the pretentions of slavery, giving legal protection to the friendless and helpless negroes, and diffusing an abolition sentiment among the conserva tive men of the border, and the influential classes of the great city of the State, whose prosperity was supposed to depend upon her intimate relations and immense trade with the slave-holding regions to the south of her. To this task he brought some peculiar qualifications. Pro foundly ignorant of men, he was, nevertheless, profoundly versed in the knowledge of man. The baldest charlatan might deceive him into trusting his personal worth, but the acutest reasoner could not mislead him in deter mining the general drift of popular sentiment, and the political tendencies of the times. Conscious of abili ties that might place him in the front rank of our states men, his sagacity, not less than his conscience, taught him to take Time for his ally, and lightly regarding the odium of his present work, to look confidingly to the larger promises of the future. Loving personal popu larity, he was entirely destitute of the qualifications for attaining it. Really warm-hearted and singularly tena cious in his attachments, he was perpetually regarded as utterly selfish and without capacity for friendship ; so that his defects, no less than his merits, shut him up to a course which could hope for personal triumph only in the triumph of great principles. He was gifted by nature with a massive and cogent eloquence, little likely to sway the immediate passions of the populace, but PRESIDENT OF A COLLEGE AND STATE SENATOR. 43 sure to infiltrate the judgment and conscience of the controlling classes in the community. His energy Avas tireless, and his will absolutely inflexible. " Under such leadership, ably seconded by the faith ful and true old man who so long stood in Ohio the champion of Abolition, pure and simple, and the peculiar representative of the Reserve, a new element sprang up in Ohio politics. It cast a handful of votes for Birney for the Presidency ; had risen to proportions which made it a respectable element in political calculations, when it cast, what was thought to be, the vote of the balance of power for Van Buren ; and had reached the height of its unpopularity with the old ruling class of the State when, in 1852, refusing to sustain General Scott on account of the ' anti-agitation' and ' finality of the slavery question' features in his platform, it persisted in again giving the votes of its balance of power to John P. Hale, a»d thus permitting the triumph of Franklin Pierce. " But before another Presidential election the shreAvd calculations of the sagacious leader of this outcast among parties had been realized. Holding, as has been seen, the balance of power, and subordinating all minor ques tions to what they regarded as the absorbing issue of slavery or antislavery, they had already, with a handful of votes, controlled a great election, and sent this Aboli tion leader to the United States Senate. A greater triumph now awaited him. As dexterous in managing parties as he Avas blind in managing men, he placed such stress upon the new organization which had risen upon the ruins of the old Whig party, that, detesting his principles and distrusting himself, they were, nevertha 14 JAMES A. GARFIELD. less, forced to secure the votes without which the elec tion were lost in advance, by placing his name at the head of their ticket, and bearing the odious Abolitionist in triumph into the chair of the chief executive of the State. The impulse thus given was never wholly lost ; for though the people were by no means as radical as their governor, they gave at their next Presidential election a handsome majority to Fremont, and a year later again elected their Abolition leader. " Whether it was through a far-seeing anticipation of what Avas to groAV out of this antislavery struggle, or whether it Avas only a result of the sagacious forecast which in most things distinguished his administration, Governor Chase early began to attempt an effective or ganization of the militia. In this, as in his political views, he was in advance of his times. In every State west of the Alleghanies the militia had fallen into undis guised contempt. The old-fashioned militia musters had been given up ; the subject had been abandoned as fit only to be the fertile theme for the l'idicule of rising writers and witty stump orators. The cannon issued by the Government were left for the uses of political parties on the occasion of mass meetings or victories at the polls. The small arms were scattered, rusty, and become worth less. In Chicago a novel drill had been an inducement for the organization of the Ellsworth Zouaves, and here and there through the West the young men of a city kept up a military company ; but these were the exceptions. Popu lar prejudice against doing military duty was insurmount able, and no name for these exceptional organizations so struck the popular fancy as that of ' Corn-stalk Militia.' JAMES G. BLAINE, PRES. GARFIELD'S SECRETARY OF STATE. IMS Eecond was allotted its proportion of the work on the c.nml, and was allowed four days to perform it; bub so vigorous was the regiment in the discharge of its duties, that it accomplished its work in seventeen hours. On the luth of March the division moved to Milliken's Bend, 981 x---.=? -iff QmeE0B%k . --vi?"? Ly/j<>, *••/'.;' lW< H " •-/">/ ^SBt ^0% . mm i'ftfl ~ : fff* Ilii SH WILLIAM M. HUNT, PEES. GAEFIELD'S SECEETAEY OF THE NAVY. rraiBitaitiifeillaliiitiiitiliiiliiaBiliBJL THE WHITE HOUSE-THE OFFICIAL RESIDENCE OF THE PRESIDENTS. BECOMES A BRIGADIER-GENERAL. 69 where it was soon joined by the remainder of the corps. 1 fere supplies were received, and four weeks were spent in drilling and fitting for the coming campaign. " The Ninth Division took the advance in the move ment toward the rear of Vicksburg. The troops moved to Richmond, Madison Parish, Louisiana, and embarked about thirty miles below Vicksburg, on transports which had ran the batteries, and moved down to Grand Gulf. Here they debarked, crossed the point, again took trans ports, moved down to Bruinsburg, and debarked on the Mississippi side of the river. The division advanced against Port Gibson, and at twelve o'clock at night had a slight engagement with the enemy. The whole corps moved up and bivouacked near Magnolia Church. At daybreak the troops were under arms and advancing. The Ninth Division, taking the left of the line, speedily engaged the enemy, and continued in action until four o'clock p. M. The Forty-second was placed under a heavy fire of artillery at seven o'clock A. M., and con- tiued there until nine o'clock A. m., when it was advanced to the centre of the division line and ordered to charge. The order was obeyed with spirit and courage, but, meet ing with unexpected obstacles, the division commander ordered it to retire. It continued skirmishing until twelve o'clock, when it joined the Sixteenth Ohio and Twenty-second Kentucky, and charged a strong position held by the rebels, but, after a brave effort, failed to dislodge them, and was again ordered to retire. It was moved to the right, and about three o'clock p. m. maue a third charge, and in conjunction with the Forty-ninth Indiana and One. Hundred and Fourteenth Ohio, carried 70 JAMES A. GARFIELD. the enemy's position. In this engagement the^regimenl sustained a heavier loss than any other one in the corps. " On the 2d of May the corps advanced and took possession of Port Gibson, and moved on by way of Champion Hills and Big Black Bridge to the rear of Vicksburg. The regiment was engaged both at Cham pion Hills and Big Black, but the loss was comparatively slight. It participated in the charges on the works at Vicksburg on the 19th and 22d of May, the Ninth Divis ion holding an advanced position in the Thirteenth Corps. In these assaults the regiment lost heavily, especially on the 22d. On the 10th of June the Forty-second was moved toward the right in support of some batteries, where it remained until June 27th, when it moved to Big Black Bridge. After the surrender of Vicksburg the regiment marched to Jackson and participated in the reduction of that place, and then returned to Vicksburg, where it remained until ordered to the Department of the Gulf. " The regiment arrived at Carrollton, near New Or leans, August 15th, and on the 6th of September started on the Western Louisiana campaign. At Brashear city the Ninth and Twelfth Divisions of the Thirteenth Corps were consolidated, and Brigadier-General Lawler was assigned to the command of the brigade. The brigade moved up to Vermilion Bayou, and from there to Ope- lousas, where it remained a few days, and returned with the corps to Berwick Bay. On the 18th of Novembei the brigade crossed to Brashear city, with the intention of going into Texas, but the following night it was ordered to Thibodeaux, and proceeded thence by way of Donald- BECOMES A BRIGADIER-GENERAL. 71 greatly to the credit of the eminent men who GENERAL GARFIELD ENTERS CONGRESS. 153 sat in the first Congress that they deliberated long and carefully before they completed any work of legislation. They had been in session four months when their first bill, ' relating to the time and manner of administering certain oaths,' became a law. Then followed in quick succession the great statutes of the session : to provide a revenue to fill the empty treasury of the nation; to create the department of the treasury, the department of foreign affairs, the department of war ; to create an army ; to regulate commerce ; to establish the govern ment of our vast territory ; and, that monument of ju ridical learning, the act to establish the judiciary of the United States. "I must not omit from this summary the ninth statute in the order of time, the ' act for the establish ment and support of light-houses, beacons, buoys, and public piers.' As an example of broad-minded states manship on the subject, that statute stands alone in the legislative history of the last century. Everywhere else the commerce of the ocean was annoyed and obstructed by unjust and vexatious light-house charges. But our first Congress, in a brief statute of four sections, provided 'that from the 15th day of August, 1789, all the light houses, beacons, buoys, and public piers of the United States shall be maintained at the expense of the national treasury.' From that date the lights of our coast have shone free as the sunlight for all the ships of the world. " Great as were the merits of that first Congress, it was not free from many of the blemishes which have clouded the fame of its successors. It dampens not a little our enthusiasm for the ' superior virtues of the 154 ¦ JAMES A. GARFIELD. fathers,' to learn that Hamilton's monument of statesman ship, the funding bill, which gave life to the public credit and saved from dishonor the war debts of the States, was for a time hopelessly defeated by the votes of one sec tion of the Union, and was carried at last by a legisla tive bargain, which in the mildest slang of our day would be called a ' log-rolling job.' The bill fixing the permanent seat of the government on the banks of the Potomac was the argument which turned the scale and carried the funding bill. The bargain carried them both through. Nor were demagogues of the smaller type un known among our fathers. For example, when a joint resolution was pending in the house of the first Con gress to supply each member at the public expense with copies of all the newspapers published in New York, an amendment was offered to restrict the supply to one paper for each member, the preamble declaring that this appropriation was made ' because newspapers, be ing highly beneficial in disseminating useful knowledge, are deserving of public encouragement by Congress.' That is, the appropriation was not to be made for the benefit of members, but to aid and encourage the press! The proprietors of our great dailies would smile at this patriotic regard for their prosperity. It is scarcely ne cessary to add that the original resolution passed with out the amendment. " Whatever opinions we may now entertain of the federalists as a party, it is unquestionably true that we are indebted to them for the strong points of the con stitution, and for the stable government they founded and strengthened during the administrations of Washing GENERAL GARFIELD ENTERS CONGRESS. 155 ton and ulams. Hardly a month passed, during that period, in which threats of disunion were not made with more or less vehemence and emphasis. But the founda tions of national union and prosperity had been so wisely and deeply laid that succeeding revolutions ' of public opinion failed to destroy them. " With the administration of Jefferson came the re action against the formal customs and stately manners of the founders. That skilful and accomplished leader of men, who had planted the germ of secession in the reso lutions of 1798, brought to his administration the aid of those simple, democratic manners which were so effec tual in deepening the false impression that the preceding administration had sought to establish a monarchy. "In delivering his inaugural, Jefferson appeared be fore Congress in the plainest attire. Discarding the plush breeches, silk stockings, and silver knee-buckles, he wore plain pantaloons ; and his Republican admirers noted the fact that no aristocratic shoe-buckles covered his instep, but his plain American shoes were fastened with honest leather strings. The carriage and footmen, with outriders in livery, disappeared ; and the spectacle of the President on horseback was hailed as the certain sign of Republican equality. These changes were noted by his admirers as striking proofs of his democratic spirit; but they did not escape the equally extravagant and absurd criticism of his enemies. Mr. Goodrich has preserved an anecdote which illustrates the absurdity ot both parties. Near the close of Jefferson's term, the congressional caucus had named Mr. Madison for the president. The leading barber of Washington (who was 156 JAMES A. GARFIELD. of course a federalist) while shaving a federalist senator, vehemently burst out in this strain : " ' Surely this country is doomed to disgrace and shame. What presidents we might have, sir! Just look at Daggett, of Connecticut, and Stockton, of New Jersey ! What queues they have got, sir — as big as your wrist, and powdered every day, sir, like real gen tlemen as they are. Such men, sir, would confer dig nity upon the chief magistracy ; but this little Jim Madison, with a queue no bigger than a pipe-stem ! Sir, it is enough to make a man forswear his country ! ' " Many customs of that early time have been pre served to our own day. In the crypt constructed under the dome of the Capitol, as the resting-place for the re mains of Washington, a guard was stationed, and a light was kept burning for more than half a century. Indeed, the office of keeper of the crypt was not abolished until after the late war. " For the convenience of one of the early speakers of the House, an urn filled with snuff was fastened to the speaker's desk : and until last year, I have never known it to be empty during the session of the House. " The administration of Madison, notwithstanding the gloomy prediction of the federalist barber, restored some of the earlier customs. It had been hinted that a car riage was more necessary to him than to the widower Jefferson. Assisted by his beautiful and accomplished wife, he resumed the presidential levees ; and many so ciety people regretted that the elevated dais was not re stored, to aid in setting off the small stature of Mr. Madi son. GENERAL GARFIELD ENTERS CONGRESS. 157 " The limits of this article will not allow me to notice the changes of manners and methods in Congress since the administration of the elder Adams. Such a review would bring before us many striking characters and many stirring scenes. We should find the rage of party spirit pursuing Washington to his voluntary retreat at Mount Vernon at the close of his term, and denouncing him as the corrupt and wicked destroyer of his country. We should find the same spirit publicly denouncing a chief- justice of the United States as a ' driveller and a fool,' and impeaching, at the bar of the Senate, an eminent as sociate justice of the supreme court for having manfully and courageously discharged the high duties of his office in defiance of the party passions of the hour. We should see the pure and patriotic Oliver Wolcott, the secretary of the treasury, falsely charged, by a committee of Con gress, with corruption in office 'and with the monstrous crime of having set on fire the public buildings for the purpose of destroying the evidences of his guilt. We should see the two houses in joint session witnessing the opening of the returns of the electoral colleges and the declaration of a tie vote between Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr ; and then, in the midst of the fiercest excite ment, we should see the House of Representatives in con tinuous session for eight days, several members in the last stages of illness being brought in on beds and at tended by their wives, while the ballotings went on which resulted in Jefferson's election. And we should witness a similar scene, twenty-four years later, when the election of the younger Adams by the House, avenged in part the wrong of his father. 158 JAMES A. GARFIELD. "In the "long line of those who have occupied seats in Congress, we should see, here and there, rising above the undistinguished mass, the figures of those great men whose lives and labors have made their country illustri ous, and whose influence upon its destiny will be felt for ages to come. We should see that group of great states men whom the last war with England brought to public notice, among whom were Ames and Randolph, Clay and Webster, Calhoun and Benton, Wright and Prentiss, mak ing their era famous by their statesmanship, and creating and destroying political parties by their fierce antago nisms. We should see the folly and barbarism of the so-called code of honor destroying noblemen in the fatal meadow of Bladensburg. We should see the spirit of liberty awaking the conscience of the nation to the sin and danger of slavery, whose advocates had inherited and kept alive the old anarchic spirit of disunion. We should trace the progress of that great struggle from the days when John Quincy Adams stood in the House of Representatives, like a lion at bay, defending the sacred right of petition ; when, after his death, Joshua R. Gid dings continued the good fight, standing at this post for twenty years, his white locks, like the plume of Henry of Navarre, always showing where the battle for freedom raged most fiercely ; when his small band in Congress, re-enforced by Hale and Sumner, Wade and Chase, Love- joy and Stevens, continued the struggle amid the most turbulent scenes ; when daggers were brandished and pistols were drawn in the halls of Congress ; and later, when, one by one, the senators and representatives of eleven States, breathing defiance and uttering maledic- GENERAL GARFIELD ENTERS CONGRESS. 159 tions upon the Union, resigned their seats and left the Capitol to take up arms against their country. We should see the Congress of a people long unused to war, when confronted by a supreme danger, raising, equipping," and supporting an army greater than all the armies of Napoleon and Wellington combined ; meeting the most difficult questions of international and constitutional law; and, by new forms of taxation, raising a revenue which,' in one year of the war, amounted to more than all the national taxes collected during the first half century of the government. We should see them so amending the constitution as to strengthen the safeguards of the Union and insure universal liberty and universal suffrage, and restoring to their places in the Union the eleven States whose governments, founded on secession, fell into instant ruin when the Rebellion collapsed ; and we should see them, even when the danger of destruction seemed great est, voting the largest sum of money ever appropriated by one act, to unite the East and the West, the Atlantic and the Pacific coasts, by a material bond of social, com mercial, and political union. " In this review we should see courage and coward ice, patriotism and selfishness, far-sighted wisdom and short-sighted folly, joining in a struggle always desperate and sometimes doubtful ; and yet, out of all this turmoil and fierce strife we should see the Union slowly but surely rising, with greater strength and brighter lustre, to a higher place among the nations. " Congress has always been and must always be the theatre of contending opinions ; the forum where the op posing forces of political philosophy meet to measure their 160 JAMES A. GARFIELD. strength ; where the public good must meet the assault* of local and sectional interests ; in a word, the appointed place where the nation seeks to utter its thought and register its will. CONGRESS AND THE EXECUTIVE. " This brings me to consider the present relations of Congress to the other great departments of the govern ment, and to the people. The limits of this article will permit no more than a glance at a few principal heads of inquiry. " In the main, the balance of powers so admirably ad justed and distributed among the three great depart ments of the government have been safely preserved. It was the purpose of our fathers to lodge absolute power nowhere ; to leave each department independent within its own sphere ; yet, in every case, responsible for the exercise of its discretion. But some dangerous innova tions have been made. " And first, the appointing power of the President has been seriously encroached upon by Congress, or rather by the members of Congress. Curiously enough, this encroachment originated in the act of the chief executive himself. The fierce popular hatred of the federal party, which resulted in the elevation of Jefferson to the presi dency, led that officer to set the first example of remov ing men from office on account of political opinions. For political causes alone he removed a considerable number of officers who had recently been appointed by President Adams, and thus set the pernicious example. His imme diate successors made only a few removals for political GENERAL GARFIELD ENTERS CONGRESS. 161 reasons. But Jackson made his political opponents who were in office feel the full weight of his executive hand. -From that time forward the civil offices of tho govern ment became the prizes for which political parties strove ; and, twenty-five years ago, the corrupting doctrine that to the victors belong the spoils ' was shamelessly an nounced as an article of political faith and practice. It is hardly possible to state with adequate force the nox ious influence of this doctrine. It was bad enough when the federal officers numbered no more than eight or ten thousand ; but now, when the growth of the country and the great increase in the number of public offices occa sioned by the late war, have swelled the civil list to more than eighty thousand, and to the ordinary motives for political strife this vast patronage is offered as a reward to the victorious party, the magnitude of the evil can hardly be measured. The public mind has, by degrees, drifted into an acceptance of this doctrine ; and thus an, election has become a fierce, selfish struggle between the 'ins' and the 'outs,' the ofie striving to keep and the other to gain the prize of office. It is not possible for any president to select, with any degree of intelligence, so vast an army of office-holders without the aid of men who are acquainted with the people of the various sec tions of the country. And thus it has become the habit of presidents to make most of their appointments on the recommendation of members of Congress. During the last twenty-five years, it has been understood, by the Congress and the people, that offices are to be obtained by the aid of senators and representatives, who thus be come the dispensers, sometimes the brokers of patronage. n 162 JAMES A. GARFIELD. The members of State legislatures who choose a senator, and the district electors who choose a representative, look to the man of their choice for appointments to office. Thus, from the President downward, through all tho grades of official authority, to the electors themselves, civil office becomes a vast corrupting power, to be used in running the machine of party politics. " This evil has been greatly aggravated by the pas sage of the Tenure of Office Act, of 1867, whose object was to restrain President Johnson from making removals for political cause. But it has virtually resulted in the usurpation, by the Senate, of a large share of the ag- pointing power. The President can remove no officer without the consent of the Senate ; and such consent is not often given, unless the appointment of the successor nominated to fill the proposed vacancy is agreeable to the senator in whose State the appointee resides. Thus, it has happened that a policy, inaugurated by an early president, has resulted in seriously crippling the just powers of the executive, and has placed in the hands of senators and representatives a power most corrupting and dangerous. " Not the least serious evil resulting from this inva sion of the executive functions by members of Congress is the fact that it greatly impairs their own usefulness as legislators. One-third of the working hours of senators and representatives is hardly sufficient to meet the de mands made upon them in reference to appointments to office. The spirit of that clause of the constitution which shields them from arrest ' during their attendance on the session of their respective houses, and in going to and GENERAL GARFIELD ENTERS CONGRESS. 163 from the same,' should also shield them from .being ar rested from their legislative work, morning, noon, and night, by office-seekers. To sum up in a word : the present system invades the independence of the execu tive, and makes him less responsible for the character of his appointments ; it impairs the efficiency of the legis? lator by diverting him from his proper sphere of duty and involving him in the intrigues of aspirants for office ; it degrades the civil service itself by destroying the per sonal independence of those who are appointed ; it repels from the service those high and manly qualities which are so necessary to a pure and efficient administration ; and finally, it debauches the public mind by holding up public office as the reward of mere party zeal. " To reform this service is one of the highest and most imperative duties of statesmanship. This reform cannot be accomplished wdthout a complete divorce between Congress and the executive in the matter of appoint ments. It will be a proud day when an administration senator or representative, who is in good standing in his party, can say as Thomas Hughes said, during his recent visit to this country, that though he was on the most in timate terms with the members of his own administration, yet it was not in his power to secure the removal of the humblest clerk in the civil service of his government. *' This is not the occasion to discuss the recent en largement of the jurisdiction of Congress in reference to the election of a president and vice-president by the States. But it cannot be denied that the electoral bill has spread a wide and dangerous field for congressional action. Unless the boundaries of its power shall be re- 164 JAMES A. GARFIELD. stricted by a new amendment of the constitution, we have seen the last of our elections of president on the old plan. The power to decide who has been elected maybe so used as to exceed the power of electing. " I have long believed that the official relations be tween the executive and Congress should be more open and direct. They are now conducted by correspondence with the presiding officers of the two houses, by consul tation with committees, or by private interviews with in dividual members. This ?frequently leads to misunder standings, and may lead to corrupt combinations. It would be far better for both departments if the members of the cabinet were permitted to sit in Congress and par ticipate in the debates on measures relating to their sev eral departments — but, of course, without a vote. This would tend to secure the ablest men for the' chief execu tive offices ; it would bring the policy of the adminis tration into the fullest publicity by giving both parties ample opportunity for criticism and defence. CONGRESS OVERBURDENED. " As a result of the great growth of the country and of the new legislation arising from the late war, Congress is greatly overloaded with work. It is safe to say that the business which now annually claims the attention of Congress is tenfold more complex and burdenseme than it was forty years ago. For example : the twelve annual appropriation bills, with their numerous details, now con sume two-thirds of each short session of the House. Forty years ago, when the appropriations were made more in block, one week was sufficient for the work. The vast GENERAL GARFIELD ENTERS CONGRESS. 165 extent of our country, the increasing number of States and Territories, the legislation necessary to regulate our mineral lands, to manage our complex systems of internal revenue, banking, currency, and expenditure, have so in creased the work of Congress that no one man can ever read the bills and the official reports relating to current legislation ; much less can he qualify himself for intelli gent action upon them. As a necessary consequence, the real work of legislation is done by the committees ; and their work must be accepted or rejected without full knowledge of its merits. This fact alone renders leader ship in Congress, in the old sense of the word, impossible. For many years we have had the leadership of commit tees and chairmen of committees ; but no one man can any more be the leader of all the legislation of the Senate or of the House, than one lawyer or one physician can now be foremost in all the departments of law or medi cine. The evils of loose legislation resulting from this situation must increase rather than diminish, until a remedy is provided. " John Stuart Mill held that a numerous popular as sembly is radically unfit to make good laws, but is the best possible means of getting good laws made. He suggested, as a permanent part of the constitution of a free country, a legislative commission, composed of a few trained men, to draft such laws as the legislature, by general resolu tions, shall direct, which draft shall be adopted by the legislature, without change, or returned to the commis sion to be amended.* " Whatever may be thought of Mr. Mill's suggestion, * Mill's Autobiography, pp. 20-45. 166 JAMES A. GARFIELD. it is clear that some plan must be adopted to relievo Con gress from the infinite details of legislation, and to pre serve harmony and coherence in our laws. " Another change observable in Congress, as well as in the legislatures of other countries, is the decline of ora tory. The press is rendering the orator obsolete. Sta tistics now furnish the materials upon which the legislator depends ; and a column of figures will often demolish a dozen pages of eloquent rhetoric. " Just now, too, the day of sentimental politics is pass ing away, and the work of Congress is more nearly allied to the business interests of the country and to ' the dis mal science,' as political economy is called by the ' prac tical men ' of our time. CONGRESS AND THE PEOPLE. " The legislation of Congress comes much nearer to the daily life of the people than ever before. Twenty years ago, the presence of the national government was not felt by one citizen in a hundred. Except in paying his postage and receiving his mail, the citizen of the inte rior rarely came in contact with the national authority. Now, he meets it in a thousand ways. Formerly the legislation of Congress referred chiefly to our foreign re lations, to indirect taxes, to the government of the army, the navy, and the Territories. Now a vote in Congress may, any day, seriously derange the business affairs of every citizen. "And this leads me to say, that now, more than ever before, the people are responsible for the character of their Congress. If that body be ignorant, reckless, and GENERAL GARFIELD ENTERS CONGRESS. " 161 corrupt, it is because the people tolerate ignorance, reck lessness, and corruption. If it be intelligent, brave, and pure, it is because the people demand those high quali ties to represent them in the national legislature. Con gress lives in the blaze of ' that fierce light which beats against the throne.' The telegraph and the press will to-morrow morning announce at a million breakfast tables what has been said and done in Congress to-day. Now, as alwa3'S, Congress represents the prevailing opinions and political aspirations of the people. The wildest de lusions of paper money, the crudest theories of taxation, the passions and prejudices that find expression in the Senate and House, were first believed and discussed at the firesides of the people, on the corners of the streets, and in the caucuses and conventions of political parties. " The most alarming feature of our situation is the fact that so many citizens of high character and solid judgment pay but little attention to the sources of po litical power, to the selection of those who shall make their laws. The clergy, the faculties of colleges, and many of the leading business men of the community, lever attend the township caucus, the city primaries, or the county convention ; but they allow the less intelli gent and the more selfish and corrupt members of the community to make the slates and 'run the machine" of politics. They wait until the machine has done its work, and then, in surprise, and horror at the ignorance and corruption in public office, sigh for the return of that mythical period called the ' better and purer days of the republic' It is precisely this neglect of the first steps in our political processes that has made possible the 168 JAMES A. GARFIELD. worst evils of our system. Corrupt and incompetent presidents, judges, and legislators can be removed, but when the fountains of political power are corrupted, when voters themselves become venial and elections fraudu lent, there is no remedy except by awakening the pub lic conscience, and bringing to bear upon the subject the power of public opinion and the penalties of the law. The practice of buying and selling votes at our popular elections has already gained a foothold, though it has not gone as far as in England. " It is mentioned in the recent biography of Lord Macaulay, as a boast, that his three elections to the House of Commons cost him but ten thousand dollars. A hundred years ago, bribery of electors was far more prevalent and shameless in England than it now is. " There have always been, and always will be, bad men in all human pursuits. There was a Judas in the college of the Apostles, an Arnold in the army of the Revolution, a Burr in our early politics ; and they have had successors in all departments of modern life. But it is demonstrable, as a matter of history, that on the whole the standard of public and private morals is higher in the United States at the present time than ever be fore ; that men in public and private stations are held to a more rigid accountability, and that the average moral tone of Congress is higher to-day than at any previous period of our history.* It is certainly true that * On this point I beg to refer the reader to a speech delivered by Hon. George F. Hoar, in the House of Representatives, August 9, 1876, in which that distinguish d gentleman said: "I believe there is absolutely less of eorruptiou, less of maladministration, and less of vice and evil in public life than there was in t'ue sixteen years which covered the administration of GENERAL GARFIELD ENTERS CONGRESS. 169 our late war disturbed the established order of society, awakened a reckless spirit of adventure and speculation, and greatly multiplied the opportunities and increased the temptations to evil. The disorganization of the Southern States and the temporary disfranchisement of its leading citizens threw a portion of their representa tion in Congress, for a short time, into the hands of po litical adventurers, many of whom used their brief hold on power for personal ends, and thus brought disgrace upon the national legislature. And it is also true that the enlarged sphere of legislation so mingled public duties and private interests, that it was not easy to draw the line between them. From that cause, also, the repu tation, and in some cases the character, of public men suffered eclipse. But the earnestness and vigor with which wrong-doing is everywhere punished is a strong guaranty of the purity of those who may hold posts of authority and honor. Indeed, there is now danger in the opposite direction, namely, that criticism may de generate into mere slander, and put an end to its power for good by being used as the means to assassinate the reputation and destroy the usefulness of honorable men. It is as much the duty of all good men to protect and defend the reputation of worthy public servants as to detect and punish public rascals. " In a word, our national safety demands that the fountains of political power shall be made pure by intel ligence, and kept pure by vigilance ; that the best citi- Washington, the administration of John Adams, and the first term of Jeffer son." This assertion is maintained by numerous citations of unquestioned facts in the speech. 170 JAMES A. GARFIELD. zens shall take heed to the selection and election of tho worthiest and most intelligent among them to hold seats in the national legislature ; and that when the choice has been made, the continuance of their representative shall depend upon his faithfulness, his ability, and his willing ness to work. CONGRESS AND CULTURE. "In Congress, as everywhere else, careful study — thorough, earnest work — is the only sure passport to usefulness and distinction. From its first meeting in 1774 to its last in 1788, three hundred and fifty-four men sat in the Continental Congress. Of these, one hundred and eighteen — one third of the whole number -—were college graduates. That third embraced much the largest number of those whose names have come down to us as the great founders of the republic. Since the adoption of the constitution of 1787, six thousand two hundred and eighteen men have held seats in Con gress ; and among them all, thorough culture and ear nest, arduous work have been the leading characteristics of those whose service has been most useful and whose fame has been most enduring. Galloway wrote of Samuel Adams : ' He drinks little, eats temperately, thinks much, and is most indefatigable in the pursuit of his objects.' This description can still be fittingly ap plied to all men who deserve and achieve success any where, but especially in public life. As a recent writer has said, in discussing the effect of Prussian culture, so we may say of culture in Congress : ' The lesson is, that whether you want him for war or peace, there is no way GENERAL GARFIELD ENTERS CONGRESS. 171 in which you can get so much out of a man as by train ing, not in pieces, but the whole of him ; and that the trained men, other things being equal, are pretty sure, in the long run, to be masters of the world.' " Congress must always be the exponent of the polit ical character and culture of the people ; and if the next centennial does not find us a great nation, with a great and worthy Congress, it will be because those who repre sent the enterprise, the culture, and the morality of the nation, do not aid in controlling the political forces which are employed to select the men who shall occupy the great places of trust and power." CHAPTER VI. GENERAL GARFIELD S CONGRESSIONAL CAREER. The Wade-Davis Manifesto — General Garfield before the Convention - Moral Courage wins the Day — Triumphant Nomination and El*>cti' a of General Garfield — Is appointed a Member of the Committee of Wars and Mean? — Speech on the Constitutional Amendment — A Grand De nunciation of Slavery — Speech on the Reconstruction of the Southern States — Speech on Confiscation — A Reminiscence of the War — Gradual Rise of the Negro — How Garfield refused to surrender a Fugitive Slave — Speech on State Sovereignty — General Garfield as a Temperance Worker — How he shut up a Beer Brewery — A Good Speculation — Gen eral Garfield's Tariff Record — Views of the Iron and Steel Bulletin- General Garfield's Course Satisfactory — To the Protectionists — His Real Position on this Question — Re-election of General Garfield to Congress , — Is made Chairman of the Military Committee — Successive re-elections to Congress — Is made Chairman of the Committee on Appropriations — Debate on the Civil Appropriation Bill of 1872 — General Garfield's mode of conducting Public Business — The Salary Grab — General Garfield's Course respecting it — Letter to a Friend — Garfield successfully Vindi- dicates his Course — A Silly Rumor Refuted — General Garfield urges the Repeal of the Salary Bill. When the time for holding the Congressional Convention of General Garfield's district" arrived in 1864, his political enemies spread the report through the district that he had written the famous Wade-Davis manifesto against Presi dent Lincoln, or was at least thoroughly in sympathy with it. This manifesto had created the most intense excitement throughout the West, and especially in tbe CONGRESSIONAL CAREER. 173 Western Reserve, where Mr. Lincoln was universally bo- loved, and where any attempt to criticise his course was resented by the sturdy Republican phalanx as almost equal to disloyalty. The consequence was that General Garfield was summoned by a committee to appear before the Convention and explain himself. It seemed to him a square challenge to his independence, and he resolved to meet it manfully. He went to the Convention, was given a seat on the platform, and was called upon by the chair man for a statement as to his connection with the obnox ious letter. He made a speech which he supposed could have no other effect than to dig his political grave. He had not written the Wade-Davis letter, he said, but he had only one regret connected with it, and that was that there was a necessity for its appearance. He approved the letter, defended the motives of its authors, asserted his right to independence of thought and action, and told the delegates that if they did not want a free agent for their represent ative, they had better find another man, for he did not desire to serve them any longer. After he had finished speaking, he left the platform and strode out of the hall. When he reached the foot of the stairs he heard a great tumult above, which he imagined was the signal of his unanimous rejection. On the contrary, it was the sound of his nomination by acclamation. No sooner had he left than an Ashtabula delegate rose and said that he thought the Convention could not do better than to renominate by acclamation a man of such independence and courage as General Garfield had just shown himself to be. Ilis motion was carried with a hurrah before the delegates opposed to Garfield had time to open their mouths. Gov- 1 74 JAMES A. GARFIELD : ernor Todd said, after the meeting dispersed, that a dis trict that would allow a young fellow like Garfield to tweak its nose and cuff its ears in that manner deserved to have him saddled on it for the rest of his life. And it came near being the case. The election come off in the fall of 1864, and Gen eral Garfield was returned by a majority of nearly 12,l,0( votes. His return to the House was a matter of general rejoicing to the Republicans in Congress, and so highly was he esteemed that he was appointed a member of the Committee of Ways and Means. This was done at the request of the Secretary of the Treasury, who had spoken of him as one of the best informed men on fi nancial matters to be found in public life. The Com mittee of Ways and Means is the most important in the House. It is charged with the consideration and preparation of all the financial measures of Congress, and provides the means of raising the revenue. Con sequently its members are chosen by the Speaker with the greatest care, and are selected from the ablest mem bers of the House. General Garfield gave himself up to a profound study of financial matters, and soon made it apparent to all that the praise of the Secretary of the Treasury was neither rashly bestowed nor undeserved. General Garfield continued an active and leading iebater in Congress, and fully maintained the reputa tion he had made during his first years in that body He spoke frequently and eloquently. He supported the constitutional amendment prohibiting slavery every where within the limits of the United States, and in the course of his remarks said : HIS CONGRESSIONAL CAREER. 175 " Mr. Speaker : — We shall never know why slavery dies so hard in this Republic and in this hall till we know why sin is long-lived and Satan is immortal. With marvellous tenacity of existence, it has outlived the expectations of its friends and the hopes of its enemies. It has been declared here and elsewhere to be in the several stages of mortality — wounded, mori bund, dead. The question was raised by my colleague (Mr. Cox) yesterday whether it was indeed dead, or only in a troubled sleep. I know of no better illustra tion of its condition than is found in Sallust's admira ble history of the great conspirator, Cataline, who, when his final battle was fought and lost, his army broken and scattered, was found far in advance of his own troops, lying among the dead enemies of Rome, yet breathing a little, but exhibiting in his countenance all the ferocity of spirit which had characterized his life. So, sir, this body of slavery lies before us among the dead enemies of the Republic, mortally wounded, im potent in its fiendish wickedness, but with its old fe rocity of look, bearing the unmistakable marks of its infernal origin. " Who does not remember that thirty years ago — a shorf period in the life of a nation — but little could be said with impunity in these halls on the subject of slavery ? How well do gentlemen here remember the history of that distinguished predecessor of mine, Joshua R. Giddings, lately gone to his rest, who, with his for lorn hope of faithful men, took his life in his hand, and in the name of justice protested against the great crime, and who stood bravely in his place until his white locks, 176 JAHES A. 0ARFIELD : like the plume of Henry of Navarre, marked where the battle for freedom raged fiercest ! " We can hardly realize that this is the same people and these the same halls, where now scarcely a man can be found who will venture to do more than falter out an apology for slavery, protesting in the same breath that he has no love for the dying tyrant. None, I be lieve, but that man of more than supernal boldness, from the city of New York (Mr. Fernando Wood), has ventured, this session, to raise his voice in favor of slavery for its own sake. He still sees in its features the reflection of beauty and divinity, and only he. ' How art thou fallen from heaven, 0 Lucifer, son of the morning ! How art thou cut dowrn to the ground, which didst weaken the nations ! ' Many mighty men have been slain by thee ; many proud ones have hum bled themselves at thy feet ! All along the coast of our political sea these victims of slavery lie like stranded wrecks, broken on the headlands of freedom. How lately did its advocates, with impious boldness, maintain it as God's own, to be venerated and cherished as divine. It was another and higher form of civilization. It was the holy evangel of America dispensing its mercies to a benighted race, and destined to bear countless blessings to the wilderness of the West. In its mad arrogance it lifted its hand to strike down the fabric of the Union, and since that fatal day it has been a ' fugitive and a vagabond upon the earth.' Like the spirit that Jesus cast out, it has, since then, ' been seeking rest and find ing none.' " It has sought in all the corners of the Republic to HIS CONGRESSIONAL CAREER. 177 find some hiding-place in which to shelter itself from the death it so richly deserves. "It sought an asylum in the untrodden territories of the West; but, with a whip of scorpions, indignant freeman drove it thence. I do not believe that a loyal man can now be found who would consent that it should again enter them. It has no hopes of harbor there. It found no protection of favor in the hearts or consciences of the freemen of the Republic, and has fled for its last hope of safety behind the shield of the constitution. We propose to follow it there, and drive it thence as Satan was exiled from heaven." * During the same session the question of the re construction of the Southern States and the proper treat ment of the negroes was debated. General Garfield spoke earnestly on the subject, and on one occasion said : " We should do nothing inconsistent with the spirit and genius of our institutions. We should do nothing for revenge, but everything for security ; nothing for the past, everything for the present and the future. Indem nity for the past we can never obtain. The four hundred thousand graves in which sleep our fathers and brothers, murdered by rebellion, will keep their sacred trust till the angel of the resurrection bids the dead come forth. The tears, the sorrow, the unutterable anguish of broken hearts can never be atoned for. We turn from that sad but glorious past, and demand such securities for the future as can never be destroyed. " We must recognize in all our action the stupendous facts of the war. In the very crisis of our fate, God brought us face to face with the alarming truth that we 12 1.78 JAMES A. GARFIELD : must lose our own freedom or grant it to the slave. In the extremity of our distress we called upon the black man to help us save the Republic, and amid the very thunder of battle we made a covenant with him, sealed both with his blood and ours, and witnessed by Jehovah, that when the nation was redeemed he should be free and share with us the glories and blessing of freedom. In the solemn words of the great Proclamation of Eman cipation, we not only declared the slaves forever free, but we pledged the faith of the nation ' to maintain their freedom' — mark the words, ' to maintain their freedom.' The Omniscient witness will appear in judgment against us if we do not fulfil that covenant. Have we done it ? Have we given freedom to the black man ? What is freedom ? Is it a mere negation ; the bare privilege of not being chained, bought and sold, branded and scourged ? If this be all, then freedom is a bitter mock ery, a cruel delusion, and it may well be questioned whether slavery were not better. "But liberty is no negation. It is a substantive, tangible reality. It is the realization of those imperisha ble truths of the Declaration 'that all men are created equal,' that the sanction of all just government is ' the consent of the governed.' Can these truths be realized until each. man has a right to be heard on all matters relating to himself? ... We have passed the Red Sea of slaughter ; our garments are yet wet ' with its crimson spray. We have crossed the fearful wilderness of war, and have left our four hundred thousand heroes to sleep beside the dead enemies of the Republic. We have heard the voice of God, amid the thunders of battle, HIS CONGRESSIONAL CAREER. 179 rom manning us to wash our hands of iniquity, to ' pro claim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabi tants thereof.' When we spurned his counsels we were defeated, and the gulfs of ruin yawned before us. When we obeyed his voice, he gave us victory. And now, at last, we have reached the confines of the wilderness. Before us is the land of promise, the land of hope, the land of peace, filled with possibilities of greatness and glory too vast for the grasp of the imagination. Are we worthy to enter it ? On what condition may it be ours to enjoy and transmit to our children's children ? Let us pause and make deliberate and solemn preparation. " Let us as representatives of the, people, whose ser vants we are, bear in advance the sacred ark of republi can liberty, with its tables of the law inscribed with the irreversible guarantees of liberty. Let us here build a monument, on which shall be written not only the curses of the law against treason, disloyalty, and oppression, but also an everlasting covenant of peace and blessing with loyalty, liberty, and obedience, and all the people will say Amen !" When the subject of confiscation was brought up, General Garfield spoke at length upon it, and in the course of his remarks, related this leaf from his army experience : " I would have no man there, like one from my own State, who came to the army before the great struggle in Georgia, and gave us his views of peace. He came as the friend of Vallandigham, the man for whom the gentleman on the other side of the House from my State worked and voted. We were on the eve of a great battle, I said to 180 . JAMES A. GARFIELD : him, ' You wish to make Mr. Vallandigham governor of Ohio. Why?' 'Because, in the first place,' using the language of the gentleman from New York (Mr. Fer nando Wood), 'you cannot subjugate the South, and we propose to withdraw without trying it longer. In the next place, we will have nothing to do with this aboli tion war, nor will we give a man or a dollar for its sup port,' (Remember, gentlemen, what occurred in regard to the conscription bill this morning). ' To-morrow,' I con tinued, ' we may be engaged in a death struggle with the rebel army that confronts us, and is daily increasing. Where is the sympathy of your party ? Do you want us beaten, or Bragg beaten ? ' He answered that they had no interest in fighting ; that they did not believe in fighting. " Mr. Noble. — A question right here. " Mr. Garfield. — I cannot yield ; I have no time. You can hear his name, if you wish. He was the agent sent by the copperhead secretary of state to distribute election blanks to the army of the Cumberland. His name was Griffiths. " Mr. Noble. — A single question. " Mr. Garfield. — I have no time to spare. " Mr. Noble. — I want to ask the gentleman if he knows that Mr. Griffiths has made a question of veracity with him by a positive denial of the alleged conversation, published in the Cincinnati Enquirer. " Mr. Garfield. — No virtuous denials in the Cincinnati Enquirer can alter the facts of this conversation, which was heard by a dozen officers. "I asked him further, 'How would it affect youi HIS CONGRESSIONAL CAREER. 181 party if we should crush the rebels in this battle and ut terly destroy them?' 'We would probably lose votes by it.' ' How would it affect your party if we should be beaten ?' ' It would probably help us in votes.' " That, gentlemen, is the kind of support the army is receiving in what should be the house of its friends. That, gentlemen, is the kind of support these men are inclined to give this country and its army in this terrible struggle. I hasten to make honorable exceptions. I know there are honorable gentlemen on the other side who do not belong to that category, and I am proud to acknowledge them as my friends. I am sure they do not sympathize with these efforts, whose tendency is to pull down the fabric of our government, by aiding their friends over the bor der to do it. Their friends, I say, for when the Ohio elec tion was about coming off, in the army at Chattanooga, there was more anxiety in the rebel camp than in our oWn. The pickets had talked face to face, and made daily in quiries how the election in Ohio was going. And at mid night of the 13th of October, when the telegraphic news was flashed down to us, and it was announced to the army that the Union had sixty thousand majority in Ohi», there arose a shout from every tent along the line on that rainy midnight, which rent the skies with jubilees, and sent de spair to the hearts of those who were ' waiting and watch ing across the border.' It told them that their colleagues, their sympathizers, their friends, I had almost said their emissaries at the North, had failed to sustain themselves in turning the tide against the Union and its army. And from that hour, but not till that hour, the army felt safe from the enemy behind it. 182 JAMES A. GARFIELD! " Thanks to the 13th of October. It told thirteen oi my colleagues that they had no constituencies." General Garfield was an earnest advocate of the policy of providing for the negroes by the Government. He fa vored a wise and careful guardianship until they were able to care for themselves. In one of his speeches he said : " I cannot forget that less than five years ago I re ceived an order from my superior officer in the army, commanding me to search my camp for a fugitive slave, and, if found, to deliver him up to a Kentucky captain, who claimed him as his property ; and I had the honor to be, perhaps, the first officer in the army who peremptorily refused to obey such an order. We were then trying to save the Union without hurting slavery. I remember, sir, that when we undertook to agitate in the army the ques tion of putting arms into the hands of the slaves, it was said, ' Such a step will be fatal ; it will alienate half our army, and lose us Kentucky.' By and by, when our ne cessities were imperious, we ventured to let the negroes dig in our trenches, but it would not do to put muskets in their hands. We ventured to let a negro drive a mule team, but it would not do to have a white man or a mu latto just in front of him or behind him ; all must be ne groes in that train ; you must not disgrace a white soldier by putting him in such company. ' By and by,' some one said, ' Rebel guerillas may capture the mules ; so, for the sake of the mules, let us put a few muskets in the wagons and let the negroes shoot the guerillas if they come.' So, for the sake "of the mules we enlarged the lim its of liberty a little. [Laughter.] By and by we al- HIS CONGRESSIONAL CAREER. 183 lowed the negroes to build fortifications, and armed them to save the earthworks they had made' — not to do justice to the negro, but to protect the earth he had thrown up. By and by we said in this hall that we would arm the negroes, but they must not be called soldiers, nor wear the national uniform, for that would degrade white sol diers. By and by we said, 'Let them wear the uniform, but they must not receive the pay of soldiers.' For six months we did not pay them enough to feed and clothe them; and their shattered regiments came home from South Carolina in debt to the Government for the clothes they wore. It took us two years to reach a point where we were willing to do the most meager justice to the black man, and to recognize the truth that, ' A man's a man for a' that.' " The incident to which General Garfield referred in the first part of the above remarks is related as follows by an officer of General Sherman's staff: " One day I noticed a fugitive slave come rushing into camp with a bloody head, and apparently frightened almost to death. He had only passed my tent a moment when a regular bully of a fellow came riding up, and, with a volley of oaths, began to ask after his ' nigger.' " General Garfield was not present, and he passed on to the division commander. This division commander was a sympathizer with the theory that fugitives should be returned to their masters, and that the Union soldiers should be made the instruments for returning them. He accordingly wrote a mandatory order to General Gar field, in whose command the darky was supposed to be 184 JAMES A. GARFIELD : hiding, telling him to hunt out and deliver over the prop erty of the outraged citizen. " I stated the case as fully as I could to General Gar field before handing him the order, but did not color my statement in any way. He took the order, and deliber ately wrote on it the following indorsement : " ' I respectfully, but positively, decline to allow my command to search for, or deliver up, any fugitive slaves. I conceive that they are here for quite another purpose. The command is open, and no obstacles will be placed in the way of the search.' " I read the indorsement, and was frightened. I ex pected that, if returned, the result would be that the general would be court-martialled. I told him my fears. He simply replied : " ' The matter may as well be tested first as last. Right is right, and I do not propose to mince matters at all. My soldiers are here for far other purposes than hunting and returning fugitive slaves.' " During the session a resolution was offered tendering the thanks of Congress to General George H. Thomas, for his conduct at the battle of Chickamauga, and reflecting, as General Garfield thought, unjustly upon his old chief, General Rosecrans. This brought Garfield to his feet, and in a brilliant and earnest speech he eulogized Gen eral Rosecrans, while at the same time he did full justice to General Thomas. During the session it was proposed to grant the sanc tion of the Government of the United States to the con struction of a new railway line between New York and Philadelphia. This was opposed on the ground that the HIS CONGRESSIONAL CAREER. 185 State of New Jersey had granted a monopoly of the rail road traffic across her limits between those points to the Camden and Amboy Railroad Company, and that the proposed action of Congress would be an unwarrantable interference with the sovereign authority of that State. Upon this subject General Garfield spoke with great eloquence, and his speech was generally regarded as one of the most convincing arguments against State sover eignty ever delivered in Congress. He said : " Mr. Coleridge somewhere says that abstract defini tions have done more harm in the world than plague and famine and war. I believe it. I believe that no man will ever be able to chronicle all the evils that have re sulted to this nation from the abuse of the words ' sover eign' and ' sovereignty.' What is this thing called ' State sovereignty ? ' Nothing more false was ever uttered in the halls of legislation than that any State of this Union is sovereign. Consult the elementary text-books of law, and refresh your recollection of the definition of •' sover eignty.' Speaking of the sovereignty of nations, Black- stone says : " ' However they began, by what right soever they subsist, there is and must be in all of them a supreme, irresistible, absolute, uncontrolled authority in which the jura summi imperii or rights of sovereignty reside.' " Do these elements belong to any State of this Re public ? Sovereignty has the right to deelare war. Can New Jersey declare war ? It has the right to conclude peace. Can New Jersey conclude peace ? Sovereignty has the right to coin money. If the Legislature of New Jersey should authorize and command one of its citizens 186 JAMES A. GARFIELD: to coin a half-dollar, that man, if he made it, though it should be of solid silver, would be locked up in a felon's cell for the crime of counterfeiting the coin of the real sovereign. A sovereign has the right to make treaties with foreign nations. Has New Jersey the right to make treaties? Sovereignty is clothed with the right to regulate commerce with foreign states. New Jersey has no such right. Sovereignty has the right to put ships in commission upon the high seas. Should a ship set sail under the authority of New Jersey it would be seized as a smuggler, forfeited and sold. Sovereignty has a flag. But, thank God, New Jersey has no flag; Ohio has no flag. No loyal State fights under the ' lone star,' the ' rattlesnake,' or the ' palmetto tree.' No loyal State of this Union has any flag but ' the banner of beauty and of glory,' the flag of the Union. These are the indispensable elements of sovereignty. New Jersey has not one of them. The term cannot be applied to the separate States, save in a very limited and restricted sense, referring mainly to municipal and police regula tions. The rights of the States should be jealously guarded and defended. But to claim that sovereignty in its full sense and meaning belongs to the States is noth ing better than rankest treason. Look again at this doc ument of the Governor of New Jersey. He tells you that the States entered into the ' national compact /' National compact ! I had supposed that no governor of a loyal State would parade this dogma of nullification and secession which was killed and buried by Webster on the 16th of February, 1833. " There was no such thing as a sovereign State mak- HIS CONGRESSIONAL CAREER. 187 ing a compact called a constitution. The very language of the Constitution is decisive : ' We, the people of the United States, do ordain and establish this Constitution. The States did not make a compact to be broken when any :ne pleased, but the people ordained and established the Constitution of a sovereign Republic ; and woe be to any corporation or State that raises its hand against th6 majesty and power of this great nation." General Garfield is an active and ardent worker in the temperance cause. About this time he gave a prac tical evidence of his devotion to its principles, which is thus related by Mr. H. L. Baker. He states that it was told tp him by a man who lived almost next door to Gen eral Garfield, in Painesville, Ohio, for ten years, and during that time the events spoken of occurred. " It was in 1865 that the temperance people of Painesville were a good deal worked up over a beer brewery running full blast in their midst. They held meeting after meeting, and discussed all sorts of plans for getting rid of the obnoxious industry, but all to no avail as far as any practical outcome was concerned. " During that time General Garfield returned home, and attended the*next temperance meeting as an earnest, enthusiastic temperance man. The same old subject of the brewery came up. After listening a few minutes, the general rose up and said : " ' Gentlemen, it is the easiest thing in the world to dispose of that brewery. I will agree to do it in one hour.' " The announcement took them all by surprise, of course. Suppress in one hour the nuisance they had sc 188 JAMES A. GARFIELD : long bothered their heads over ? Do in one hour what they failed to do in six months ? It seemed impossible. But he soon showed them that he meant business. " He went over to the brewery, and in less than an hour he had purchased the whole property and paid cash, some $10,000, I believe. He destroyed all. the manufac tured liquor, and all the exclusive brewing machinery. What disposal to make of the property was now the question. It did not lie idle long, however. " The next fall he converted the building and ma chinery into a large cider-mill, and made hundreds of bar rels of cider. Not one drop of cider would he sell or give away, for he was too strict a temperance man to think it right to drink even cider ; but every barrel of it he kept till it had become cider vinegar^ and then sold it. " The good people of the town were glad to learn that, after the property proved to be a good investment, and the general made it pay him well. After using the build ing four or five years he sold it to other parties, and moved upon his farm at Mentor, Lake County, Ohio. " This is a small thing, to be sure ; but it shows that General Garfield's principles are not a dead letter, but are real, live matters, which he is ready to "put into practice in his daily life." Throughout the reconstruction period and the quarrel between Congress and President Johnson, General Gar field warmly championed the cause of Congress against the President. He made a good record on the Committee of Ways and Means, and was in favor of a moderate pro tective tariff and a steady reduction of public expendi tures and taxation. HIS CONGRESSIONAL CAREER. 189 Mr. Garfield's course with regard to a protective tariff is thus summed up by The Iron and Steel Bulletin, one of the leading protectionist journals of the United States : " General Garfield's tariff record having been made a subject of discussion since his nomination for the Presi dency, it is both just and proper that we should state that the protectionists of the country, who have kept watch over tariff legislation during the past twenty years, and who have assisted to shape and maintain the present tariff, are perfectly satisfied with his tariff votes and speeches. They and all other protectionists have indeed abundant reason to be thankful to him for valuable assistance ren dered to the cause of industry when it was in serious peril from free-trade attacks. His votes and speeches have been uniformly and consistently in favor of the protective policy. His first tariff speech in Congress was made in 1866. In this speech he carefully defined his position on the question of protection as follows : " ' I hold that a properly adjusted competition between home and foreign products is the best gauge by which to regulate international trade. Duties should be so high that our manufactures can fairly compete with the foreign product, but not so high as to enable them to drive out the foreign article, enjoy a monopoly of the trade, and regulate the price as they please. This is my doctrine of protection. If Congress pursues this line of policy stead ily, we shall, year by year, approach more nearly to the basis of free trade, because we shall be more nearly able to compete with other nations on equal terms. I am for a protection that leads to ultimate free trade. I am for that 190 JAMES A. GARFIELD : free trade which can only be achieved through a reason able protection.' " There was nothing in this declaration to which pro tectionists could fairly object. We are exporting many products of American workshops and factories today be cause protection has made their production and exporta tion possible. Great Britain was able to establish and maintain free trade only after centuries of the most vigor- orous protection of all her industries. This country is simply copying her wise example, and in the extract we have quoted, General Garfield distinctly declares his ap proval of it. "In his next speech, delivered in 1870, upon General Schenck's tariff bill, which provoked a long and bitter controversy, General Garfield advised the protectionists of the House to assent to a moderate reduction of the war duties which were then in force, for the reason that they were higher than was necessary for the protection of our industries, and, being so, they gave occasion for unfriendly criticism of the protective policy, from which it should be relieved. He said : " ' After studying the whole subject as carefully as I am able, I am firmly of the opinion that the wisest thing that the protectionists in this House can do, is to unite in a moderate reduction of duties on imported articles. He is not a faithful representative who merely votes for the highest rate proposed in order to show on the record that he voted for the highest figure, and therefore is a sound protectionist. He is the wisest man who sees the tides and currents of public opinion, and uses his best efforts to protect the industry of the people against sudden col HIS CONGRESSIONAL CAREER. 191 lapses and sudden changes. Now, if I do not misunder stand the signs of the times, unless we do this ourselves, prudently and wisely, we shall before long be compelled to submit to a violent reduction, made rudely and without discrimination, which will shock, if not shatter, all our protected industries. " ' The great want of industry is a stable policy ; and it is a significant comment on the character of our legisla tion that Congress has become a terror to the business men of the country. This very day the great industries of the nation are standing still, half paralyzed at the un certainty which hangs over our proceedings here. A dis tinguished citizen of my own district has lately written to me this significant sentence : ' If the laws of God and nature were as vascillating and uncertain as the laws of Congress in regard to the business of its people, the uni verse would soon fall into chaos.' " ' Examining thus the possibilities of the situation, I believe that the true course for the friends of protection to pursue is to reduce the rates on imports whenever we can justly and safely do so ; and, accepting neither of the extreme doctrines urged on this floor, endeavor to estab lish a stable policy that will commend itself to all patri otic and thoughtful people.' " General Schenck's bill passed the House June 6, 1870, General Garfield voting for it in company with all the protectionists in that body. It passed the Senate dur ing the samj mo ,th, such leading protectionists as Sena tors Howe, Scott, Morrill, of Vermont, Sherman, and Wilson voting for it. The bill reduced the duties on a long list of articles — pig iron, for instance, from $9 to 192 JAMES A. GARFIELD : $7 — but it was a triumph of the protective policy, and a disastrous defeat of the free traders and revenue re formers, who had favored still lower duties. It embodied provisions that are retained in the existing tariff, with which all protectionists are entirely satisfied. In 1872, two years after the passage of General Schenck's bill, a bill, to reduce duties on imports and to reduce internal taxes, was reported to the House of Representatives by Mr. Dawes, the chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, and after discussion it passed by a large majority, such prominent protectionists as Dawes, Frye, Foster, Frank W. Palmer, Ellis H. Rob erts, William A. Wheeler, and George F. Hoar voting for it. General Garfield voted for it. Judge Kelley and sixty other protectionists voted against it. It became a law, passing the Senate by a two-thirds vote, such lead ing' protectionists as Ferry, Howe, the two Morrills, Mor ton, Sherman, and Wilson supporting it. Protectionists, as will be seen, were not united upon the merits of this bill, which, among other provisions, reduced the duty on many iron and steel products ten per cent., but there was no conflict of principle involved in their differences — nothing but a question of expediency. In 1875, three years after the passage of the bill just referred to, Mr. Dawes, still chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, reported a bill to farther protect the sinking fund and to provide the exigencies of the Gov ernment, which provided among other things for the res toration of the ten per cent, which had been taken from the duties on iron and steel by the act of 1872. This bill passed the House by a close vote, General Garfield vot- HIS CONGRESSIONAL CAREER. 193 ing for it, as did nearly every protectionist in the House. The bill passed the Senate and became a law, the vote being very close — yeas thirty, nays twenty-nine. The protectionists in the Senate were almost unanimously in favor of it. Mr. -Sherman made a strong speech against it, and Mr. Scott and Mr. Frelinghuysen very ably sup- portecl it. Mr. Sherman voted against it. The passage of this bill gave great encouragement to our prostrated iron and steel industries. " The next tariff measure that came before Congress was the bill of Mr. Morrison, which was presented in the House in 1876, but was so vigorously opposed that it never reached the dignity of a square vote upon its merits. Two years afterwards Mr. Wood undertook the preparation of a tariff bill which greatly reduced duties on most articles of foreign manufacture, and which he confidently hoped might become a law. This bill pos sessed more vitality than that of Mr. Morrison, and it was with great difficulty that the friends of protection were able to secure its defeat. In the early as well as in the later stages of the struggle there was no uncer tainty about the position of General Garfield ; he was against the bill. On the 4th of June he delivered an elaborate speech against it in Committee of the Whole, in the course of which he said : '"I would have the duty so adjusted that every great American industry can fairly live and make fair profits. The chief charge I make against this bill is that it seeks to cripple the protective features of the law.' " He further said, in concluding his speech : "'A bill so radical in its character, so dangerous to 13 1 94 JAMES A. GARFIELD : our business prosperity, would work infinite mischief at this time, when the country is just recovering itself from a long period of depression and getting again upon solid ground, just coming up out of the wild sea of panic and distress which has tossed up so long. "'Let it be remembered that twenty-two per cent. of all the laboring people of this country are artisans engaged in manufactures. Their culture has been fos tered by our tariff laws. It is their pursuits and the skill which they have developed that produced the glory ef our Centennial Exhibition. To them the country owes the splendor of the position it holds before the world more than to any other equal number of our citi zens. If this bill "becomes a law, it strikes down their occupation and throws into the keenest distress the brightest and best elements of our population. " ' When the first paragraph has been read, I will propose to strike out the enacting clause. If the com mittee will do that, we can kill the bill to-day.' " On the day following the delivery of General Gar field's speech, his suggestion to strike out the enacting clause was carried into effect, upon motion of Mr. Con ger, and the bill was killed — yeas 134, nays 121. The majority against the bill was only 13. " During the recent session of Congress a vigorous effort was made to break down the tariff by piecemeal legislation. ' Divide and conquer ' was the motto of the free traders. They were defeated in every effort to reduce duties, and in every instance they encountered General Garfield's opposition. Iron and steel manufac? turers have good cause to remember his vote in the HIS CONGRESSIONAL CAREER. 195 Ways and Means Committee last March, on the bill of Mr. Covert to reduce the duty on steel rails. General Garfield voted with Judge Kelley and Messrs. Conger, Frye, Felton, Gibson, and Phelps against any reduction, and that was the end of Mr. Covert's bill — the vote being seven against to six in favor of it. Had the bill prevailed, the entire line of duties on iron and steel and other manufactures would have been seriously en dangered. " Such is General Garfield's tariff record, and as we have already stated, it is entirely satisfactory to pro tectionists. He has been charged with being a member of the British free trade Cobden Club, but he has re peatedly declared over his own signature that the use of his name by the Cobden Club was wholly unautho rized by him, and that its free trade doctrines did not meet with his approval. If the club thought, by the conferring of an empty compliment, to entrap him into an expression of sympathy with its philosophy of sel fishness and greed, it failed signally. " General Garfield is a candidate for the Presidency. With that we have nothing to do. Our readers will vote for or against him as they please. But General Garfield has rendered great service to the cause of home industry during his public career, and we would have been untrue to ourselves and to every individual mem ber of this association if we had not testified as we have done to the excellence and fulness of that service, now that his tariff record has been misrepresented. American iron and steel manufacturers have found him a wise friend in time of need, and we say so gratefully." 196 JAMES A. GARFIELD : In 1866 General Garfield was again a candidate for the House of Representatives. A few of his con stituents living in the Mahoning Valley, an iron pro ducing district, opposed his nomination on the ground that he did not favor as high a tariff on iron as they wanted. The Convention, however, was overwhelm ingly on his side, and he was nominated with enthu siasm, and elected by a majority of 10,000 votes. At the meeting of Congress General Garfield was appointed by the Speaker of the House Chairman of the Committee on Military Affairs. In this position he rendered good service to the country and to his party. His commit tee was kept busy remodelling the regular army to suit the altered needs of the country, and looking after the demands of the discharged soldiers for pay and bounty, of which many had been deprived by the red tape de cisions of the accounting officers of the Government. In 1868 Gen. Garfield was opposed in the nominat ing convention of his district by Darius Caldwell, of Ash tabula, who secured forty votes. General Garfield was, however, nominated by a handsome majority, and elected as usual by the people at the polls. He continued to serve on the Military Committee of the House, adding to his reputation and rendering good service to the country. In 1870 General Garfield was again elected to Con gress, this time without opposition. In 1872 a few blank ballots were cast in the convention, and the Liberal Re publicans ran a candidate in opposition to him at the polls, but he was elected by his usual triumphant ma jority. At the meeting of the forty-second Congress in 1871, HIS CONGRESSIONAL CAREER. 197 General Garfield was appointed by the Speaker, Chair man of the House Committee on Appropriations, and held this position nntil the elections of 1874 gave the Democrats control of the House. In this important posi tion he largely reduced the expenditures of the Govern ment, and thoroughly reformed the system of estimates and appropriations, providing for closer accountability on the part of those who spend the public money, and a clear knowledge, on the part of those who vote it, of what it is used for. A fair idea of the manner in which General Garfield carried out the work of his committee may be gained fiom the following. The Sundry Civil Appropriation Bill for 1872 was passed by the House and sent to the Senate, where several amendments were tacked on to it These amendments did not all meet the approval of Gen eral Garfield, and on the 8th of June, 1872, he rose in the House, as Chairman of the Appropriation Committee, and said : " I ask the House to allow me to submit the proposi tion to non-concur in all the amendments of the Senate to the Sundry Civil Appropriation Bill, and to accede to the request of the Senate for a Committee of Conference." Mr. Campbell, of Ohio, said : " I hope the suggestion of the chairman of the Committee on Appropriations (Mr. Garfield) will be accepted. By accepting it the minority will lose none of their privileges, for they will have the same right to make dilatory motions after the report of the Committee of Conference comes before the House that they now have." Mr. Beck, of Kentucky, said : " This side of the 198 JAMES A. GARFIELD: House wdl, I have no doubt, vote unanimously for the bill as it came from the Senate, with the exception of the bayonet clause. If the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Gar field) will offer a substitute containing every proposition of the Senate except that, we will assent to it." Mr. Garfield said, " If the ' bayonet clause,' as the gentleman terms it, were off, and all the other amend ments of the Senate were retained, I should be compelled to vote against the bill, because there are appropriations to the amount of more than a million and a half of dol lars which have been put on by the Senate, to which, as Chairman of the Committee on Appropriations, I can never consent. . . -. I ask the gentlemen to allow me to take the sense of the House on my proposition." The question was taken, and (two-thirds not voting in favor thereof) it was decided in the negative. After some further debate, Mr. Garfield said : " I have sent a resolution to ,the desk, which T ask to be read." The clerk then read as follows : " Resolved, That the House non-concur in the amend ments of the Senate to the House Bill No. 2705, being the Sundry Civil Appropriation Bill, and agree to a con ference thereon ; and that upon the appointment of such committee, the House do take a recess until eight o'clock on Monday morning." The question being put, the resolution was adopted. The Chair announces the appointment of Mr. Gar field, of Ohio, Mr. Palmer, of Iowa, and Mr. Niblack of Indiana, as the conferees on the part of the House, on the disagreeing votes of the two Houses on the amendments of the Senate to the bill H. R. No. 2705. HIS CONGRESSIONAL CAREER. 199 On the 10th of June, Mr. Garfield, of Ohio, said : " 1 rise to make a privileged report." The clerk read the report of the Committee of Con ference on the Civil Sundry Appropriation Bill. After some remarks by Mr. Kelley, of Pennsylvania, in opposition to the report, Mr. Garfield said : " On the merits of the amendment now in debate by itself considered, I will not now speak. No man on this floor regrets more than I do that the House was brought to a dead-lock on a question of this sort appended to a general appropriation bill. But there is another phase of the subject which rises altogether above that amendment or any other amendment that can be brought into this House. To discuss that greater question I must call the attention of members to the parliamentary history of this bill. It is one of the twelve great appropriation bills ne cessary for carrying on the Government. After being considered forty days in the Committee of Appropriations, after being elaborately debated in this House, it went to the Senate, and, after having there encountered storm and tempest of no ordinary character, it came back to the House with such amendments as the Senate saw fit to add. Again in the House, it was a bill in order under the rules of parliamentary law, for our rules do not allow us to rule as out of order an amendment added by the Sen ate. The bill, then, being in order, there were but five courses of action open to the Houses in the ordinary pro cesses of legislation. The first was to refer it back to the Committee on Appropriations, to be considered and brought back subject to the order of the House. The second was, we might have referred it to the Committee of the Whole 200 JAMES A. GARFIELD : on the state of the Union, where it would have been open to debate and amendment on every one of the ninety-three amendments, and then to be reported back to the House to await the further order of this body. A third course was, that we should proceed to consider it in open House under the five minutes' rule, subject to amendments and debate. A fourth plan was to non-concur in all the Sen ate amendments and send the bill to a committee of con ference, to be again brought back into the House. There was a fifth plan, to concur in all the Senate amendments, and then send the bill to the President for his approval. " Now, there is no other ordinary course to be taken with an appropriation bill, and I call the attention of the House to the fact that I and my associates on the Com mittee on Appropriations tried again and again in the House each and all of these five ordinary courses of pro cedure, and again and again did the minority of this House refuse to allow the House to take either of these courses until late at night of Saturday, and after a twelve hours' session, and then only on condition that the non- concurrence and reference to a conference committee should be coupled with a recess which should bring us within four hours of the final adjournment of Congress. In other words, the minority have for days refused to allow the usual legislative processes to be employed in reference to a great and necessary public measure ; they have refused to allow it to be debated or considered ex cept upon terms of their own dictation wholly beyond the ordinary range of parliamentary order. " Mr. Speaker, a question has, therefore, arisen, in its importance far above any item in this bill, and it is simply HIS CONGRESSIONAL CAREER. 201 this : shall the majority of the members of this House have the right to consider and act upon a great appropri-, ation bill in the mode provided in the rules ? The mo ment a minority, however large, deny that proposition, that moment we are in the midst of a parliamentary revo lution, and legislation of any sort is impossible for ever more until that position be utterly abandoned. In saying this I do not fail to recognize the utmost right of the mi nority to make dilatory motions for any and all legitimate purposes. I recognize that right whenever the minority is being oppressed by any parliamentary proceeding. If, for instance, we should insist that a bill should be passed without being read, I would filibuster at long as any man here to prevent it, if it were a bill that I did not under stand or approve. " Mr. Eldredge, of Wisconsin, said : I want to ask a question on this particular point, as to what was said by him to gentlemen on this side of the House, and to me personally. " Mr. Garfield. — When we went into the conference committee, we sat two hours on Saturday night, running our session into midnight. " We met on Sunday, and sat eight hours continu ously. At the end of six hours we had finished, to the satisfaction of the conferees, every other item of disagree ment between the two Houses. When we reached the tenth amendment, the one in dispute, the Senate con ferees informed us that they could make no report that did not treat of that subject in it ; that the report must be one and a whole. The committee on the part of the House was then compelled to adopt one of two courses, 202 JAMES A.GARFIELD: either at eight o'clock on Monday morning, four hour? before the time fixed for final adjournment, bring back a report that they had made no progress whatever, thai nothing was agreed to, nothing settled, thus making it wholly impossible to reach an adjustment before twelve o'clock, or to bring in a report concurring in something. " After mature deliberation, we thought it to be our duty to bring in a report, and in order to do that we proposed a substitute to the Senate's tenth amendment. That substitute consists, in the main, of the enforcement bill sent to the House by the Senate a few weeks since ; but there are two or three important modifications put on that at the suggesfion of the House conferees. " The amendment thus guarded is clearly within the provisions of the Constitution, which empower Congress to regulate the time, place, and manner of holding elec tions for the representatives in Congress. Now, the Committee of Conference having brought in a report un der the rules, I do now insist, and shall continue to»de- mand, that the bill before the House shall be acted on ; and against all factions and revolutionary resistance I propose to stand, if need be, until December next, until this appropriation bill shall be considered, shall be voted on, voted up or^voted down. " And now, once for all, I say to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Eldredge), and to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Kelley), that I have said no word to them or to any man inconsistent with the declarations I have made in these remarks. I challenge any man to the proof, if he venture to join the issue. " After some debate, Mr. Kelley, of Pennsylvaniaj HIS CONGRESSIONAL CAREER. 203 moved to recommit the report to the committee, and his motion was sustained by the House, by a vote of yeas 99, nays 79, 62 members not voting. " Subsequently, Mr. Garfield, of Ohio, said : Mr. Speaker, I desire to submit the following report from the the Committee of Conference. " The clerk read as follows : " The Committee of Conference on the disagreeing votes of the two Houses on the amendments to the bill (H. R. No. 2705) making appropriations for sundry civil expenses of the Government for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1873, and for other purposes, having met, after full and free conference, have been unable to agree. James A. Garfield, Frank W. Palmer, Wm. E. Niblack, Managers on the part of the House. Cornelius Cole, Geo. F. Edmunds, John W. Stevenson. Managers on the part of the Senate. " Mr. Garfield, of Ohio. — The Senate originally asked for a committee of conference in reference to the dis agreeing votes of the two Houses on this bill, and I sup pose they will make known their wishes. I do not know but the House might hasten business by ordering a new conference. I move the appointment of a new Confer ence on the disagreeing votes of the two Houses on the bill; and on that motion I demand the previous question " The motion of Mr. Garfield, of Ohio, was agreed to. 204 JAMES A. GARFIELD : "The Speaker. — The chair appoints the same con ferees as managers on the part of the House. " Mr. Garfield, of Ohio, soon after submitted a privi leged report, and said : In explanation of. the report, 1 desire to state to the House that the main body of the report is the same as was presented before. Three im portant changes were made, in view of additional facts brought before the Conference Committee as to the amount of the sums appropriated. Beyond those three changes every word is the same, except what relates to the tenth amendment, the matter in contest between the two Houses. " There are but three changes made in that tenth amendment. We strike out the words 'this act or,' in the fortieth fine of the print which the gentlemen have before them. The second change is the forty-third line, where we strike out the words ' he resides,' and insert in lieu thereof the words ' his duties are to be performed.' The third, and the one of chief importance, is the addi tion of a proviso at the end of line sixty-two, in these words : " ' And provided further, That the supervisors here in provided for shall have no power or authority to make arrests or to perform other duties than to be in the immediate presence of the officers holding the election, and to witness all their proceedings, includ ing the counting of the votes, and the making of a return thereof.' " The effect of this is that the supervisors autho rized by this act stand by and witness the proceedings y£ the election, and have the official right to stand by.; HIS CONGRESSIONAL CAREER. 205 so that if frauds are being perpetrated, the Government of the United States may have as witnesses a member of the Democratic party, and one of the Republican party, to the facts in the case. " Mr. Eldredge. — I desire to ask the Chairman of the Committee on Appropriations if the words 'guarded an 1 inspected ' are not retained in the bill. "Mr. Garfield. — No, sir. It is provided that when ten citizens in any county or parish in any Congres sional district shall apply to the judge of the district in which such county or parish is situated, ' to have said registration or election both guarded and scrutinized.' " Mr. Eldredge. — Yes, those are the words, ' guarded and scrutinized.' " Mr. Garfield. — The persons applying express their wish to have the elections guarded and scrutinized. But the powers of the persons appointed for that pur pose are in terms restricted by the proviso I have read. " Mr. Eldredge. — They are to guard and scrutinize the election. "Mr. Garfield. — The gentleman is in error. The words ' guarded and scrutinized apply only to the form of application made to the judge. But those words do not apply at all to the powers of the persons appointed. Their powers are defined and limited by the strong language of the proviso which I have just read. They are thus made mere witnesses of all the transactions of the election. " Mr. Kerr, of Indiana, said : Before my colleague (Mr. Niblack) takes the floor, I want to ask a question, in order to remove any doubt upon the mind of any member 206 JAMES A. GARFIELD : of the House. I desire to know of the Chairman of the Committee of Appropriations whether he understands that there is anything in the language of this amendment that touches the matter of qualifications of electors. " Mr. Garfield. — I understand, on the contrary, that there is nothing that can touch or change the qualifica tions of electors now provided by law. "Mr. Ritchie, of Maryland, said: In the State of Maryland the judges of the election have no discretion as to the qualifications of voters. They are controlled by the registration list ; in fact, they are merely record ing officers. Now, I ask the gentlemen what would be the relation of the supervisors contemplated by this amendment to our registration and elections ? " Mr. Garfield. — That of simply standing by and see ing the work done, without any other power than to witness it from beginning to end. "Mr. Eldredge. — Gentlemen who have not surren dered their opposition on this question have not yet had an opportunity to speak. None of us have had that opportunity who feel that we cannot surrender our opposition as long as we have the power to resist this measure. I ask the gentleman to yield to me for two or three minutes. ¦ " Mr. Garfield. — Gentlemen all around me insist that I shall call the previous question. I cannot yield far ther. " Mr. Holman, of Indiana, said : This is the most fatal measure ever brought into this Congress. " Mr. Haldeman, of Pennsylvania, said : We are not going to yield. HIS CONGRESSIONAL CAREER. 207 " Mr. Eldredge. — It is an unconstitutional bill. " Mr. Holman. — It is most infamous in its character. " Mr. Garfield. — I now move that the rules be sus pended, and that the House proceed to take an imme diate vote, without dilatory motions, upon agreeing to the report of the Committee of Conference. " The question was put on the motion of Mr. Gar field to suspend the rules; and there were — yeas 122, nays 23. " So, two-thirds voting in favor thereof, the rules were suspended. "The Speaker. — The House has directed that it now vote by yeas and nays upon this question. Will the House agree to the report of the Committee of Con ference on the disagreements of the Senate to the Sun dry Civil Appropriation Bill ? " The question was taken ; and it was decided in the, affirmative, as follows : yeas 102, nays 79 ; not voting, 59. " So the report of the Committee of Conference was agreed to." On the 24th of February, 1873, the Appropriation Bill being under consideration, Mr. Butler, of Massachu setts, offered an amendment increasing the salaries paid to the President and Vice-President of the United States, the heads of departments, and the members of Con gress. This measure did not meet with Mr. Garfield's ap proval, and at the close of Mr. Butler's remarks, he said : " I desire to answer some of the points which have been made in support of this amendment. Some of the salaries referred to in the amendment, I doubt not, are too low — perhaps all of them. But I feel it to be my duty 208 JAMES > A. GARFIELD : to call the attention of the committee to the movement of salaries in the last ten years. I hold in my hand a state ment of salaries other than legislative, as they were paid in 1860. The total amount of the salaries of officers of this government, in the several executive departments here in Washington in 1860, was $809,864.67. The war so greatly increased our civil service, that now, in the year just closed, in the calendar year 1872, the total for the same classes of salaries with the increase of bu reaus that have been put on the various departments, was |3,598,878.35, being an increase of $2,789,113.68. " Now the fact that the salaries of the officers of the Government other than legislative, have been thus in creased in the twelve years, is a fact that the House ought to know. And when it is proposed to increase the salaries by a sum I think somewhere in the neighborhood of a million and a half or two millions of dollars in one amendment, I feel it my duty to show them what the total of the salaries will be. I, of course, believe that the propositions in this amendment ought to be separated. Some of them gentlemen ought doubtless to vote for. But to pass that amendment in the lump, as laid before the committee now, I do not think it just, I do not think it equitable, and I do not think the House will do it ; it ought not to be done." Notwithstanding General Garfield's opposition, the bill passed the House, and was sent to the Senate, where it was amended. The amendments were not satisfactory to the House, and a Committee of Conference was ap pointed. It resulted in the presentation of a bill by Gen eral Garfield, making a large increase in the salaries of the niS CONGRESSIONAL CAREER. 209 Executive officers of the Government and members of Congress. On the 3d of March, 1873, in presenting this bill, General Garfield said- : " Mr. Speaker, if I can have the attention of the House, I will explain the points embraced in this report, in reference to the salaries of the President, Vice-Presi dent, Cabinet officers, members of the Supreme Court, and members of the two Houses of Congress. The amendment known as the Butler Amendment was agreed to by the Senate in everything except the provision in reference to the salaries of members of Congress. I wish to state in a few words the condition of that question in the conference. In the first place the Senate voted di rectly on the proposition to strike out the provision increasing the salary of members of Congress, and by a large vote refused to strike it out. The Senate conferees insisted that the $6,500 clause, cutting off mileage, actu ally reduced the pay of some eighteen members of the Senate. They refused, therefore, to submit to an amend ment which cut down the salary of so many senators. The Senate conferees were unanimous in fixing the sal ary at $7,500, and cutting off all allowances except ac tual individual travelling expenses of a member from his home to Washington and back once a session, and cutting off all other allowances of every kind. That proposition was agreed to by a majority of the conferees on the part of the House. I was opposed to the increase in confer ence as I have been opposed to it in the discussion and in my votes here, but my associate conferees were in favoi of the Senate amendment,, and I was compelled to choose between signing the report aud running the risk of bring- 14 210 JAMES A. GARFIELD : ing on an extra session of Congress. I have signed the report, and I present it as it is, and ask the House to act on it in accordance with their best judgment. " Mr. Hibbard, of New Hampshire, said : I desire to ask the gentleman how much plunder will be taken from the treasury if this raising of salaries is adopted ? " Mr. Garfield. — I am glad the gentleman has asked me that question. The report presented here, taking into account the changes made with reference to the salaries of members and officers of both Houses and other increases of salaries in this bill, will, according to the best estimate I have been able to make, involve an annual increase of about three-quarters of a million of dollars. " Mr. Hibbard. — How much for the present Congress ? " Mr. Garfield. — For the present Congress it involves an additional expenditure of about one and a quarter mil lion. I think the House ought to know all the facts." On the final passage of the bill Gen. Garfield voted for it, for the same reasons that induced him to sustain the report of the committee of conference. He was sharply criticised for his course, for the measure proved one of the most objectionable to the country ever adopted by Congress. While satisfied of the propriety of his conduct, General Garfield was yet sensitive to the criticisms upon him. He wrote to a friend as follows in relation to his conduct : " Hiram, Ohio.. April 21, 1873. i " Dear Friend : — Your kind and welcome letter of the 11th instant came duly to hand, for which I thank you. When I went into the army I did so expecting to fellow ithe path of xluty, whether it led me to life or death. In HIS CONGRESSIONAL CAREER. 211 entering Congress I undertook to follow the path of duty there, whether it led to political life or political death. I have cast many thousands of votes during my ten years of service, and none with a more conscientious conviction that I was doing right than the one for which I am so much blamed. Perhaps the people will never so understand it, but I believe most of them will some day. They may think I made a mistake, and they may be right about it. But I am sure that fair-minded men, when they fully understand the case, will see that I acted from worthy motives, and tried to do my duty. I have addressed a letter to the district, which will appear in this week's paper. They will see that I did all I could to keep the salary clause off from my bill, and when that effort failed I did what I could to reduce the amount appropriated, and, that by standing by the bill I saved the treasury several hundred thousand dollars. " In 1856, Mr. Giddings voted for a large increase of pay of members of Congress, and the pay then dated back sixteen months. It passed the House then by one ma jority, and Mr. Giddings' vote turned the scale. It was not a part of an appropriation bill, but stood alone on its own merits. Mr. Giddings was not censured, but was, that same fall, renominated and re-elected. They did not call him a thief nor a robber ; now they call me both, when I did more than any other member to prevent the increase of salaries. I believe that, in the long run, the people will be just. As ever, your friend, " J. A. Garfield." By the terms of the salary bill General Garfield was 212 JAMES A. GARFIELD : entitled to $5,000 back pay as a member of the House. He drew the amount, but as his ideas of duty would not permit him to appropriate it to his own use, he promptly paid it back into the treasury of the United States. Shortly after the nomination of General Garfield for the Presidency, some of his political opponents declared that while he had not used his back pay for his own wants, he had made a present of it to Hiram College. With regard to this a Cleveland reporter called upon Professor B. A. Hinsdale, the President of Hiram College, and said to him: " I understand that a story is being told in certain sections that General Garfield made a proposition to Hi ram College, viz., that he would draw from the United States Treasury the $5,000 due him by the back salary grab, and give it to the college, providing the trustees were willing to accept it. Now, President Hinsdale, wha Senator from Ohio, to succeed the Hon. John Sherman, who had accepted the secretaryship of the Treasury in the cabinet 6f President Hayes. He withdrew from the contest, however, at the special request of President Hayes, who assured him he could be of more service to the administration as a member of the House than as a senator. Mr. Blaine had been elected to the Senate, and General Garfield was now the formally recognized leader of the Republican party in the House. He held this position for several years, displaying in it all his old vigor and boldness, and the sound qualities of leadership that induced the Republican party to nominate him for the Presidency. At the meeting of the forty-fifth Congress in 1877, General Garfield was the Republican candidate for Speaker of the House, and received the full vote of his party. The Democrats being so largely in the ma jority, the Republican nomination and the vote upon it were merely complimentary. Hon. Samuel J. Ran dall, of Pennsylvania, was elected Speaker by the Dem ocrats. In 1878 General Garfield was again elected to Con gress by a handsome majority. In the same year, when the Democrats controlled the Legislature of Ohio, General Garfield was a candidate for is' 226 JAMES A. GARFIELD. s the complimentary vote of his party for United States Senator ; but after a prolonged and bitter contest in the caucus, his name was withdrawn, and it was resolved to cast only blank votes in the two Houses. The forty-sixth Congress met in extra session op the 18th of March, 1879. General Garfield was nomi nated by the Republicans for Speaker of the House, and received one hundred and twenty-five votes, but the Democratic majority reseated Speaker Randall. The Speaker, in reorganizing the standing committees of the House, placed General Garfield at the head of the Re publican membership of the Committee of Ways and Means. He also appointed him one of the committee charged with revising the rules of the House of Repre sentatives, thus paying a high and deserved compliment to General Garfield's rare knowledge of parliamentary law. General Garfield was the acknowledged leader of the Republican side of the House during this session. He held the Democracy to a strict accountability in forcing the extra session upon the country, and denounced their course in withholding the supplies of the Government in order to force upon it an acceptance of their schemes 'for removing the safeguards that had been thrown around the ballot box, which measures he declared were unpa triotic and dangerous. On the 29th of March, 1879, he made his great effort. The House went into Committee of the Whole, Mr. Springer, of Illinois, in the chair, on the Army Appropriation Bill. " Mr. Stephens, of Georgia, obtained the floor, and proceeded to speak in a clear voice. He did not desire LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 227 to say much outside of the pending point of order. The section against which that point had been raised was clearly germane to the bill. All laws penal in their char acter were to be ¦construed strictly, but laws involving questions of public right, public liberty, and public policy were to be liberally construed — not strictly. The gentle man from Maine (Mr. Frye) had said that the section did not, on its face, retrench expenditures. That was not the question. The question was, ' Would it probably retrench expenditures ? ' He thought it would, and not only possibly or probably, but certainly. The past his tory of the country showed that enormous expenditures had attended the use of troops at elections. He went on to argue that the acts of 1795 and 1817 only authorized the use of the troops to put down domestic insurrection. The provision for the use of troops for civil purposes was an entirely different matter. The law authorizing the use of troops at the polls had never any existence until 1865, and the danger of such a law would not, he pre sumed, be denied by anybody. If there was any man on the floor who was in favor of peaceable elections and order throughout the length and breadth of the land he (Mr. Stephens) professed to be equally strong with him in that feeling. He was for law and order. He had wit nessed the soldier at the polls, and had seen no good of it. The country had got along three-fourths of a century without having troops at the polls, and the sentiment of the people was as much against their presence there now as it had ever been. The future harmony, order, and prosperity of the country would be greatly promoted by hereafter adhering to the principles and precepts of the 228 JAMES A. GARFIELD. fathers of the Republic. Congress had a right to raise armies and to designate the purpose for which they should be used ; and the President's right to control and direct their movements was clearly an executive one, with which Congress had no power to interfere. But it could say that the executive could not use such forces for a particular purpose. It had a right (which he did not think the executive would deny) to say that the military should not be used at the polls. Let the land forces be devoted to protecting the frontier. Let the navy be afloat on the sea, protecting the country's flag and commerce. Let each be in the sphere to which it was entitled, in which, in the past, it had won such honor and glory for the common country. Let them perform their duties, and let the civil administration of the coun try go on in its own channel. Let members of Congress be returned as heretofore, and if any man was defrauded of his right, then let the high court of the country, the House of Representatives, decide that question, and not the bayonet of the soldier. REVOLUTIONARY DECISION OF THE CHAIR. * " The Chairman then proceeded to rule on the point of order, which he did by declaring the section to be in order, both on the ground of its being germane and of its retrenching expenditure. There could scarcely be a doubt as to its being germane, for it related to the duties of the army, or rather to the uses to which the army may be put. ' Germane ' did not mean synonymous, but meant something near akin, closely allied, relevant to the sub- LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 229 iect. As to the question of retrenching expenditures, he referred to the official estimates and to appropriations heretofore made to show how much money had been ex pended for transportation and other expenses attending the use of the troops at the polls. The ending section proposed to retrench such expenditures for the future. For these and other reasons the point of order was over ruled. " Mr. Conger (Rep.), of Michigan, appealed from the decision of the chair, and the decision was sustained — yeas 125, nays 107. " Mr. New (Rep.), of Indiana, offered an amendment providing that nothing contained in the section should be held to abridge or affect the duty or power of the Presi dent under the fourth article of the Constitution to send troops into States on the application of the legislature or executive. " The amendment was allowed to stand over for the present. MR. GARFIELD'S SPEECH. " Mr. Garfield (Rep.), of Ohio, then took the floor. He commenced his speech by referring to the gravity and solemnity of the crisis that had now been brought upon the country, and declared that the House had, to-day, re solved to enter upon a revolution against the Constitution and the Government ; and that the consequence of that resolve, if persisted in, meant nothing short of subversion of the Government. He sketched the point at issue be tween the two Houses at the close of the last Congress, Mid read from a report of one of the Senate conferees to 230 JAMES A. GARFIELD. the effect that the Democratic conferees on the part of the House were determined, unless the action of the House was concurred in, to refuse making appropriations to carry on the Government, and he also quoted from the speech of Senator Beck (another of the conferees) to the effect that the Democrats claimed the right which the House ot Commons in England had established, after two centu ries of conquest, to say they would not grant the money of the people unless there was a redress of grievances. These propositions, continued Mr. Garfield, in various forms, more or less vehemently, were repeated in the last House, and with that situation of affairs the session came near its close. The Republican majority in the Senate, and the Republican minority in the House, expressed the deepest possible solicitude to avoid the catastrophe here threatened. They expressed their strongest desire to avoid the danger to the country and to its business of an extra session of Congress, and they expressed their wil lingness to let go what they considered the least impor tant of the propositions — not as a matter of coercion at all, but as a matter of fair adjustment and compromise, if they could be met in the spirit of adjustment on the other side. Unfortunately, no spirit of adjustment appeared on the other side to meet their advances. And now the new Congress is assembled, and after ten days of deliberation the House of Representatives has resolved substantially to reaffirm the propositions of its predecessor, and on these propositions we are met to-day. This is no time to enter into all this case. I am not prepared for it myself. But I shall confine myself to the one phase of the issue pre sented in this bilL LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 231. DRAWING THE LINES. "Mr. Atkens (Dem.), of Ten., asked Mr. Garfield whether he understood him to state that there had been no proposition to compromise made in Conference Committee. " Mr. Garfield replied that he did not undertake to state what had been said in the Conference Committee, for he had not been a member of the Conference. He had been only stating what had been stated on the floor of the House and of the Senate. "Mr. Atkins. — Then I state that a proposition was made in the Conference Committee the same as the prop osition now before the House, and which is proposed to be attached to this bill. " Mr. Garfield. — I take it for granted that what my friend says is strictly true. I know nothing to the con trary. The question may be asked why we make any special resistance to propositions which a great many gen tlemen have declared are to be considered of no impor tance. So far as this side is concerned I desire to say this : We recognize you, gentlemen of the other side, as skilful parliamentarians and skilful strategists ; you have chosen wisely and adroitly your line of assault ; you have put forward perhaps the least objectionable of your meas ures, but we meet that as one part of your programme. We reply to it as an order of battle, and we are as much compelled by the logic of the situation to meet you on the skirmish line as we would be if you were attacking the intrenchments themselves. And, therefore, on the thresh old, we desire to plant our case on the general grounds on which we choose to defend it. 232 JAMES A. GARFIELD. - THE FEEBLEST GOVERNMENT ON EARTH. " Mr. Garfield then went on to refer to what he had Btated on the last day of the last Congress, as to the division of the government into three parts — the nation, the Senate, and the people ; and he said that, looking at the government as a foreigner might look upon it, it might be said to be the feeblest government on the earth, while looking at it as American citizens did, it was the mightiest government. A foreigner could point out a dozen ways in which the government could be killed, and that not by violence. ' Of course all govern ments might be overturned by the sword. But there was some ways by which this government might be ut terly annihilated without the firing of a gun. The people might say that they would not elect' representa tives. That, of course, was a violent supposition, but there was no possible remedy for such a condition of things, and without a House of Representatives there could be no support of a government, and, consequently, there could be no government ; so the States might say through their legislatures, that they would not elect senators. The very abstention from electing senators would absolutely destroy the government, and there would be no process of compulsion. Or, supposing that the two Houses were assembled in their usual order, and that a bare majority of one in either House should firmly bind itself together and say that it would vote to adjourn at the moment of meeting each day, and would do that for two years in succession — in that case Avhat would happen and what would be the measure of redress I LEAD'S THE REPUBLICAN OHPOSITION. 233 The government would die. There could not be found in the whole range of judicial or executive authority any remedy whatever. The power of a member of the House to vote was free, and he might vote ' no ' on every proposition of that kind. It was not so with the ex ecutive. The executive had no power to destroy the government. Let the executive travel but one inch beyond the line of law and there was the power of im peachment. But if the electors among the people who elected representatives, or if the electors in the State legislatures who created senators, or if senators and representatives themselves abstain from the perform ance of their duty, there was no remedy. WHAT THE CONSTITUTION MEANT. " At a first view it might seem remarkable that a body of wise men like those who framed the Constitution should have left the whole side of the fabric of govern ment open to those deadly assaults, but on another view of the case they were wise. What was their reliance ? It was on the sovereignty of the nation, on the crowned and anointed sovereign to whom all American citizens owed their allegiance. That sovereign was the body of the people of the United States, inspired by their love of country and their sense of obligation to public duty. As the originators of the forces that were sent to Congress to do their work they had no need of any coercive authority to be laid on them to compel them to do their manifest duty. Public opinion, the level of that mighty ocean from which all heights and all depths were measured, was deemed a sufficient measure to guard that side of the 234 JAMES A. GARFIELD. constitution and those approaches to the life of the na tion, absolutely from all danger, all harm. Up to this hour our sovereign has never failed us. There has never been such abstention from the exercise of those primary functions of sovereignty, as either to cripple or endanger the government. And now, for the first time in our history, and I will say for the first time in at least two centuries in the history of English-speaking people, has it been proposed, or at least insisted upon, that these voluntary powers shall be used for the destruction of the government. I want it understood that the propo sition which I have read, and which is the programme announced to the American people to-day, is, this day, that if we cannot have our way in a certain manner, we will destroy the government of this country by using the voluntary power not of the people, but of ourselves, against the government to destroy it. What is our theory of law ? It is free consent. That is the gran ite foundation of our whole structure. Nothing in this Republic can be a law that has not a free consent of the House, the free consent of the Senate, and the free consent of the executive. Or if the executive refuses his free consent, then it must have the free consent of two-thirds of each body. Will .anybody deny that? Will anybody challenge a line of that statement — that free consent is the foundation rock of all our institutions ? THREATS TO STOP THE GOVERNMENT. "And yet the programme announced two weeks ago was, that if the Senate refused to consent to the demand of the" House the government should stop. The proposi- LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 235 tion was then, and the programme is now, that although there is not a Senate to veto it, there is still a third independent factor in the legislative power of the govern ment which is to be coerced at the peril of the destruc tion of the government. It makes no difference what your issue is. If it were the simplest and most inoffen sive proposition in the world, yet if you demand as a matter of coercion that it shall be put in, every fair- minded Republican in America would be bound to resist it as much as though his own life depended on his re sistance. I am not arguing as to the merits of .your three amendments at all : I am speaking of our methods, and I say that they are against the constitution of our country. I say that they are revolutionary to the core, and that they tend to the destruction of the first ele ment of American liberty, which is free consent of all the powers that unite to make the law. I ask anybody to take up my challenge and to show me where hitherto this consent has been coerced as a condition precedent to the support of the government. It is a little surpris ing to me that our friends on the other side should have gone into this great contest on so slender a topic as the one embraced in this particular bill. Victor Hugo said, in his description of the great Battle of Waterloo, that two armies were like two mighty giants, and that some times a chip under the heel of one might determine the victory. It may be, gentlemen, that there is merely a chip under your heel, or it may be that you treated it as a chip on our shoulder. But whether it is under your heel or on our shoulder it represents a matter of revolution, and we fight for the chip as if it Wt)J«? an 236 JAMES A. GARFIELD. ingot of tho richest ore. [Loud applause on the floor and in the galleries.] A POINT FOR DEMOCRATIC MEMBERS. " Let us see what the chip is. Do the gentlemen know what they ask when they ask us to repeal ? Who made this law which you now demand to have repealed in this bill ? It was introduced into the Senate of the United States by a prominent Democrat from the State of Ken tucky (Mr. Powell). It was insisted upon in an able and elaborate speech by him. It was reported againstby- a Republican committee in that body. It went through days and weeks of debate in the Senate, and when it finally came to be acted upon in that body this is about the way the vote ran : Every Democrat in the Senate voted for it, and every senator who voted against it was a Republican. No Democrat voted against it, but every . Democratic senator voted for it. Who were they ? Mr. Hendricks, of Indiana ; Mr. Davis, of Kentucky ; Mr. Johnson, of Maryland ; Mr. McDougal, of California ; Mr. Powell, of Kentucky; Mr. Richardson, of Illinois, and Mr. Saulsbury, of Delaware. There were fewer Republican senators who voted for it than there were who voted against it. Thirteen Republican senators voted against it and only ten for it. The bill then came over to the House and was put upon its passage here. And how did the vote stand in this body ? Every Democrat in the House of Representatives voted for it — sixty of them. The total number of persons who voted for it in the House was about one hundred and thirteen, and of thatr number a majority were Democrats. The distin- LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 237 guished Speaker of the House, Samuel J. Randall, voted for it. The distinguished chairman of the Committee of Ways and Means (Fernando Wood) voted for it. A dis tinguished member from Ohio, now a senator from that State (Mr. Pendleton) voted for it. Every man of leading name or fame in the Democratic party who was then in the Congress of the United States voted for the bill, and not one against it. In this House there were but few Republicans who voted against it. I was one of the few. Thaddeus Stephens voted against it. What was the object of the bill at that time ? It was this — it was alleged by Democrats that in those days of war there was interference with elections in the border States. There was no charge of any interference in the States where war did not exist. But lest there might be some infraction of the freedom of elections a large number of Republicans in Congress were unwilling to give any ap pearance whatever of interfering with the freedom of elections, voted against this law as an expression of their purpose that the army should not be improperly used in and about any election. " Mr. Carlisle (Dem.) of Kentucky. — I want to ask if the Democrats in the Senate and the House did not vote for that proposition because it came in the form of a substitute for another proposition still more objectiona ble to them ? " Mr. Garfield. — The gentleman is quite mistaken. The original bill was introduced by Senator Powell, of Ken tucky. It was amended by several persons in its course through the Senate, but the vote I have given is the final vote. A Republican senator moved to reconsider it, 238 JAMES A. GARFIELB. hoping to kill the proposition, and for four or five days it was delayed. It was again passed, every Democrat vofc ing for it. In the House there was no debate, and there fore no expression of the reason why anybody voted for it. STEPHENS IN A MERRY MOOD. " Mr. Stephens, of Georgia. — I wish to ask the gentle man if the country is likely to be revolutionized and the Government destroyed by repealing a law that the gentle man voted against? (Laughter on the Democratic side.) "Mr. Garfield. — I think not, sir. That is not the element of revolution that I have been discussing. The proposition now is that fourteen years have passed since the war, and not one petition from any American citizen has come to us asking that the law be repealed ; not one memorial has found its way to our desks, complaining of the law ; and now the Democratic House of Representa tives hold that if they are not permitted to force on another House and the executive against their will and their consent, the repeal of a law that the Democrats made it shall be a sufficient ground for starving this Govern ment. That is the proposition we are h,ere debating. " Mr. Wood (Dem.), of New York. — Before the gentle man leaves that part of the discussion, I desire to ask him whether he wishes to make the impression on this House that the bill introduced by Senator Powell, of Kentucky, which resulted finally in the law of 1865, was the bill that passed the Senate and the House which he stated that the present Speaker of the House and myself voted in favor of? LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 239 "Mr. Garfield. — I have not intimated that there were no amendments. There were amendments. " Mr. Wood. — I want to correct the impression. I deny that, so far as I am personally concerned, I ever voted for the bill, except as a substitute for a more per nicious and objectionable measure. [Applause, on the Democratic side.] " Mr. Garfield. — All I say is a matter of record. What 1 say is that the gentleman voted for that law, and every Democrat in the Senate and in the House who voted at all voted for it. " Mr. Wood. — I want to ask the gentleman whether, in 1865, at the time of the passing of this law, the war had really yet subsided — whether there was not a portion of this country in a condition where it was impossible to exercise an elective franchise unless there was some kind of military interference ; and whether, at the expiration of fourteen years after the war has subsided, that gentle man is yet prepared to continue a war measure in a time of profound peace in the country ? GOING BACK TO 1860. *• Mr. Garfield. — I have no doubt that the patriotic gentleman from New York took all those things into consid eration when he voted for that bill, and I may have been unpatriotic in voting against it ; but he and I must stand on our record as made up. Let it be understood that I have not at all entered into the discussion of the merits of the case. I am discussing a method of revolution against the Constitution of the United States. I desire 240 JAMES A. GARFIELD. to ask the forbearance of the gentlemen on the other side for remarks that I dislike to make, for they will bear witness that I have in many ways shown my desire that the wounds of the war shall be healed and that the grass that God plants over the graves of our dead may signalize the return of the spring of friendship and peace between all parts of this country. But I am compelled by the necessity of the situation to refer for a moment to a chap ter of history. The last act of the Democratic administra tion in this House, eighteen years ago, was stirring and dramatic, but it was heroic and high-sotiled. Then the Democratic party said, ' If you elect your man as Presi dent of the United States, we will shoot your Union to death ;' and the people of this country, not willing to bo coerced, but believing that they had a right to vote for Abraham Lincoln if they chose, did elect him lawfully as President. And then your leaders in control of the major ity of the other wing of this Capitol did the heroic thing of withdrawing from their seats, and your representatives withdrew from their seats and flung down to us the gage of mortal battle We called it rebellion, but we admitted that it was honorable, that it was courageous, and that it was noble to give us the fell gage of battle and fight it out in the open field. That conflict and what followed we all know too well ; and to-day, after eighteen years, the book of your domination is opened where, you turned down your leaves in 1860, and you are signalizing your return to power by reading the second chapter (not this time an heroic one), that declares that if we do not let you dash a statute out of the book, you will, not shoot the Union to death, as in the first chapter, but starve it to LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 241 death by refusing the necessary appropriations. (Ap plause on the Republican side.) You, gentlemen, have it in your power to kill this movement ; you have it in your power, by withholding these two bills, to smite the nerve centres of our constitution to the stillness of death ; and you have declared your purpose to do it if you cannot break down the elements of free consent that up to this time have, always ruled in the Government. SUPERCILIOUS CARPING. " Mr. Davis (Dem.), of North Carolina.— Do I under stand- the gentleman to state that refusal to admit the army at the polls will be the death of this government ? That is the logic of his remark if it means anything. We say it will be the preservation of the government to keep the army from destroying liberty at the polls. " Mr. Garfield. — I have too much respect for the intel ligence of the gentleman from North Carolina to believe that he thinks that that was my argument. He does not say that he thinks so. On the contrary, I am sure that every clear-minded man knows that that was not my argument. My argument was this — that unless some independent branch of the legislative power against its will is forced to sign or vote what it does not consent to, it will use the power in its hands to starve the govern ment to death. " Mr. Davis. — How does the gentleman assume that we are forcing some branch of the government to do what it does not wish to do ? How do we know that, or how does the gentleman know it ? is 242 JAMES A. GARFIELD. " Mr. Garfield. — My reply to the gentleman is, that I read at the outset of my remarks the declaration of his party asserting that this is its programme. In 1856, in Cincinnati, in the National Democratic Con vention, and still later, in 1860, the national Democ racy in the United States, affirmed the right of the veto as one of the sacred rights of our Government, and declared that any law which could not be passed over a veto had no right to become a law, and that the only redress was an appeal from the veto to the people at the next election. That has been the Democratic doctrine on that subject from the remotest day — certainly from Gen eral Jackson's time until now. What would you* have said in 1861 if the Democratic majority in the Senate, in stead of taking the course which it did, had simply said : ' We will put an amendment on an appropriation bill de claring the right of any State to secede from the Union at pleasure, and forbidding any officer of the army or navy of the United States from interfering with any State in its purpose to secede ? ' Suppose the Demo cratic majority had said then, ' Put that on these appro priation bills, or we will refuse supplies to the govern ment.' Perhaps they could have killed the government then by starvation. But in the madness of that hour the secession government did not dream that it would be honorable to put their fight on that ground, but they walked out on their plan of battle and fought it out. But now, in a way which the wildest of secessionists never dreamed of taking, it is proposed to make this new assault on the vitals of the nation. LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 243 A REPUBLICAN CHALLENGE. " Gentlemen (addressing the Democratic side of the House), we have tried to count the cost. We did try to eount it in 1861 before we picked up the gage of battle ; and although no man could then forecast the awful loss in blood and treasure, yet having started in we staid there to victory. We simply made the appeal to our sovereign, to that great omnipotent public opinion in America, to determine whether the Union should be shot to death. And now lawfully in our right hand, in our place here, we pick up the gage of battle which you have thrown down, and will appeal to our common sovereign to say whether you shall break down the principle of free consent in legislation at the price of starving the government to death. We are ready to pass these bills for the support of the government at any hour when you will offer them in the ordinary way, and if you offer these other measures as separate measures, we will meet you in the spirit of fair and fraternal debate. But you shall not compel us — you shall not coerce us — even to save this government, until the question has gone to the sovereign to determine whether it will consent to break down any of its voluntary powers. And on that ground, gentlemen, we plant ourselves. (Loud applause on the Republican side and in the galleries.) We remind you, in conclusion, that this great zeal of yours in regard to keeping the officers of the government out of the States has not been always yours. I remember that only six years before the war your law authorized mar glials of the United States to go through all our house- 244 JAMES A. GARFIELD. holds and hunt for fugitive slaves. It did not only tha^ but it empowered marshals to call for a posse-comitatus and to call upon all the bystanders to join in the chase, and your Democratic attorney-general declared in an opinion, in 1854, that a marshal of the United States might call to his aid the whole posse, including soldiers and sailors and marines of the United States, to join in the chase and to hunt down the fugitive. Now, fellow members of the. House, if, for the purpose of making sla very eternal, you could send your marshals and could summon posses and use the armed forces of the United States, by what face or grace can you tell us that, in order to procure freedom in elections and peace at the polls, you cannot use the same marshal with his armed posse ? But I refrain from discussing the merits of the proposition. I have tried in this hurried and unsatis factory way to give my ground of opposition to this legis lation." As Mr. Garfield resumed his seat, he was again loudly applauded on the Republican side and in the gal leries. On the 4th of April, in reply to Mr. Tucker, of Vir ginia, who in behalf of his party had threatened the stop page of the supplies of the army unless the rider tacked on to the appropriation bill, forbidding the use of the troops at the polls, should be adopted, General Garfield spoke with rare force and effect. " Mr. Garfield, of Ohio, said : During the last four days fifteen or twenty demolitions of his argument of last Saturday had been made in the presence of the House and of the country. All of them save one had alleged LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 245 that he held it to be revolutionary to place this legisla tion on an appropriation bill. If they had any particular pleasure in setting up a man of straw to knock him down again, they had enj'03'ed that pleasure. He had never claimed that it was either revolutionary or unconstitu tional to put a rider on an appropriation bill. No man on the Republican side had claimed that. The most that had been said was that it was considered a bad parliamen tary practice. All parties in tie country had repeatedly said that. The gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Black burn) had thought that he was especially severe in show ing that he (Mr. Garfield) had insisted on the passage of a conference report in 1872, in an appropriation bill that had a rider to it, and had said that it was revolution ary in the Democratic party to resist it. What he (Mr. Garfield) had said on that occasion, and what he said now, was that it was revolutionary in the gentleman's party to refuse to let the appropriation bill be voted on. For four days gentlemen on that side had said that the House should not vote on the appropriation bill because there was a rider on it He had tried to prevent that rider being put on, but when the minority insisted that the House should never act upon it, he had said that that was an unparliamentary obstruction. The Republicans did not filibuster to prevent a vote on the pending measure. The majority had a right (however indecent it might be as a matter of parliamentary practice) to put a rider on the appropriation bill and pass it. When the bill was sent to the Senate that body had a perfect right to pass it. And when it went to the President, it was the President's constitutional right to approve and sign it. If the Presi- 246 JAMES A. GARFIELD. dent signed it, then it would be a luw ; but it was equally the President's constitutional right to disapprove it Should he do so, then, unless the other side had a two- third^ majority in the House and Senate to pass the bill notwithstanding the President's objections, it could not be passed without the flattest violation of the constitution. THE VETO QUESTION. " Nobody on the Republican side had brought up the question of a veto. It had been brought up by the proc lamation of Democratic caucuses and by the conference committees of the last House that had written it down as their programme, that they would bind together these elements of legislation and send them to the President, and that if he did not approve them the Democratic party would not vote supplies for the government. You (said he, addressing the opposite side) threatened him in ad vance, before you let him have an opportunity to say yes or no. You walked into this Capitol with your threats. against him in your high-sounding proclamations. You ' threatened in the index : ' it remains to be seen whether in the body of your work and in its concluding sentences your thunder will be as loud as it was in the opening chapter. (Applause on the Republican side.) Let no gentleman say that I, or any man on this floor, have threatened a veto. It would be indecent to do it. It would be indecent for any of us even to speak of what the executive intends, for none of us has the right to know that. But you in advance proclaim to him that if he dared to exercise his constitutional power you would refuse to vote the supplies of the government — in other LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 247 words, that you would starve it to death. And that is the proposition of my distinguished friend from Virginia (Mr. Tucker), who has come nearer meeting this case than any man on this floor — has made a point which is a •part of the grandeur of his intellect, which I respect. He says that under our constitution we can vote supplies for the army for but two years, and that in a certain way the army ceases to be if the supplies are not voted. He is mistaken in one thing — the army is an organization in dependent of appropriation bills so far as the creation of officers and ranks is concerned. The mere supply of it, of course, comes through the appropriation bills. If you refuse supplies to the army it must perish of inanition. The gentleman from Virginia says, ' Unless you let us ap pend a condition, which is to us a redress of grievances, we will let the army be annihilated on the 30th of June next by lack of food and shelter.' That is fair in argu ment ; that is brave. But what is the ' grievance ' of which the gentleman complains ? A law : a law of the land. A law made by the representatives of the people, made through all the proper forms of consent known to our constitution. And it is his grievance that he could not get rid of it in the ordinary and constitutional way of repealing a law. If he can get rid of it by all the powers of consent that go to make or unmake a law, then he can do so, whether it is a ' grievance ' or not, whether it is good or bad. " If the gentleman from Virginia wants to take before the American people this proposition of letting our army be annihilated on the 30th of June next, unless the Pres ident, against his conscience and sense of duty, shall sign '248 JAMES A. GARFIELD. what he sends him, we will debate the question in the forum of every man's mind. If what the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Blackburn) calls ' the return of the Dem ocratic party to its birthright ' (changed to ' heritage ' in the Record?) is to be signalized in its first great act by striking down the grand army of the United States, the people of this country will not be slow to understand that there are reminiscences about that army which these gentlemen would willingly get rid of. [Loud applause on the Republican side and in the galleries]. " In the course of further remarks Mr. Garfield ex pressed his willingness to help the Democrats to wipe from the statute book the law authorizing the use of the army at the polls. A bill for that purpose should be in troduced in the regular manner." In describing the effect of this speech the correspond ent of the New York Herald said : " The exposure by General Garfield to-day of the de mure manner in which the rider of the army bill was arranged by the Democrats will deservedly put the man agers of the extremists to disgrace. The amendment so hastily offered from the Democratic side after he sat down, showed their surprise and a certain demoralization. This amendment has yet to be discussed in the House, as well as Mr. Baker's, offered in the interest of economy, and, he might have added, of a useful and necessary re form, and the whole bill will be elaborately discussed and amended in the Senate. It will go to the President in a shape quite different from that in which it was brought into the House, and there are signs here that the moderate men of the Democratic side are at last — and a little too LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 249 late, as usual — making up their minds to assert them selves. They begin to try to steer their ship after th? extremists have carried it into the breakers." Commenting upon the speech, the Herald said, edit? rially : " The discussion of the army bill yesterday was more powerful and noteworthy than it has been on any preced ing day. Its great feature was the second speech of Mr. Garfield, who rose to the full height of the occasion and stripped the question of the infinite' rubbish which has gathered around it in the progress of the debate. It was really a statesmanlike effort, alike remarkable for candor, for clearness of statement, for force of logic and especially for the sureness of aim with which he hit the Democratic position between wind and water and set his opponents at work in trying to stop the leaks in their ship. He frankly repudiated all the Republican nonsense about the enor mity of attaching extraneous legislation to an appropria tion bill. He declared his willingness to repeal the offensive sections of the Revised Statutes in separate bills. He stated some strong reasons why it is inexpe dient to strike out merely the one clause which the Dem- acrats seek to repeal without annulling the whole section. The effect of his speech seems to have been remarkable in disconcerting the Democrats. It is probable now that if an attempt is made to carry out the threat of stopping the supplies, the party will split, and our correspondent therefore says, very aptly and forcibly, that Mr. Garfield ' has broken the Democratic line.' " On the 16th of April, during the debate on the South ern Claims Bill, General Garfield made the following gen 250 JAMES A. GARFIELD. erous appeal in behalf of the men of the South who were loyal to the Union during the rebellion. He said : " The general doctrine of belligerents is, of course, ac cepted by everybody to cover as enemies technically all the inhabitants of the belligerent territory. That general doctrine is recognized by all lawyers everywhere. But nobody has ever denied, except the gentleman from Wis consin, that during our late war, and since the Supreme Court has repeatedly determined that in cases before it the question of loyalty cannot be raised where the party has been granted a pardon. It was stated in the last Congress that ninety-nine per cent, of all the people of the seceded States were what we would call disloyal, and that every man in those States that amounted to anything belonged to that category. I desire to traverse that prop osition by some facts. Do gentlemen know that, leaving out all the border States, there were fifty regiments and seven companies of white men in our army fighting for the Union from the States that went into rebellion ? Do they know that from the single State of Kentucky more Union soldiers fought under our flag than Napoleon took into the battle of Waterloo — more than Wellington took with all the allied armies against Napoleon ? Do they remember that 186,000 colored men fought under our flag against the rebellion and for the Union, and that of that number 90,000 were from the States which went into rebellion? To say that they were enemies, that they had no rights, and that when we came out of the war we should not pay them and their families for all the proper losses that they suffered in aid of our Govern ment, is what I had hoped no man on either side of the LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 251 House would say. I am glad to know that the gentlemen who fought against us do not say it — not one of them. It remained for one of our own soldiers to say that nothing ought to be paid to any man, however loyal, if he came from the South. In my judgment, that is in the highest degree inequitable and unjust. Let the Southern Claims Commission go on until it has acted in cases before it, and then let it be mustered out. Let us not enlarge that business, but let us complete it. Most of all, let us not turn it over to a court where the distinction between loyalty and disloyalty is not retained." On the 19th of June, 1879, Mr. McMahon (Dem.), of Ohio, submitted to conference report upon the judi cial expenses bill. The report recommends that the House recede from its disagreement to amendment 1 and agree to the same, with an amendment striking out the words inserted by the Senate and inserting in lieu thereof the following: "Under any of the provisions of title 26 of the Revised Statutes of the United States authorizing the appointment or payment of general or special deputy marshals for services in connection with elections or on election day." " Mr. McMahon proceeded to explain the report. If adopted it would prohibit any officer of the Government from making any contract or incurring any liability under any of the provisions of title 26 of the Revised Statutes. It would be seen that supervisors were not mentioned in the section. There was no doubt that all supervisors, ordinary and chief, were paid out of a perma nent annual appropriation fund. The limitation was con fined to marshals, and if Democrats surrendered that limi- 252 JAMES A. GARFIELD. tation, they would be base and worthless representatives of the people, and would no longer deserve the confidence of their constituents. Whatever might be thought of supervisors of elections the course of the Republican party in regard to special deputy marshals had been one of the grossest outrages on decent and fair elections that had ever been committed. THE REPUBLICAN ATTITUDE. " Mr. Garfield, of Ohio, opposed the report, and laid down the position occupied by the Republican side on this question. The bill went beyond making appropriations and proposed to prevent the executive authority of the Government from enforcing the law. The issue was nar rowed down to this point — the majority avowed its de termination that marshals, deputy marshals, and assistant marshals shall not be appointed to execute the laws as -embodied in title 26 of the Revised Statutes, and con fessed that the clause in the conference report was in tended and devised for that purpose. That made a square issue, which everybody could understand. The other side did not like the law, but it should have proposed to amend it so as to correct the abuses complained of. The Hepublican side of the House was willing to offer or to accept an amendment placing the appointment of deputy marshals and assistant marshals (where that of the super visors is) in the courts. That would be in the direction of legislation to cure the evil complained of. The other side, for want of a two-thirds majority, could not con stitutionally repeal the law and therefore, not being able to repeal it, it wished to prevent the execution of the LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 258 law. It was necessary that the courts should be open to all suitors, that justice should be done in every district, that prisoners should have a speedy trial. And so the other side segregated from all the other appropriations of the year that for the judicial expenses of the Government, and it held out the bill for judicial expenses in one hand and said, not to the minority alone but to all the offi cers of the nation, ' Take this money ; but you can only have it on condition that we shall be permitted to couple with it a provision that certain laws, which we cannot repeal, shall not be enforced ; that for the coming year they shall be nullified. POSITION OF THE PRESIDENT. " See the attitude in which this bill puts the Presi dent of the United States. It puts him absolutely be tween two fires — the fire of your law on the one side, and the fire of heaven and his oath on the other. " Mr. McMahon, of Ohio. — How is the President at all interfered with. " Mr. Garfield. — The President has taken an oath that he shall see to it that the laws be faithfully executed. You do not repeal this law, but you make it impossible for him to execute it without his running in danger, on the one hand, of your impeaching him, or, on the other hand, without neglecting his duty and violating his oatli. Now, I take it that no President of the United States can allow himself to be put in that attitude. The wisdom of the old writer of Proverbs, ' Surely in vain the net is spread in the sight of any bird,' is quite likely to apply in this case. I do not see that there is the slightest 254 JAMES A. GARFIELD. probability that you can catch the President in this net, or that he will allow himself to be put in a position where he will be compelled to decide between obeying his oath and the constitution on the one hand, and obeying this entangling law on the other hand. During the summer and fall of 1879, General Garfield delivered a number of speeches in the West. At the twenty-fifth reunion of the Western Republicans, held at Madison, in July, 1879, he spoke as follows : " This vast assembly must have richly enjoyed the review of the party's history presented here and cele brated here to-day, and not only a review of the past, but the hopeful promises made for the future of that great party. The Republican party, organized a quar ter of a century ago, was made a necessity to carry out the pledges of the fathers that this should be a land of liberty. " There was in the early days of the Republic, a Re publican party that dedicated this very territory, and all our vast territory, to freedom ; that promised much for schools ; that abolished imprisonment for debt, and that instituted many wise reforms. But there were many conservatives in those days, whose measures degenerated into treason ; and the Republican party of to-day was but the revival of the Republican party of seventy years ago, under new and broader conditions of usefulness. "It is well to remember and honor the greatest names of the Republican party. One of these is Joshua R. Giddings, who for twenty years was freedom's cham pion in Congress, and, from a feeble minority of two, lived to see a Republican Speaker elected, and himself to LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 255 conduct him to the chair. Another is Abraham Lincoln, the man raised up by God for a great mission. No man ever had a truer appreciation of the principles of the Dec laration of Independence, that great charter which it was the mission of the Republican party to enforce. " There was a fitness in the first platform of the Wis consin Republicans that they based themselves upon the Declaration of Independence. While the Republicans, from the first, have been true to their principles, perfect ing all they promised, as proved to-day by the whole record, the Democrats, on the other hand, steadily wrong, have been forced from one bad position to another. "Can any Democrat point with pride to his party platforms of 1854, or find in them any living issue ? The issues they then presented led us into war and involved, us in a great national debt. Looking for the cause of that debt, I say that the Democratic party caused it. " We are, as a nation, emerging from difficulties, and the Republican party alone can probably claim that the brightest page of our country's history has been written by the true friends of freedom and progress. The Re publican party has yet work to do. We are confronted to-day in Congress by nearly the same spirit that pre vailed in the years just before the war. " They tell us that the National Government is but the servant of the States ; that we shall not interpose, as a nation, to guard an honest election in a State ; that if we will interpose they will deny appropriations. Is this less dangerous than their position in 1861 ? Have we no interest except in local elections, no power to guard the ballot box and' protect ourselves against outrages 256 JAMES A. GARFIELD. upon it ? Why does the South make this issue ? I an swer : They have a solid South, and only used to carry Ohio and New York to elect the President, and they trust to carry these States by the means they best know how to use. "There are sentimentalists and optimists who may see no danger in this. There had been sentimentalists and optimists in the Republican party, but to-day all were stalwarts. President Hayes, when he came into office, was an optimist, but he saw all his hopes, concil iation frustrated, and all his advances met with scorn. We all now stand together on the issue as one." At the Andersonville Reunion, at Toledo, Ohio, on tbe 3d of October, 1879, General Garfield said : " My Comrades, Ladies and Gentlemen : I have ad dressed a great many audiences, but I never before stood in the presence of one that I felt so wholly unworthy to speak to. A man who came through the war without Deing shot or made prisoner is almost out of place in such an assemblage as this. " While I have listened to you this evening, I have remembered the words of the distinguished Englishman who once said, 'that he was willing to die for his coun try.' Now, to say that a man is willing to die for his country is a good deal, but these men who sit before us have said a great deal more than that. I would like to know where the man is that would calmly step out on the platform and say, ' I am ready to starve to death for my country.' That is an enormous thing to say, but there is a harder thing than that. Find a man, if you can, who will walk out before this audience and LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 257 say, ' I am willing to become an idiot for my country." How many men could you find who would volunteer to become idiots for their country ? " Now, let me make this statement to you, fellow- citizens : One hundred and eighty-eight thousand such men as this were captured by the rebels who were fight ing our Government. One hundred and eighty-eighl thousand ! How many is that. They tell me there are 4,500 men and women in this building to-night ! Mul tiply this mighty audience by forty and you -will have about 188,000. Forty times this great audience were prisoners of war to the enemies of our country. And to every man of that enormous company there stood open night and day the offer: 'If you will join the rebel army, and lift up your hand against your flag, you are free.' " A voice.—' That's so.' " General Garfield. — ' And you shall have food, and you shall have clothing, and you shall see wife, and: mother, and child.' " A voice. — ' We didn't do it, though.' " General. — And do you know that out of that 188,000 there were less than 3,000 who- accepted the offer ? And of those 3,000, perhaps nine-tenths of them did it with the mental reservation that they would desert at the first hour — the first moment there was an opportunity. " Voices.— ' That's so.'- " General Garfield.— But 185,000 out of the 188,000 said : ' No ! not to see wife again ;. not to see child again; not to avoid starvation;, not to avoid idiocy; not 17 258 JAMES A. GARFIELD. to avoid the most loathsome of deaths, will I lift this hand against ray country forever.' Now, we praise the ladies for their patriotism ; we praise our good citizens at home for their patriotism ; we praise the gallant sol diers who fought and fell. But what were all these things compared with that yonder ? I bow in rever ence. I would stand with unsandaled feet in the pres ence of such heroism and such suffering ; and I would say to you, fellow-citizens, such an assemblage as this has never yet before met on this great earth. " Who have reunions ? I will not trench upon for bidden ground, but let me say this : Nothing on the earth and under the sky can call men together for re unions except ideas that have immortal truth and im mortal life in them. The animals fight. Lions and tigers fight as ferociously as did you. Wild beasts tear to the death, but they never have reunions. Why? Because wild beasts do not fight for ideas. They merely fight for blood. " All these men, and all their comrades went out inspired by two immortal ideas. " First, that liberty shall be universal in America. " And, second, that this old flag is the flag of a Nation, and not of a State ; that the Nation is supreme over all people and all corporations. " Call it a State; call it a section; call it a South- call it a North ; call it anything you wish, and yet armed with the nationality that God gave us, this is a Nation against all State sovereignty and secession what ever. It is the immortality of that truth that makes these reunions, and that makes this one. You believed LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 259 it on the battle-field, you believed it in the hell of An dersonville, and you believe it to-day, thank God ; and you will believe it to the last gasp. " Voices — ' Yes, we will,' ' That's so,' etc. " General Garfield. — Well, now, fellow-citizens and fellow-soldiers — but I am not worthy to be your fellow in this work, — I thank you for having asked me to speak to you. [Cries of ' Go on ! ' ' Go on ! ' ' Talk to us more, etc.] " I want to say simply that I have had one oppor tunity only to do you any service. I did hear a man who stood by my side in the halls of the legislation — the man that offered on the floor of Congress the resolution that any man who commanded colored troops should be treated as a pirate and not as a soldier ; as a slave-stealei and not as a soldier — I heard that man calmly say, with his head up in the light, in the presence of this American people, that the Union soldiers were as well treated, and as kindly treated in all the Southern prisons as were the rebel soldiers in all the Northern prisons. " Voices. — ' Liar !' ' Liar !' ' He was a liar !¦' " General Garfield. — I heard him declare that no kinder men ever lived than General Winder and his Com mander-in-Chief, Jeff. Davis. [Yells of derision, hisses, etc.] And I took it upon myself to overwhelm him with the proor [a roll of applause begins], with the proof of the. tortures you suffered, the wrongs done to you, were suffered and done with the knowledge of the Confederate authorities from Jefferson Davis down — [great applause, waving of hats, veterans standing in their chairs and cheering]— that »t was a part of their policy to make you 260 JAMES A. GARFIELD. idiots and skeletons, and to exchange your broken and shattered bodies and dethroned minds for strong, robust. well-fed rebel prisoners. That policy, I affirm, has never had its parallel for atrocity in the civilized world." " Voice.—' That's so.' " General Garfield. — It was never heard of in any land since the dark ages closed upon the earth. While history lives men. have memories. We can forgive and forget all other things before we can forgive and forget I this. " Finally, and in conclusion, I am willing, for one — and I think I speak for thousands of others — I am will ing to see all the bitterness of the late war buried in the grave of our dead. I would be willing that we should imitate the condescending, loving-kindness of him who planted the green grass on the battle-fields and let the fresh flowers bloom on all the graves alike. I would clasp hands with those who fought against us, make them my brethren, and forgive all the past, only on one su preme condition : that it be admitted in practice, acknowl edged in theory, that the cause for which we fought, and you suffered, was and is, and for evermore will be right, eternally right." [Unbounded enthusiasm.] " Voices.—' That's it,' ' That's so,' etc. " General Garfield. — That the cause for which they fought was, and forever will be, the cause of treason and wrong. [Prolonged applause.] Until that is acknowl edged my hand shall never grasp any rebel's hand across any chasm, however small." [Great applause and cheers] General Garfield took an active part in the campaign in Ohio in the fall of 1879, which returned a Republican LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 261 legislature, and ensured the election of a United States senator of the same political faith. The new Legislature of Ohio assembled in January, 1880, and at once proceeded to the election of a United States senator to succeed Allen G. Thurman, whose term would expire on the 3d of March, 1881. General Gar field was placed in nomination by his friends. Ex-Sen ator Stanley Matthews, ex-Attorney-General Alphonso Taft, and ex-Governor William Denison had also entered into a canvass for the place, but by the time the caucus met the general sentiment of the State was so earnest and enthusiastic in favor of Garfield that his three com petitors withdrew without waiting for a ballot, and he was nominated unanimously by a rising vote. On the 15th of January he was elected United States Senator by a majority of 22 in the Assembly, and 7 in the Senate. On the same day General Garfield arrived in Colum bus from Washington, and in the evening a reception was given to him in the hall of the House of Representatives, in the State capitol. He was introduced by Governor Foster, and after some hand-shaking, spoke as follows : " Fellow-citizens : I should be a great deal more than a man, or a great deal less than a man, if I were not ex tremely gratified by the many marks of kindness you have shown me in recent days. I did not expect any such meeting as this. I knew there was a greeting awaiting me, but did not expect so cordial, generous, and general a greeting, without distinction of party, without distinc tion of interests, as I have received to-night. And you will allow me, in a moment or two, to speak of the mem ories this chamber awakens. 262 JAMES A. GARFIELD. " Twenty years ago this last week I first entered this chamber and entered upon the duties of public life, in which I have been every hour since that time in some capacity or other. I left this chamber eighteen years ago, and I believe I have never entered it since that time. But the place is familiar, though it was not peopled with the faces that I see before me here to-night alone, but with the faces of hundreds of people that I knew here twenty years ago, a large number of whom are gone from earth. " It was here in this chamber that the word was first brought of the firing on Fort Sumter. I remember dis tinctly a gentleman from Lancaster, the late Senator Schleigh — General Schleigh, who died not very long ago — I remember distinctly as he came down this aisle, with all the look of agony and anxiety in his face, informing us that the guns had opened upon Sumter. I remember that one week after that time, on motion of a leading Demo cratic senator, who occupied a seat not far from that po sition (pointing to the Democratic side of the chamber), that we surrendered this chamber to several companies of soldiers who had come to Columbus to tender their ser vices to the imperilled Government. They slept on its carpets and on these sofas, and quartered for two or three uights in this chamber while waiting for other quarters outside the capitol. "All the early scenes of the war are associated with this place in my mind. Here were the musterings — here was the centre, the nerve centre, of anxiety and agony. Here over 80,000 Ohio citizens tendered their services in the course of three weeks to the imperilled nation. Here, where we had been fighting our political battles with sharp LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 263 and severe partisanship, there disappeared, almost as if by magic, all party lines ; and from both sides of the cham ber men went out to take their places on the field of bat tle. I can see now, as I look out over the various seats, where sat men who afterward became distinguished in the service in high rank, and nobly served their constituen cies and honored themselves. " We now come to this place, while so many are gone ; but we meet here to-night with the war so far back in the distance that it is an almost half-forgotten memory. We meet here to-night with a nation redeemed. We meet here to-night under the flag we fought for. We meet with a glorious, a great and growing Republic, made greater and more glorious by the sacrifices through which the country has passed. And coming here as I do to night, brings the two ends of twenty years together, with all the visions of the terrible and glorious, the touching and cheerful, that have occurred during that time. " I came here to-night, fellow-citizens, to thank this General Assembly for their great act of confidence and compliment to me. I do not undervalue the office that you have tendered to me yesterday and to-day ; but I say, I think, without any mental reservation, that the manner in which it was tendered to me is far higher to me, far more desirable, than the thing itself. That it has been a voluntary gift of the General Assembly of Ohio, without solicitation, tendered to me because of their confidence, is as touching and as high a tribute as one man can receive from his fellow-citizens, and in the name of all my friends, for myself, I give you my thanks. 264 JAMES A. GARFIELD. " I recognize the importance of the place to which you have elected me ; and I should be base if I did not also recognize the great man whom you have elected me to succeed. I say for him, Ohio has had few larger- minded, broader-minded men in the records of our his tory than that of Allen G. Thurman. Differing widely from him as I have done in politics, and do, I recog nize him as a man high in character and great in intel lect ; and I take this occasion to refer to what I have never before referred to in public : that many years ago, in the storm of party fighting, when the air was filled with all sorts of missies aimed at the character and reputation of public men, when it was even for his party interest to join the general clamor against me and my associates, Senator Thurman said in public, in the campaign, on the stump — when men are as likely to say unkind things as at any place in the world — a most generous and earnest word of defence and kindness for me, which I shall never forget so long as I live. I say, moreover, that the flowers that bloom over the garden^ wall of party "politics are the sweetest and most fragrant that bloom in the gardens of this world ; and where we can fairly pluck them and enjoy their fragrance, it is manly and delightful to do so. "And now, gentlemen of the General Assembly, without distinction of party, I recognize this tribute and compliment paid to me to-night. Whatever my own course may be in the future, a large share of the in spiration of my future public life will be drawn from this occasion and these surroundings, and I shall feel inew the sense of obligation that I feel to the State of LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 265 Ohio. Let me venture to point a single sentence in regard to that work. During the twenty years that I have been in public life, almost eighteen of it in the Congress of the United States, I have tried to do one thing. Whether I was mistaken or otherwise, it has been the plan of my life to follow my conviction at whatever personal cost to myself. "I have represented for many years a district in Congress, whose approbation I greatly desired ; but though it may seem, perhaps, a little egotistical to say it, I yet desired still more the approbation of one person, and his name was Garfield. He is the only man that I am compelled to sleep with, and eat with, and live with, and die with ; and if I could not have his approbation I should have bad companionship. And in this larger constituency which has called me to rep resent them now, I can only do what is true to my best self, applying the same rule. "And if I should be so unfortunate as to lose the confidence of this larger constituency, I must do what every other fair-minded man has to do — carry his polit ical life in his hand and would take the consequences. But I must follow what seems to me to be the only safe rule of my life ; and with that view of the case, and with that much personal reference, I leave that subject. "Thanking you again, fellow-citizens, members of the General Assembly, Republicans as well as Demo crats — all party men as I am — thanking you both for what you have done and for this cordial and manly greeting, I bid you good-night." On the day of General Garfield's election to the Sen- 266 JAMES A. GARFIELD. ate, President Hinsdale, of Hiram College, made the fol lowing announcement to the students of that institu tion: " To-day a man will be elected to the United States Senate in Columbus, who, when a boy, was once the bell- ringer in this school and afterward its president. Feeling this, we ought, in some way, to recognize this step in his history. I will to-morrow morning call your attention to some of the more notable and worthy features of General Garfield's history and character." The address which President Hinsdale delivered on the occasion is as follows : " Young Ladies and Gentlemen : I am not going to attempt a formal address on the life and character of General Garfield. There is now no call for such an at tempt, and I have made no adequate preparations for such a task. My object is far humbler : simply to hold up to your minds some points in his history, and some features in his character that young men and women may study with interest and profit. " I shall begin by destroying history, or what is commonly held to be history. The popularly accepted account of General Garfield's history and character is largely fabulous. We are not to suppose that the ages of myth and legend are gone ; under proper conditions such growths spring up now, and I know of no man in public life around whom they have sprung up more rankly than around the subject of my remarks. " No doubt you have seen some of the stories con cerning him and his family that appear ever and anon in pie newspapers ; that his mother chopped cordwood : that LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 267 she fought wolves with fire to keep them from devour ing her children, her distinguished son being one of the group ; that the circumstances of the family were most pinching ; that Garfield himself could not read at the age of twenty-one; that he was peculiarly reckless in his early life ; that, when he had become a man, he went down from the pulpit to thrash a bully who interrupter him in his sermon on the patience of Job. " These stories, and others like them, are all false and all harmful. They fail of accomplishing the very purpose for which they were professedly told — the stimulation of youth. To make the lives of the great distorted and monstrous is not to make them fruitful as lessons. " If a life be anomalous and outlandish, it is, for that reason, the poorer example. It is all in the wrong direc tion. It makes the impression that, in human history, there is no cause and no effect ; no antecedent and no consequent ; that everything is capricious and fitful ; and suggests that the best thing to do is to abandon one's self to the currents of life, trusting that some beneficent gulf- stream will seize you and bear you to some happy shore. No, young people, do not heed such instruction as this. " The best lives for them to study are those that are natural and symmetrical ; those in which the relation be tween cause and effect is so close and apparent that the dullest can see it;- and that preach in the plainest terms the sermon on the text : ' Whatever a man soweth that shall he also reap.' " Irregular and abnormal lives will do for ' studies, but healthy, normal, harmonious lives should be chosen for example. And General Garfield's life from the first 268 JAMES A. GARFIELD. has been eminently healthy, normal, and well-propor tioned. " He was born in the woods of Orange, Cuyah »ga County, in 1831. His father died when the son was a year and a half old. Abram Garfield's circumstances were those of his neighbors. Measured by our standard they were all poor ; they lived on small farms, for which they had gone in debt, hoping to clear and pay for them by their toil. Garfield dying, left his wife and four young children in the condition that any one of his neigh bors would have done in like circumstances — poor. The family life before had been close and hard enough; now it became closer and harder. " Grandma Garfield, as some of us familiarly call her, was a woman of unusual energy, faith, and courage. She said the children should not be separated, but kept them together ; and that the home should be maintained, as when its head was living. The battle was a hard one, and she won it. All honor to her, but let us not make her ridiculous by inventing impossible stories. " To external appearance, young Garfield's life did not differ materially from the lives of the neighbors' boys. " He chopped wood, and so did they ; he mowed, and so did they ; he carried butter to the store in a little pail, and so did they. Other families that had not lost their heads naturally shot ahead of the Garfields in property, but such differences counted far less then than they do now. The traits of his maturer character appeared early ; studiousness, truthfulness, generosity of nature, and men tal power. So far was he from being reckless, that he was almost serious, reverent, and thoughtful. So far was LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 26S he from being unable to read at twenty-one, that he was a teacher in the district schools before he was eighteen. " He was the farthest removed from being a pugilist, though he had great physical strength and courage, cool ness of mind, was left-handed withal, and was both able and disposed to defend himself and all his rights, and did so on due occasion. " His three months' service on the canal has been the source of numerous fables and morals. The morals are as false as the fables, and more misleading. All I have to say about it is : James A. Garfield has not risen to the position of a United States Senator because he ' ran on a canal.' Nor is it because he chopped more wood than the neighbors' boys. Many a man has run longer on the canal, and chopped more wood, and never became a senator. " General Garfield once rang the school bell when a student here. That did not make him the man he is. Convince me that it did, and I will hang up a bell in every tree in the campus, and set you all to ringing. Thomas Corwin, when a boy, drove a wagon, and became the head of the Treasury ; Thomas Ewing boiled salt, and became a senator ; Henry Clay rode a horse to mill from the ' Slashes,' and he became the great commoner of the West. But it was not the wagon, the salt, and horse that made these men great. " These are interesting facts in the lives of these illustrious men ; they show, that in our country it has been, and still is possible for young men of ability, en ergy, and determined purpose to rise above a lowly con dition, and win places of usefulness and honor. Poverty 270 JAMES A. GARFIELD. may be a good school ; straitened circumstances may develop power and character; but the principal con ditions of success are in the man, and not in his sur roundings. " Garfield is the man he is because nature gave him a noble endowment of faculties that he has nobly handled. We must look within, and not without, for the secret of destiny. The thing to look at in a man's life are his aspirations, his energy, his courage, his strength of will, and not the wood he may have chopped, or the salt he may have boiled. How a man works, and not what he does, is the test of worth. " His success did not lie in his technical scholarship, or his ability as a drill-master. Teachers are plenty who much surpass him in these particulars. He had great ability to grasp a subject, to organize a body of intel lectual materials, to amass facts and work out striking generalizations, and therefore he excelled in rhetorical exposition. An old pupil who has often heard him on the stump, once told me, ' The General succeeds best when talking to the people just as he did to his class.' He imparted to his pupils largeness of view, enthusiasm, and called out of them unbounded devotion to himself. " This devotion was not owing to any plan or trick, but to the qualities of the man. Mr. H. M. Jones, of the Cleveland schools, an old Hiram scholar, speaking of the old Hiram days before Garfield went to college, once wrote me : ' There began to grow up in me an admira tion and love for Garfield that has never abated, and the like of which I have never known. A bow of recognition, or a simple word from him, was to me an inspiration.' LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 271 "Probably all were not equally susceptible, but all the boys who were long under his charge (save perhaps, a few ' sticks'), would speak in the same strain. He had great power to energize young men. General Garfield has carried the same qualities into public life. He has commanded success. His ability, knowledge, mastery of questions, generosity of nature, devotion to the public good, and honesty of purpose, have done the work. He has never had a political ' machine.' He has never for gotten the day of small things. He has never made per sonal enemies. " It is difficult to see how a political triumph could be more complete or more gratifying than his election to the Senate. No ' bar-gains,' no ' slate,' no ' grocery' at Colunfbus. He did not even go to the capital city. Such things are inspiring to those who think politics in a broad way. He is a man of positive convictions, freely uttered. Politically he may be called a 'man-of-war;' and yet few men, or none, begrudge him his triumph. Democrats vied with Republicans the other day in Wash ington in snowing him under with congratulations ; some of them were as anxious for his election as any Repub lican could be. " It is said that he will go to the Senate without an enemy on either side of the chamber. These things are honorable to all parties. They show that manhood is more than party. The Senator is honored, Ohio is hon ored, and so is the school in 'Hiram, with which he was connected so many years. The whole story abounds in interest, and I hope I have so told it as to bring out some if its best points, and to give you stimulus and cheer." 272 JAMES A. GARFIELD. General Garfield took an active part in the regular session of the forty -sixth Congress, which met in Decem ber, 1879, and on the 17th of March, 1880, -delivered one of his most powerful speeches. The Civil Appropriation Bill was under discussion, and the Democratic majority was endeavoring to force the Government into removing the United States marshals from the polls at elections, by refusing the appropriation for the pay of those officers. General Garfield said : " The discussion of this bill has concentrated upon two topics — the public printing and the election laws. On the subject of the public printing I shall take no time, except to say this : After one of the saddest histories in the experience of this Government with the old contract system, which broke down by the weight of its own cor ruption, it was developed and proved beyond any contro versy that in the four years preceding the administration of Abraham Lincoln, out of the private profits on the public printing and binding, the sum of $100,000 was contributed by the public printer for political purposes, mainly to carry the Democratic elections in Pennsyl vania; and that vast contribution did not exhaust the profits of the public printer out of the Government. This exposure destroyed the wretched contract system, and thereafter the Government itself assumed the responsi bility of the work. At first the Senate or the House of Representatives elected a Printer, as they had a manifest right to do under the clause of the Constitution which gives each House the power to elect its own officers. But when, by and by, the office grew into a great national establishment, in which all the printing and binding for LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 2/0 all departments of the Government was done, it became manifest that the Senate was exercising a power of ap pointment unwarranted by the Constitution ; and in the year 1874, on motion of Mr. Hale, of New York, a reso lution was adopted by a two-thirds vote suspending the rules of the House and making in order on a sundry civil service appropriation bill an amendment to change the law and make the Printer an officer of the United States, to be appointed by the President and confirmed by the Senate. I had charge of that bill and voted for the amendment, as did nearly all my associates, and it was adopted by the almost unanimous vote of this House, both parties uniting in declaring that the old law was un constitutional, and that experience had proved it unwise ; Republicans taking their share of responsibility for their own blunders and mistakes ; all agreeing that the law ought to conform to the Constitution. "When the Democratic party came into power in 1876, they amended that law by making it take effect immediately. We made it take effect when a vacancy should occur in the office of Public Printer. In 1876 the law was so changed as to make it take effect immediately. And that passed by the general consent of both parties. The proposition now is, to go back, and in the face of our past experience, make a change in this law which will .not affect in any way the question of economy, which will not change one iota of the machinery of the management of the public printing, and does not pretend to be in the direction of economy ; but merely abolishes a constitu tional office and creates an unconstitutional one, takes the appointing power out of the hands of the President and 18 274 JAMES A. GARFIELD. unlawfully places it in the hands of this House, merely to get some Democrat into office. This is to be done for no public good, to satisfy the demands of party hunger. I have no doubt that this amendment will be, as it cer tainly ought to be, ruled out of order, and I will waste no "urther words in discussing it. " CONTEMNING THE SUPREME COURT DECISION. " I will now call attention, during the short time left me, to what I consider a matter of far greater moment. My colleague [Mr. McMahon], in his speech opening the discussion upon this bill, made the announcement in substance, and it remains uncontradicted and not pro tested against by anyone on this side of the House, first, that ' we have not hitherto made, do not in this bill, and will not in any future bill, make any appropriation what ever for supervisors or special deputy marshals, so far as they have to do with congressional elections.' He asserts that it was not proper for any officer of the Government to appoint special deputy marshals when no appropriation had been made for that specific pur pose. " Then, further on, he declares — I quote from his printed speech : " ' And I desire to say that because the Supreme Court of the United States has decided that the election law is •constitutional by a sort of eight-by-seven decision — and I mean by that a division apparently according to party lines (without impugning the good faith of any member of the Supreme Court, but to show how differently a legal LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 275 question may appear to persons who have been educated in different political schools) — that although that court has decided the constitutionality of the law, that when we come, as legislators, to appropriate money, it is our duty to say, is this law constitutional? or, if constitu tional, is it a good law, and are we bound to appropriate money for it ? ' " He undertakes, as will be seen, to throw contempt on that decision by styling it ' a sort of eight-by-seven decision.' I remind him that it is a seven-to-two de cision, having been adopted by a larger number of the members of the court than the majority of the decisions of that tribunal. It is a decision of a broad, sweeping character, and declares that Congress may take the whole control of congressional elections, or a partial control, as they choose; that the election law as it stands on the national statute-book is the supreme law of the land on that subject. " More than that : the Supreme Court, not only in this case but in another recent case, has made a declara tion which ought to be engraven upon the minds and hearts of all the people of this country. And this is its substance : " ' That a law of Congress interpenetrates and be comes a part of every law of every State of this Union to which its subject matter is applicable, and is binding upon all people on every foot of our soil. This is the voice of the Constitution.' " Now, therefore, under this decision the election laws of the United States are the laws of every State of this Union. No judge of election, no State officer or other 27 U JAMES A. GARFIELD. persons connected with any congressional election, no elector who offers his ballot at any such election, can with impunity lift his hand or do any act against any of the provisions of these laws. They rest down upon congres sional elections upon every State like the ' casing air,' broad and general, protecting with their dignity every act, and penetrating with their authority every function of congressional elections. They are the supreme law of the land on that subject. " But now a Representative, speaking for the Demo cratic party in this House, rises, not with the plea which he could have made with some show of plausibility last year, that the law is unconstitutional, and that therefore they would not enforce it — but with a constitutional law, declared so by the Supreme Court, covering him and fill ing the Republic from end to end, reaching everywhere and covering every foot of our soil where a congressional election can be held — he rises in his place and declares that the Democratic party will not execute that law nor permit it to be obeyed. " We who are the sworn law-makers of the nation, and ought to be examples of respect for and obedience to the law — we who before we took our first step in legis lation swore before God and our country that we would support the supreme law of the land — we are now in vited to become conspicuous leaders in the violation of the law. My colleague announces his purpose to break the law, and invites Congress to follow him in his assault upon it. " Mr. Chairman, by far the most formidable danger that threatens the Republic to-day is the spirit of law- LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 277 breaking which shows itself in many turbulent and alarming manifestations. The people of the Pacific Coast, after two years of wrestling with the spirit of com munism in the city of San Francisco, have finally grap pled with this lawless spirit, and the leader of it was yesterday sentenced to penal servitude as a violator of the law. But what can we say to Dennis Kearney and his associates if to-day we announce ourselves the fore most law-breakers of the country and set an example to all the turbulent and vicious elements of disorder to follow us ? THE ELECTION LAWS MANDATORY. "My colleague [Mr. McMahon] tries to shield his violation of the law behind a section of the statutes which provides that no disbursing or other officer shall make any contract involving the expenditure of money beyond what is appropriated for the purpose. I answer that I hold in my hand a later law, a later statute, which governs the restrictive law of which he speaks, which governs him and governs the courts. It is the election law itself. I invite attention briefly to its substance. Sections 2011 and 2012 of the Revised Statutes provide that upon the application of any two citizens of any city of more than twenty thousand inhabitants to have the election guarded and scrutinized, the judge of the circuit court of the United States shall hold his court open during the ten days preceding the election. The law commands the judge of the court to so do. " In the open court from day to day, and from time to time, the judge shall appoint, and, under the seal of 278 JAMES A. GARFIELD. the court, shall commission two citizens of different politi cal parties who are voters within the precinct where they reside, to be supervisors of the election. That law k mandatory upon the judge. Should he refuse to obey he can be impeached of high crimes and misdemeanors in office. He must not stop to inquire whether an appro priation has been made to pay these supervisors. The rights of citizens are involved ; upon their application the judge must act. But what then ? " Again, section 2021 provides that on the applica tion of two citizens the marshal of the United States shall appoint special deputy marshals to protect the su pervisors in the execution of their duty. And the law is mandatory upon the marshal. He must obey it under the pains and penalties of the law. What then ? When the supervisors and special deputy marshals have been appointed they find their duties plainly prescribed in the law. And then section 5521 provides that if they neg lect or refuse to perform fully all these duties enjoined upon them, they are liable to fine and imprisonment. They cannot excuse their neglect by saying, 'We will not act because Congress has not appropriated the money to pay us.' "All these officers are confronted by the imperial com mand of the law — first to the judge and marshal to ap point, then to the supervisor and deputy marshal to act, and to act under the pains and penalties of fine and im prisonment. Impeachment enforces the obedience of the judge ; fine and imprisonment the obedience of the super visors and deputy marshals. " Now comes one other mandatory order : in the last LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 279 section of this long chapter of legislation the majestic command of the law is addressed both to Congress and the Treasury. It declares that there ' shall be paid ' out of the treasury five dollars per day to these officers as compensation for their services. Here, too, the law is equally imperious and mandatory ; it addresses itself to the conscience of every member of this House, with only this difference : we cannot be impeached for disobedi ence ; we cannot be fined or locked up in the penitentiary for voting ' no,' and refusing the appropriation ; we can not be fined or imprisoned if we refuse to do our duty. And so, shielded by the immunity of his privilege as a representative, my colleague sets the example to all offi cers and all people of deliberately" and with clear-sighted purpose violating the law of the land. " Thus he seeks to nullify the law. Thus he hopes to thwart the nation's 'collected will.' Does my col league reflect that in doing this he runs the risk of viti ating every national election ? Suppose his lead be fol lowed, and the demand of citizens for supervisors and marshals is made and refused because an appropriation has not been voted. Does he not see the possibility of vitiating every election held where fraud and violence are not suppressed and the law has not been complied with ? Yet he would risk the validity of all the con gressional elections of the United States; rather than abandon his party's purpose he would make Congress the chief of the law breakers of the land. " Mr. Chairman, when I took my seat as a member of this House, I took it with all the responsibilities which the place brought upon me; and among others was my 280 JAMES A. GARFIELD. duty to keep the obligations of the law. Where the law speaks in mandatory terms to everybody else and then to me, I should deem it cowardly and "dishonorable if I should skulk behind my legislative privilege for the pur pose of disobeying and breaking the supreme law of the land. [Applause.] THE PRESENT ISSUE. "The issue now made is somewhat different from that of the last session, but, in my judgment, it is not less significant and dangerous. I would gladly waive any party advantage which this controversy might give for the sake of that calm and settled peace which would reign in this hall if we all obeyed the law. But if the leaders on the other side are still determined to rush upon their fate by forcing upon the country this last issue — that because the Democratic party happen not to like a law they will not obey it — because they hap pen not to approve of the spirit and character of a law they will not let it be executed — I say to gentlemen on the other side, if you are determined to make such an issue, it is high time that the American people should know it. " Here is the volume of our laws. More sacred than tho twelve tables of Rome, this rock of the law rises in monumental grandeur alike above the people and the President, above the courts, above Congress, command ing everywhere reverence and obedience to its supreme authority. Yet the dominant party in this House virtu ally declares that ' any part of this volume that we do LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 281 not like and cannot repeal we will disobey. We have :ried to repeal these election laws ; we have failed be cause we had not the constitutional power to destroy them. The Constitution says they shall stand in their authority and power ; but we, the Democratic party in defiance of the Constitution, declare that if we can not destroy them outright by the repeal, they shall be left to crumble into ruin by wanton and lawless neg lect.' " Mr. Chairman. — I ask gentlemen on the other side whether they wish to maintain this attitude in regard to the legislation of this country? Are they willing to start on a hunt through the statutes and determine for them selves what they will obey and what they will disobey ? That is the meaning of my colleague's speech. If it means anything it means that. He is not an old Bran denburg elector, but an elector in this novel and mod ern sense, that he will elect what laws he will obey and what he will disobey, and in so far as his power can go, he will infect with his spirit of disobedience all the good people of this country who trust him. THE DANGER OF EXAMPLE OF DISOBEDIENCE. " I ask, gentlemen, whether this is a time when it is safe to disregard and weaken the authority of law. In all quarters the civil society of this country is becoming honey-combed through and through by disintegrating forces — in some States by the violation of contracts and the repudiation of debts ; in others by open resistance and defiance ; in still others by the reckless overturning of con- 282 JAMES A. GARFIELD. stitutions and letting ' the red fool-fury of the Seine' run riot among our people and build its blazing altars to the strange gods of ruin and misrule. All these things are shaking the good order of society and threatening the foundations of our government and our peace. In a time like this, more than ever before, this country needs a body of law-givers clothed and in their right minds, who have laid their hands upon the altar of the law as its defenders, not its destroyers. And yet now, in the name of party, for some supposed party advantage, my colleague from Ohio announces, and no one on his side has said him may, that they not only have not in the past obeyed, but in the future they will not obey this law of the land which the Supreme Court has just crowned with the authority of its sanction. If my colleague chooses to meet that issue, if he chooses to go to the country with that plea, I shall regret it deeply for my country's sake ; but if I looked only to my party's interest, it would give me joy to en gage in such a struggle. " The contest of last autumn made the people under stand the tendencies of gentlemen on the other side. Now, this cool, calm, deliberate assassination of the law will not be tolerated. We have had a winter to freeze out our passion, we have had a summer to thaw out our indifference, we have had the changing circles of the year to bring us around to order and calmness, and yet all the fiery courses of the stars seem to have shed their influ ence on my colleague to fire him with a more desperate madness and drive his party on to a still sadder fate. [Applause on the Republican side.] " I trust and believe that we may yet find some re- LEADS THE REPUBLICAN OPPOSITION. 283 sponse from the other side of the House that will pre vent this course of procedure. If we do, I will gladly give away any party advantage for the sake of strength ening the foundations of law and good order. And I therefore appeal to gentlemen on the other side to pre vent a disaster which their party leaders are preparing, not for themselves alone, but for our common country. I hope before this day is over we may see such a vote in this chamber upon this bill as will put an end to this miserable business, and cast out of these halls the dregs of that unfortunate and crazy extra session." [Applause on the Republican side.] CHAPTER VIII GENERAL GARFIELD'S FINANCIAL RECORD. General Garfield's Appointment to the Committee on Banking and Currency — His Efforts in Congress in behalf of Honest Money — A Formal State ment of his Views on the Money Question— The Currency Doctrine of 1862 — Definition of Money — Money as an Instrument of Exchange — Coin as an Instrument of Universal Credit — Statutes cannot Repeal the Laws of Value — Paper Money as an Instrument of Credit — Necessity of Resumption — A Powerful Argument — General Garfield's Speech on the Weaver Resolutions. In 1868, General Garfield was appointed Chairman of the Committee on Banking and Currency, and during the same Congress did most of the hard work on the Ninth Census. His financial views, always sound, and based on the firm foundation of honest money and unsullied national honor, had now become strengthened by his studies and investigations, and he was recognized as the best authority in the House on the great subjects of the debt and the currency. His record in the legislation concerning these subjects is without a flaw. No man in Congress made a more consistent and unwavering fight against the paper money delusions that flourished dur ing the decade following the war, and in favor of specie payments and the strict fulfilment of the nation's obliga tions to its creditors. His speeches became the financial gospel of the Republican party. No man gave more ar- FINANCIAL RECORD. 285 dent and useful support to the policy of resuming specie payments, and no man in Congress contributed more in bringing it about. One of the most carefully prepared expressions of his views on the financial question was contributed by him to The Atlantic Monthly, in February, 1876. It is a paper of the highest importance, and we give it in full. He styles it " The Currency Conflict," and says : " In the autumn of 1862, I spent several weeks with Secretary Chase, and was permitted to share his studies of the financial questions which were then en grossing his attention. He was preparing to submit to Congress his matured plans for a system of banking and currency to meet the necessities of the war, and this sub ject formed the chief theme of his conversation. He was specially anxious to work out in his own mind the prob able relations of greenbacks to gold, to the five-twenty bonds, to the proposed national bank notes, and to the business of the country. " One evening the conversation turned on some ques tion relating to the laws of motion, and Mr. Chase asked for a definition of motion. Some one answered ' Matter is inert, spirit alone can move ; therefore motion is the Spirit of God made manifest in matter.' The Secretary said, ' If that is a good definition, then legal tender notes must be the devil made manifest in paper ; for no man can foresee what mischief they, may do when they are once let loose.' He gravely doubted whether that war-born spirit, summoned to serve us in a dreadful emergency, would be mustered out of service with honor when the conflict should end, or, at the return of peace, would cap- 286 JAMES A. GARFIELD : ture public opinion and enslave the nation it had served. To what extent his fears were well founded may be ascer tained by comparing the present state of the public mind in regard to the principles of monetary science with that which prevailed when our existing financial machinery was set up. " More than a million votes will be cast at the next Presidential election by men who were school-boys in their primers when the great financial measures of 1862 were adopted ; and they do not realize how fast or how far the public mind has drifted. The log-book of this extraordinary voyage cannot be read too often. Let it be constantly borne in mind that fourteen years ago the American people considered themselves well instructed in the leading doctrines of monetary science. They had enjoyed, or rather suffered, an extraordinary experience. There was hardly an experiment in banking and currency that they or their fathers had not fully tested. THE CURRENCY DOCTRINES OF 1862. " The statesmen of that period, the leaders of public thought, and the people of all political parties wore sub stantially unanimous in the opinion that the only safe in strument of exchange known among men was standard coin, or paper convertible into coin at the will of the holder. " I will not affirm that this opinion was absolutely unanimous ; for doubtless there was here and there a dreamer who looked upon paper money as a sort of fetich, and was ready to crown it as a god. There are always a HIS FINANCIAL RECORD. 287 few who believe in the quadrature of the circle and the perpetual motion. I recently met a cultivated American who is a firm believer in Buddha, and rejoices in the hope of attaining Nirvana beyond the grave. The gods~ of Greece were discrowned and disowned by the civilized world a thousand years ago ; yet within the last genera tion an eminent English scholar attested his love for clas sical learning and his devotion to the Greek mythology by actually sacrificing a bull to Jupiter, in the back par lor of his house, in London. So, in 1862, there may have been followers of William Lowndes and of John Law among our people, and here and there a philosopher who dreamed of an ideal standard of value stripped of all the grossness of so coarse and vulgar a substance as gold. But they dwelt apart in silence, and their opinions made scarce a ripple on the current of public thought. " No one can read the history of that year without observing the great reluctance, the apprehension, the pos itive dread with which the statesmen and people of thai day ventured upon the experiment of' making treasury notes a legal tender for private debts. They did it under the pressure of an overmastering necessity, to meet the immediate demands of the war, and with a most deter mined purpose to return to the old standard at the ear liest possible moment. Indeed, the very act that made the greenbacks a legal tender provided the effective means for retiring them. " Distressing as was the crisis, urgent as was the need, a large number of the best and most patriotic men in Congress voted against the act. The ground of their opposition was well expressed by Owen Lovcjoy, of Illi- 28S JAMES A. GARFIELD : noisy who, after acknowledging the unparalleled difficul ties and dangers of the situation, said, ' There is no precipice, there is no chasm, there is no possible bottom less, yawning gulf before the nation so appalling, so ruinous, as this same bill that is before us.' " Of those who supported the measure, not one de fended it as a permanent policy. All declared that they did not abate a jot of their faith in the soundness of the old doctrines. " Thaddeus Stevens said, ' This bill is a measure of necessity, not of choice. No one would willingly issue paper currency not redeemable on demand, and make it a legal tender. It is never desirable to depart from the circulating medium which, by the common consent of civilized nations, forms the standard of value.' " In the Senate the legal-tender clause was adopted by only five majority. The senators who supported it were keenly alive to its dangerous character. Mr. Fes- senden, chairman of the committee of finance, said of the bill, ' It proposes something utterly unknown in this government from its foundation : a resort to a measure of doubtful constitutionality, to say the least of it, which has always been denounced as ruinous to the credit of any government which has recourse to it ; ... a meas ure which, when it has been tried by other countries, as it often has been, has always proved a disastrous failure.' " With extreme reluctance he supported the bill, but said the committee was bound ' that an assurance should be given to the country that it was to be resorted to only as a policy ; that it was what it professed to be, but a temporary measure. I have not heard any man ex- HIS FINANCIAL RECORD. 289 press a contrary opinion, or, at least, any man who has spoken on the subject in Congress. . . . All the gen tlemen who have written on the subject, except some wild speculators on currency, have declared that as a policy it would be ruinous to any people ; and it has been defended, as I have stated, simply and solely upon the ground that it is to be a single measure standiny alone, ana not to be repeated. ... It is put upon the ground of absolute, overwhelming necessity. " Mr. Sumner, who supported the bill, said : ' Surely we must all be against paper money, we must insist upon maintaining the integrity of the Government, and we must all set our faces against any proposition like the present except as a temporary expedient, rendered im perative by the exigency of the hour. ... A remedy which at another moment you would reject is now pro posed. Whatever may be the national resources, they are not now in reach except by summary process. Re luctantly, painfully, I consent that the process should issue. And yet I cannot give such a vote without warning the Government against the dangers from such an experiment. The medicine of the constitution must not become its daily bread.' " Such was the unanimous sentiment which animated Congress in making its solemn pledge to return to the old path as soon as the immediate danger should pass. " The close of the war revealed some change of opinion, but the purpose of 1862 was still maintained. December 14, 1865, the House of Representatives re solved — " That the House cordially concurs in the views of 290 JAMES A. GARFIELD : the Secretary of the Treasury in relation to the neces sity of a contraction of the currency with a view to as early a resumption of specie payments as the business interest of the country will permit; and we hereby pledge co-operative action to this end as speedily as practicable. " This resolution was adopted on a call of the ayes and noes, by the decisive vote of one hundred and forty-four to six. " The last ten years have witnessed such a change of sentiment as seldom occurs in one generation. Dur ing that time, we have had a Babel of conflicting theo ries. Every exploded financial dogma of the last two hundred years has been revived and advocated. Con gresses and political parties have been agitated and con vulsed by the discussion of old and new schemes to escape from the control of the universal laws of value, and to reach prosperity and wealth without treading the time-worn path of honest industry and solid values. All this recalls Mr. Chase's definition of irredeemable paper money. " The great conflict of opinion resulting from this ehange of sentiment finds expression in the cries of ' hard money ' and ' soft money ' which have been so constantly echoed from State to State during the last six months. Following these, as rallying-cries, the people are assembled in hostile political camps, from which they will soon march out to fight the Presidential battle of 1876. " The recently invented term ' soft money ' does not convey a very precise notion of the doctrine it is in- HIS FINANCIAL RECORD. 291 tended to describe. In fact, it is applied to the doc trines of several distinct groups of theorists, who differ widely among themselves, but who all agree in opposing a return to specie as the basis of our monetary system. "The scope of these opinions will be seen in the, declarations which recent public discussions have brought forth. (1.) Most of the advocates of soft money deny that political economy is a universal science. They insist that each nation should have a political economy of its own. In pursuance of this opinion, they affirm that our country should have a standard of value peculiar to itself, and a circulating medium which other nations will not use ; in short, a non-exportable currency. " ' Beyond the sea, in foreign lands, it [our greenback currency] fortunately is not money ; but, sir, when have we had such an unbroken career of prosperity in busi ness as since we adopted this non-exportable currency ? ' —(Hon. W. D. Kelley.) " ' Money should be a thing of or belonging to a country, not of the world. An exportable commodity is not fitted to be ¦ money.' — (Quoted as a motto by Henry Carey Baird.) " ' I desire the dollar to be made of such material that it shall never be exported or desirable to carry it out of the country.' — (Hon. B. F. Butler, Cooper In stitute, October 15, 1875.) " ' The venerable Henry C. Carey, under date of August 15, 1875, addressed a long letter to the chair man of the Detroit Greenback Convention, in which he argues that this country ought to maintain permanently 292 JAMES A. 0.ARFIELD : a non-exportable circulation.' He says, ' This important idea was first promulgated by Mr. Rauget, thirty-six years ago.' "I will quote one othe» financial authority, which shows that the honor of this discovery does not belong to Rauget, nor to the present century. In his work en titled ' Money and Trade Considered : with a Proposal for Supplying the Nation with Money,' published at Edin burgh, 1705, John Law says : " ' If a money be established that has no intrinsic value, and its extrinsic value be such as it will not be exported, nor will not be less than the demand for it within the country, wealth and power will be attained, and will be less precarious. . . . The paper money herein proposed being always equal in quantity to the demand, the people will be employed, the country improved, manufacture advanced, trade — domestic and foreign — ¦ carried on, and wealth and power attained ; and [it] not being liable to be exported, the people will not be set idle, etc., and wealth and power will be less precarious.' " The subsequent experiments of Law are fitting commentaries. " (2.) They propose to abandon altogether the use of gold and silver as standards of value or instruments of exchange, and hold that the stamp of the government, not the value of the material on which it is impressed, constitutes money; " ' I want the dollar stamped on some convenient and cheap material, of the least possible intrinsic value, . . . and I desire that the dollar so issued shall never be redeemed.' — (Hon. B. F. Butler, Cooper Institute.) HIS. FINANCIAL RECORD. 293 " ' A piece of pig-metal is just as much money as a piece of gold, until the public authority has stamped it and said that it shall be taken for so much. . . . Sup pose, then, that instead of taking a bar of silver or a bar of pig-metal, the government of the United States takes a piece of paper, called a greenback, and says that this shall pass for a legal tender in the receipt and expendi ture of government dues, and in all the transactipns of the people. Suppose this government to be a govern ment of good standing, of sound credit, and responsible for its paper. This dollar thus stamped, instead of ' a piece of metal being stamped, is to all intents and pur poses equivalent to a silver dollar when it has been made such by the government of the United States.' — (Cam paign speech of Governor Allen, Gallipolis, Ohio, July 21, 1875.) " ' The use of gold or other merchandise as money is a barbarism unworthy of the age.' — (Wallace P. Groom, New York.) " ' The pretense of redemption in gold and silver is of necessity a delusion and an absurdity.' — (Britton A. Hill, Missouri.) " ' The government oan make money of any material and of any shape and value it pleases.' — (Hon. 0. S. Halstead, New Jersey.) " (3.) They are not agreed among themselves as to what this new soft money shall be. They do agree, however, that the national banking system shall be abol ished, and that whatever currency may be adopted shall be issued directly from the treasury, as the only money of the nation. Three forms are proposed : — 294 JAMES A. GARFIELD : " First. The legal tenders we now have, their vol ume to be increased and their redemption indefinitely postponed. The advocates of this form are the infla tionists proper, who care more for the volume than the character of the currency. " Second. ' Absolute money ;' that is, printed pieces of paper, called dollars, to be the only standard of value, the only legal tender for all debts, public and private, the only circulating medium. The advocates of this kind of ' money,' though few in number, claim the highest place as philosophers. " The ablest defence of this doctrine will be found in a brochure of one hundred and eighteen pages, by Britton A. Hill, published in St. Louis during the present year and entitled ' Absolute Money.' The author says (page 53): " ' If such national legal-tender money is not of itself sovereign and absolute, but must be convertible into some other substance or thing, before it can command universal circulation, what matters it whether that other substance or thing be interest-bearing bonds or gold or silver coin ? . . . The coin despotism cannot be broken by substi tuting in its place the despotism of interest-bearing bonds.' " Third. A legal-tender note not redeemable, but exchangeable, at the will of the holder, for a bond of the United States bearing 3.65 per cent, interest, which bond shall in turn be exchangeable, at the will of the holder, for legal-tender notes. In order that this cur rency shall be wholly emancipated from the tyranny and barbarism of gold and silver, most of its advocates insist HIS FINANCIAL RECORD. 295 that the interest on the bonds shall be paid in the pro posed paper money. This financial perpetual motion is regarded as the great discovery of our era, and there are numerous claimants for the honor of being the first to discover it. " Mr. Wallace P. Groom, of New York, has charac terized this currency in a paragraph which has been so frequently quoted, that it may be fairly called their creed. It is in these words : " ' In the interchangeability (at the option of the holder) of national paper money with government bonds bearing a fixed rate of interest, there is a subtle princi ple that will regulate the movements of finance and com merce as accurately as the motion of the steam-engine is regulated by its governor. Such Paper Money Tokens would be much nearer perfect measures of value than gold or silver ever have been or ever can be. The use of gold or other merchandise as money is a barbarism unworthy of the age.' " (4.) The paper money men are unanimous in the opinion that the financial crisis of 1873 was caused by an insufficient supply of currency, and that a large in crease will stimulate industry, restore prosperity, and largely augment the wealth of this country. " Hon. Alexander Campbell, of Illinois, a leading writer of the soft money school, thinks there should now be in circulation not less than $1,290,000,000 of legal- tender notes. (North- Western Review, November, 1873, page 152.) " John G. Drew, another prominent writer, insists that 'as England is an old and settled country, and we 296 JAMES A.GARFIELD: are just building ours,' we ought to have at least per capita, or an aggregate of $2,500,000,000. — (' Our Currency : What it is and what it should be.') " No doubt the very large vote in Ohio and Pennsyl vania in favor of soft money resulted, in great measure, from the depressed state of industry and trade, and a vague hope that the adoption of these doctrines would bring relief. The discussion in both States was able ; and toward the close of the campaign, it was manifest that sound principles were every day gaining ground. Important as was the victory in those States, it is a great mistake to suppose that the struggle is ended. The ad vocates of soft money are determined and aggressive, and they confidently believe they will be able to triumph in 1876. " It ought to be observed, as an interesting fact of current history, that the soft money men are making and collecting a literature which cannot fail to delight the antiquarian and the reader of curiosities of literature. They are ransacking old libraries to find any " Quaint and curious Volume of forgotten lore " which may give support to their opinions. In a recent pamphlet, Henry Carey Baird refers to Andrew Yarran- ton ' as the father of English political economy.' The forgotton treatise which is now enrolled among the pa tristic books of the new school was published in London m 1677, and is entitled, ' England's Improvement by Sea and Land. To outdo the Dutch without Fighting, to pay Debts without Moneys, and to set at work all the Poor of England with the Growth of our own Lands ' HIS FINANCIAL RECORD. 297 " The author proposes a public bank, based on the registered value of houses and lands, ' the credit whereof making paper go in trade equal with ready money, yea better, in many parts of the world than money.' He was perhaps the first Englishman who suggested a currency based on land. On pages 30-33 of his book may be found his draft of a proposed law, which provides ' that all bonds or bills issued on such registered houses may be transfer able, and shall pass and be good from man to man in the nature of bills of exchange.' " The writings of John Law are also finding vigorous defenders. Britton A. Hill, in the pamphlet already quoted, devotes a chapter to his memory, compares him favorably with Leibnitz and Newton, and says, 'John Law is justly regarded as one of the most profound think ers of his age, in that he originated the first fundamental principle of this proposed absolute money.' The admirers of 'father' Yarranton should see to it that the outdoer of the Dutch is not robbed of his honors by the greajt Scotsman. "English history is being hunted through to find some comfort for the new doctrines in the writings of that small minority Avho resisted the Bullion Report of 1810 and the resumption of cash payments in 1819, and continued to denounce them afterwards. History must be rewritten. We must learn that Mathias Attwood (who?), not Lord Liverpool, Huskisson, or Peel, was the fountain of financial wisdom. Doubleday, whom no English writer has thought it worth while to answer, is much quoted by the new school, and they have lately come to feel the profoundest respect for Sir Archibald 298 JAMES A. GARFIELD: Alison, because of his extravagant assault upon the Re sumption Act of 1819. Alison holds a place in English literature chiefly because he wrote a work which fills a gap in English history not otherwise filled. "In 1845 he wrote a pamphlet entitled ' England in 1815 and 1845 ; or, a Sufficient and Contracted Cur- rency,' which the subsequent financial and commercial events in his country have so fully refuted that it has slept for a generation in the limbo of things forgotten. It is now unearthed, and finds an honored place in the new literature. "As a specimen of Alison's financial wisdom, we quote the following (pages 2,3): ' The eighteen years of war between 1797 and 1815 wTere, as all the world knows, the most glorious and, taken as a whole, the most pros perous that Great Britain has ever known. . . . Never has a prosperity so universal and unheard-of pervaded every department of the empire.' He then enumerates the evidences of this prosperity, and prominent among them is this : ' While the revenue raised by taxation was but £21,000,000 in 1796, it had reached £72,000,000 in 1815 ; and the total expenditures from taxes and loans had reached £117,000,000 in 1815.' Happy people, whose burdens of taxation were quadrupled in eighteen years, and whose expenses, consumed in war, exceeded their revenues by the sum of $225,000,000 in gold ! " The inflationists have not been so fortunate in aug menting their literary store from the writings and speeches of our early American statesmen. Still, they have made vigorous efforts to draft into their service any -isolated paragraph that can be made useful for their pur HIS FINANCIAL RECORD. 299 pose. So far as I have seen, they have found no comfort in this search except in very short extracts from three ot the great leaders of public thought. The first is from a juvenile essay in defence of paper money, written by Benjamin Franklin in 1729, when he was twenty-twc years of age. This has been frequently quoted during the last four years. They are not so fond of quoting Franklin, the statesman and philosopher, who after a life long experience wrote, in 1783, these memorable words : " I lament with you the many mischiefs, the injustice, the corruption of manners, etc., that attend a depreciated currency. It is some consolation to me that I washed my hands of that evil by predicting it in Congress, and proposing means that would have been effectual to pre vent it if they had been adopted. Subsequent operations that I have executed demonstrate that my plan was practicable but it was unfortunately rejected.' — (Works, x. 9.) " A serious attempt has been made to capture Thomas Jefferson and bring him into the service. The following passage from one of his letters to John W. Eppes (Works, vi. 140) has been paraded through this discussion with all the emphasis of italics, thus : " ' Bank paper must be suppressed, and the circulating medium must be restored to the nation to whom it belongs. It is the only fund on which they can rely for loans ; it is the only resource which can never fail them, and it is an abundant one for every necessary purpose. Treasury bills bottomed on taxes, bearing or not bearing interest, as may be found necessary, thrown into circulation, will take the place of so much gold or silver, which last, when 300 JAMES A. GARFIELD : crowded, will find an efflux into other countries, and thus keep the quantum of medium at its salutary level.' " This passage was quoted as a strong point for the soft-money men in their campaign documents in Ohio, last fall. They did not find it convenient to quote the great Virginian more fully. When this letter was writ ten, the United States was at war with England, with no friendly nation from whom to obtain loans. The demand for revenue was urgent, and the treasury was empty. Mr. Jefferson had long been opposed to the state banks, and he saw that by suppressing them and issuing treas ury notes, with or without interest, the government could accomplish two things : destroy state bank currency, and obtain a forced loan, in the form of circulating notes. In enforcing this view, he wrote from Monticello to Mr. Eppes, June 24, 1813 : 'lam sorry to see our loans be gin at so exorbitant an interest. And yet, even at that, you will soon be at the bottom of the loan-bag. Ours is an agricultural nation. ... In such a nation there is one and only one resource for loans, sufficient to carry them through the expense of a war ; and that will always be sufficient, and in the power of an honest government, punctual in the preservation of its faith. The fund I mean is the mass of circulating coin. Every one knows that, although not literally, it is nearly true that every paper dollar emitted banishes a silver one from the cir culation. A nation, therefore, making its purchases and payments with bills fitted for circulation, thrusts an equal sum of coin out of circulation. This is equivalent to bor rowing that sum ; and yet the vendor, receiving payment in a medium as effectual as coin for his purchases or pay- HIS. FINANCIAL RECORD. 301 ments, has no claim to interest. ... In this way I am not without a hope that this great, this sole resource for loans in an agricultural country might yet be recovered for the use of the nation during war ; and, if obtained in perpetuum, it would always be sufficient to carry us through any war, provided that in the interval between war and war all the outstanding paper should be called in, coin be permitted to flow in again, and to hold the field of circulation until another war should require its yielding place again to the national medium.' " From this it appears that Jefferson favored the issue of treasury notes to help us through a war ; but he in sisted that they should be wholly retired on the return of peace. His three long letters to Eppes are full of power ful and eloquent denunciations of paper money. The soft money men appeal to Jefferson. We answer them in his own words : ' The truth is that capital may be pro duced by industry, and accumulated by economy; but jugglers only will propose to create it by legerdemain tricks of paper money.' — (Letter to Eppes, Works, vi. 239.) " Their third attempt to elect some eminent states man as an honorary member of the new school affords a striking illustration of a method too often adopted in our politics. It was very confidently stated by several ad vocates of soft money that John C. Calhoun had sug gested that a paper money, issued directly by the gov ernment and made receivable for all public dues, would be as good a currency as gold and silver. Mr. Hill finally claimed Calhoun's authority in support of his ab solute money, and printed on pages 56, 57 of his pam- 302 JAMES A. GARFIELD:' phlet a passage from a speech of Calhoun's. This extract was used in the Ohio campaign with much effect, until it was shown that there had been omitted from the passage quoted these important words : ' leaviny its creditors to take it [treasury note circulation] or gold and silver at their option.' After this exposure, the great nullifier was left out of the canvass. " Thus far we have attempted no more than to ex hibit the state of public opinion in regard to the cur rency in 1861-62, the changes that have since occuired, and the leading doctrines now held by the soft money men. " Most of these dogmas are old, and have long ago been exploded. All are directly opposed to principles as well established as the theorems of Euclid. THE DOCTRINE OF HARD MONEY. " Believing that this generation of Americans is not willing to ignore all past experience, and to decide so great an issue as though it were now raised for the first time, we shall attempt to state, in brief compass, the grounds on which the doctrine of hard money rests. "Hard money is not to be understood as implying a currency consisting of coin alone (though many have held, with Benton, that no other is safe), but that coin of ascertained weight and fineness, duly stamped and authenticated by the government, is the only safe stand ard of money ; and that no form of credit-currency is safe unless it be convertible into coin at the will of the holder. HIS FINANCIAL RECORD. 303 MONEY AS AN INSTRUMENT OF EXCHANGE. " As preliminary to this discussion, it is necessary to determine the functions which money performs as an in strument of exchange. As barter was the oldest form of exchange, so it was and still is the ultimate object and result of all exchanges. For example : I wish to ex change my commodities or services for commodities or services of a different kind. I find no one at hand who has what I want, and wants what I have. I therefore "exchange, or, as we say, sell, my commodities for money, which I hold until I find some one who wishes to sell what I want to buy. I then make the purchase. The two transactions have, in fact, resulted in a barter. It amounts to the same thing as though, at the start, I had found a man who wanted my commodities, and was Will ing to give me in exchange the commodities I desired. By a sale and a purchase I have accomplished my object. Money was the instrument by which the transactions were made. The great French economist, J. B. Say, has justly described a sale as half a barter, for we see, in the case above stated, that two sales were equivalent, in effect, to one act of simple barter. But some time may elapse between my sale and the subsequent purchase. How are my rights of property secured during the inter val ? That which I sold carried its value in itself as an exchangeable commodity ; when I had exchanged it for money, and was waiting to make my purchase, the secu rity for my property rested wholly in the money result ing from the sale. If that money be a perfect instrument of exchange, it must not only be the lawful measure of 301 ' JAMES A. GARFIELD : that which I sold, but it must, of itself, be the actual equivalent in value. If its value depends upon the arbi trary acts of government or of individuals, the results of my transaction depend not upon the value of that which I sold nor of that which I bought, nor upon my prudence and skill, but upon an element wholly beyond my control — a medium of exchange which varies in value from day to day. " Such being the nature of exchanges, we should ex pect to find that so soon as man begins to emerge from the most primitive condition of society and the narrow est circle of family life, he will seek a measure and an in strument of exchange among his first necessities. And in fact it is a matter of history that in the hunting state skins were used as money, because they were the product of chief value. In the pastoral state — the next advance in civilization — sheep and cattle, being the most valuable and negotiable form of property, were used as money. This appears in the earliest literature. In the Homeric poems oxen are repeatedly mentioned as the standard by which wealth was measured. The arms of Diomed were declared to be worth nine oxen, as compared with those of Glaucos, worth one hundred. A tripod, the first prize for wrestlers, in the twenty-third book of the Iliad was valued at twelve oxen, and a female captive, skilled iu industry, at four.* " In many languages the name for money is identical with that for some kind of cattle. Even our word ' fee ' is said to be the Anglo-Saxon 'feoh,' meaning both money and cattle. Sir II. S. Maine, speaking of the primitive * Jevon'H " Money and the Mechanism of Exchange," page 21. HIS FINANCIAL RECORD. 305 state of society, says : 'Being counted by the head, the kine was called capitate, whence the economic term capi tal, the law term chattel, and our common name cattle. " In the agricultural and manufacturing stage of civi lization, many forms of vegetable and manufactured pro ducts were used as money, such as corn, wheat, tobacco, cacao-nuts, cubes of tea, colored feathers, shells, nails, etc. " All these species of wealth were made instruments of exchange because they were easily transferable, and their value was the best known and least fluctuating. But the use of each as money was not universal ; in fact, was but little known beyond the bounds of a single na tion. Most of them were non-exportable; and though that fact would have commended them to the favor of some of our modern economists, yet the mass of mankind have entertained a different opinion, and have sought to find a medium whose value and fitness to be used as money would be universally acknowledged. " It is not possible to ascertain when and by whom the precious metals were first adopted as money ; but for more than three thousand years they have been acknowl edged as the forms of material wealth best fitted to be the measure and instrument of exchange. Each nation and tribe, as it has emerged from barbarism, has aban doned its local, non-exportable medium, and adopted what is justly called ' the money of the world.' " Coinage was a later device, employed for the sole purpose of fashioning into a convenient shape the metal to be used as money, and of ascertaining and certifying officially the weight and fineness of each piece. " And here has arisen the chief error in reference to 306 JAMES A. GARFIELD : the nature of money. Because the government coins it, names its denomination, and declares its value, many have been led to imagine that the government creates it, that its value is a gift of the law. " The analogy of other standards will aid us at this point. Our constitution empowers Congress to fix the standard of weights and measures, as well as of values. But Congress cannot create extension, or weight, or value. It can measure that which has extension ; it can weigh that which is ponderable ; it can declare and subdivide and name a standard ; but it cannot make length of that which has no length ; it cannot make weight of that which is imponderable ; it cannot make value of that which has no value. Ex nihilo nihil fit. The power of Congress to make anything it pleases receivable for taxes is a matter wholly distinct from the subject now under discussion. Legislation cannot make that a measure of value which neither possesses nor represents any definitely ascertained value. COIN AN INSTRUMENT OF UNIVERSAL CREDIT. " Now apply to the operations of exchange a given coin, whose weight and fineness are certified by public authority. We cannot do this better than by borrowing the language of Frederic Bastiat, found in his treatise en titled ' Maudit Argent.' He says : " ' You have a crown. What does it signify in your hands ? It is the testimony and the proof that y ou have at some time performed a work ; and, instead of profiting by it yourself, you have allowed the community to enjoy it, in the person of your client. This crown is the evi- HIS FINANCIAL RECORD. 307 dence that you have rendered a service to society; and it states the value of that service. Moreover, it is the evidence that you have not drawn from the community the real equivalent, as was your right. In order to ena ble you to exercise that right when and as you please, society, by the hand of your client, has given you a recog nition, a title, a bond of the commonwealth, a token, in short a crown, which differs from other fiduciary titles only in this, that it carries its value in itself ; and if you can read with the eyes of the mind the inscription which it bears, you will distinctly decipher these words : 'Render to the bearer a service equivalent to that which he has rendered to society ; a value received, stated, proved, and measured by that which is in me.' ... If you now give that crown to me as the price of a service, this is the result : your ac count with society for real services is found regular, is balanced and closed, . . . and I am justly in the position where you were before.' " Edmund Burke expressed the same opinion when he said, ' Gold and silver are the two great, recognized species that represent the lasting, conventional credit of mankind.' " Three thousand years of experience have proved that the precious metals are the best materials of which to make the standard of value, the instrument of ex change. They are themselves a store of value ; they are durable, divisible, easily transported, and more constant in value than any other known substances. In the form of dust and bars, as merchandise, their value is precisely equal to their declared value as money, less the very small cost of coinage. Coin made of these metal* meas- 308 JAMES A. GARFIELD : ures wealth, because it represents wealth in itself, just as the yard-stick measures length, and the standard pound measures weight, because each has, in itself, that which it represents. "Again, the precious metals are products of labor, and their value, like that of all other merchandise, de pends upon the cost of production. A coin represents and measures the labor required to produce it; it may be called an embodiment of labor. Of course this statement refers to the average cost of production throughout the world, and that average has varied but little for many centuries. It is a flat absurdity to assert that such a re ality as labor can be measured and really represented by that which costs little or no labor. For these reasons the precious metals have been adopted by the common law of the world as the best materials in which to embody the unit of money. STATUTES CANNOT REPEAL THE LAWS OF VALUE. " The oldest and perhaps the most dangerous delusion in reference to money is the notion that it is a creation of law; that its value can be fixed and maintained by au thority. Yet no error has been more frequently refuted by experience. Every debasement of the coin, and every attempt to force its circulation at a higher rate than the market value of the metal it contains, has been punished by the inevitable disasters that always follow the viola tion of economic laws. " The great parliamentary debate of 1695, on the re- coinage of English money, affords an absolute demonstra tion of the truth that legislatures cannot repeal the laws HIS FINANCIAL RECORD. 309 »f value. Mr. Lowndes, the secretary of the treasury, though he held that a debasement of the coinage should be rejected as 'dangerous and dishonorable,' really be lieved, as did a large number of members of Parliament, that if, by law, they raised the name of the coin, they would raise its value as money. As Macaulay puts it, He was not in the least aware that a piece of metal with the king's head on it was a commodity of which the price was governed by the same law which governs the price of a piece of metal fashioned into a spoon or a buckle ; and that it was no more in the power of Parliament to make the kingdom richer by calling a crown a pound than to make the kingdom larger by calling a furlong a mile. He seriously believed, incredible as it may seem, that if the ounce of silver were divided into seven shillings instead of five, foreign nations would sell us their wines and their silks for a smaller number of ounces. He had a consider able following, composed partly of dull men who really believed what he told them, and partly of shrewd men who were perfectly willing to be authorized by law to pay a hundred pounds with eighty.' — (History of Eng land, chapter xxi.) " It was this debate that called forth those masterly essays of John Locke on the nature of money and coin, which still remain as a monument to his genius and an unanswerable demonstration that money obeys the laws of value and is not the creature of arbitrary edicts. At the same time, Sir Isaac Newton was called from those dublinie discoveries in science which made his name im mortal, to aid the king and Parliament in ascertaining the true basis of money. After the most thorough examina- 310 JAMES A. GARFIELD : tion, this great thinker reached the same conclusions The genius of these two men, aided by the enlightened statesmanship of Montague and Somers, gave the victory to honest money, and preserved the commercial honor of England for a century. PAPER MONEY AN INSTRUMENT OF CREDIT. " In discussing the use of paper as a representative of actual money, we enter a new branch of political sci ence, namely, the general theory of credit. We shall go astray at once if we fail to perceive the character of this element. Credit is not capital. It is the permission given to one man to use the capital of another. It is not an increase of capital ; for the same property cannot be used as capital by both the owner and the borrower of it, at the same time. But credit if not abused, is a great and beneficent power. By its use the productiveness of capital is greatly increased. A large amount of capital is owned by people who do not desire to employ it in the actual production of wealth. There are many others who are ready and willing to engage in productive enter prise, but have not the necessary capital. Now, if the owners of unemployed capital have confidence in the hon esty and skill of the latter class, they lend their capital at a fair rate of interest, and thus the production of wealth will be greatly increased. Frequently, however, the capital loaned is not actually transferred to the bor rower, but a written evidence of his title to it is given in stead. If this title is transferable it may be used as a substitute for money ; for, within certain limits, it has the same purchasing power. When these evidences of credit HIS FINANCIAL RECORD. 311 are in the form of checks and drafts, bills of exchange and promissory notes, they are largely used as substitutes for money, and very greatly facilitate exchanges. But all are based upon confidence, upon the belief that they represent truly what they profess to represent — actual capital, measured by real money, to be delivered on de mand. " These evidences of credit have become in modern times the chief instruments of exchange. The bank has become as indispensable to the exchange of values as the railroad is to the transportation of merchandise. It is the institution of credit by means of which these various substitutes for money are made available. It has been shown that not less than ninety per cent, of all the ex changes in the United States are accomplished by means of bank credits. The per cent, in England is not less than ninety-five. Money is now the small change of commerce. It is perhaps owing to this fact that many are so dazzled by the brilliant achievements of credit as to forget that it is the shadow of capital, not its sub stance ; that it is the sign, the brilliant sign, but not the thing signified. Let it be constantly borne in mind that the check, the draft, the bill of exchange, the promissory note, are all evidences of debt, of money to be paid. If not, they are fictitious and fraudulent. If the real capital on which they are based be destroyed, they fall with it, and become utterly worthless. If confidence in their prompt payment be impaired, they immediately depre ciate in proportion to the distrust. "We have mentioned among these instruments of credit the promissory note. Its character as an evidence 312 JAMES A. GARFIELD : of debt is not changed when it comes to us illuminated by the art and mystery of plate-printing. Name it national bank-note, greenback, Bank of England note, or what you will ; let it be signed by banker, president, or king, it is none the less an evidence of debt, a promise to pay. It is not money, and no power on earth can make it money. But it is a title to money, a deed for money, and can be made equal to money only when the debtor performs the promise — delivers the property which the deed calls for, pays the debt. When that is done, and when the com munity knows, by actual test, that it will continue to be done, then, and not till then, this credit-currency will in fact be the honest equivalent of money. Then it will, in large measure, be used in preference to coin, because of its greater convenience, and because the cost of is suing new notes in place of those which are worn and mutilated is much less than the loss which the community suffers by abrasion of the coin. To the extent, therefore, that paper will circulate in place of coin, as a substitute and an equivalent, such circulation is safe, convenient, and economical. And what is the Hmit of such safe cir culation? Economic science has demonstrated, and the uniform experience of nations has proved, that the term which marks that limit, the sole and supreme test of safety, is the exchangeability of such paper for coin, dollar for dollar, at the will of the holder. The smallest increase in volume beyond that limit produces deprecia tion in the value of each paper dollar. It then requires more of such depreciated dollars to purchase a given quantity of gold or merchandise than it did before depre ciation began. In other words, prices rise in comparison HIS FINANCIAL RECORD. 313 with such currency. The fact that it is made a legal tender for taxes and private debts does not free it from the inexorable law that increase of volume decreases the value of every part. " It is equally true that an increase of the precious metals, coined or uncoined, decreases their value in com parison with other commodities ; but these metals are of such universal currency, on account of their intrinsic value, that they flow to all parts of the civilized world, and the increase is so widely distributed that it produces but a small increase of prices in any one country. Not so with an inconvertible paper money. It is not of uni versal currency. It is national, not international. It is non-exportable. The whole effect of its depreciation is felt at home. The level of Salt Lake has risen ten feet during the last thirty years, because it has no outlet. But all the floods of the world have made no perceptible change in the general level of the sea. " The character of inconvertible paper money, the re lation of its quantity to its value, and its inevitable depre ciation by an increase of volume, were demonstrated in the Bullion Report of 1810 by facts and arguments whose force and conclusiveness have never been shaken. In the great debate that followed, in Parliament and through the press, may be found the counterpart of almost every doctrine and argument which has been advanced in our own country since the suspension of specie payments. Then, as now, there were statesmen, doctrinaires, and business men who insisted that the bank-notes were not depreciated, but that gold had risen in value ; who de nied that gold coin was any longer the standard of value, / 314 JAMES A. GARFIELD : and declared that a bank-note was 'abstract currency.' Castlereagh announced in the House of Commons that the money standard was ' a sense of value, in reference to currency as compared with commodities.' Another soft money man of that day said : ' The standard is neither gold nor silver, but something set up in the imagination, to be regulated by public opinion."1 Though the doctrines of the Bullion Report were at first voted down in Parlia ment, they could not be suppressed. With the dogged persistency which characterizes our British neighbors, the debate was kept up for ten years. Every propo sition and counter proposition was sifted, the intelli gence and conscience of the nation were invoked; the soft money men were driven from every position they "occupied in 1811, and at last the ancient standard was restored. When the bank redeemed its notes, the dif ference between the mint price and the market price of bullion disappeared, and the volume of paper money was reduced in the ratio of its former depreciation. During the last half century few Englishmen have risked their reputation for intelligence by denying the doctrines thus established. " These lessons of history cannot be wholly forgotten. It is too late to set up again the doctrines of Lowndes and Vansittart. They may disturb and distract public opinion, but can never again triumph before an intelligent tribunal. I commend to the soft money men of our time the study of this great debate and that of 1695. When they have overturned the doctrines of Locke and Newton and of the Bullion Report, it will be time for them to in vite us to follow their new theories. HIS FINANCIAL RECORD. 315 " But we need not go abroad to obtain illustrations of the truth that the only cure for depreciation of the cur rency is convertibility into coin. Our American colonies, our Continental Congress, and our State and national gov ernments have demonstrated its truth by repeated and calamitous experiments. The fathers who drafted our constitution believed they had ' shut and bolted the door against irredeemable paper money ; ' and, since then, no president, no secretary of the treasury, has proposed or sanctioned a paper currency, in time of peace, not re deemable in coin at the will of the holder. Search our records from 1787 to 1861, and select from any decade twenty of our most illustrious statesmen, and it will be found that not less than nineteen of them have left on record, in the most energetic language, their solemn pro test and warning against the very doctrines we are op posing. " The limits of this article will allow only the briefest statement of the evils that flow from a depreciated cur rency, evils both to the government and to the people, which overbalance, a thousand to one, all its real or sup posed benefits. The word 'dollar' is the substantive word, the fundamental condition of every contract, of every sale, of every payment, whether at the treasury or at the stand of the apple-woman in the street. The dol lar is the gauge that measure every blow of the hammer, every article of merchandise, every exchange of property. Forced by the necessities of war, we substituted for the this dollar the printed promise of the Government to pay a dollar. That promise we have not kept. We have suspended payment, and have compelled the citizen tc 316 JAMES A. GARFIELD : receive dishonored paper in place of money. The repre sentative value of that paper has passed, by thousands of fluctuations, from one hundred cents down to thirty-eight, and back again to ninety. At every change, millions of men have suffered loss. In the midst of war, with rising prices and enormous gains, these losses were tolerable. But now, when we are slowly and painfully making our way back to the level of peace — now, when the pressure of hard times is upon us, and industry and trade depend for their gains upon small margins of profit, the uncertainty is an intolerable evil. That uncertainty is increased by doubts as to what Congress will do. Men hesitate to invest their capital in business, when a vote in Congress may shrink it by half its value. Still more striking are the evils of such a currency in its effects upon international com merce. Our purchases from and sales to foreign nations amount in the aggregate to one billion two hundred mil lion dollars per annum, every dollar of which is measured in coin. Those who export our products buy with paper and sell for gold. Our importers buy with gold and sell for paper. Thus the aggregate value of our international exchanges is measured, successfully, by the two stand ards. The loss occasioned by the fluctuation of these currencies in reference to each other falls wholly on us. We, alone, use paper as a standard. And who, among us, bears the loss ? The importer, knowing the risk he runs, adds to his prices a sufficient per cent, to insure himself against loss. This addition is charged over from importer to jobber, from jobber to retailer, until its dead weight falls, at last, upon the laborer who consumes the goods. In the same way, the exporter insures himself against HIS FINANCIAL RECORD. 317 loss by marking down the prices he will pay for products to be sent abroad. In all such transactions capital is usually able to take care of itself. The laborer has but one commodity for sale, his day's work. It is his sole reliance. He must sell it to-day or it is lost forever. What he buys must be bought to-day. He cannot wait till prices fall. He is at the mercy of the market. Buy ing or selling, the waves of its fluctuations beat against him. Daniel Webster never uttered a more striking truth than when he said : ' Of all the contrivances for cheating the laboring classes of mankind, none has been more effectual than that which deludes them with paper money. This is the most effectual of inventions to fertil ize the rich man's field by the sweat of the poor man's face.' " But here we are met by the interconvertible-bond- and-currency men, who offer to emancipate us from the tyranny of gold and secure a more perfect standard than coin has ever been. Let us see. Our five per cent. bonds are now on a par with gold. Any actuary will testify that in the same market a 3.65 bond, payable, principal and interest, in gold, and having the same time to run, is worth but seventy-five cents in gold ; that is, thirteen cents less than the present greenback. How much less the bond will be worth if its interest be made payable in the proposed inconvertible currency, no mortal can calculate. It is proposed, then, to make the new currency equivalent to a bond which, at its birth, is thir teen cents below the greenback of to-day. We are to take a long leap downward at the first bound. But ' in- terconvertibility ' is the charm, the ' subtle principle,' the 318 JAMES A. GARFIELD : great 'regulator of finance,' which will adjust every thing. The alternate ebb and flow of bond into paper dollar, and paper dollar into bond, will preserve an equilibrium, an equipoise ; and this level of equipose is the base line that will measure the new standard of value. The lad who sold his two-dollar dog for fifty dollars, and took his pay in pups at ten dollars each, never doubted that he had made a profit of forty-eight dollars until he found how small a sum the whole litter would sell for in the market. " Undoubtedly the beam will lie level that is weight ed with the bond at one end and the paper money at the other. But what will be the relation of that level to the level of real values ? Both the bond and the cur rency are instruments of credit, evidences of debt. They cannot escape the dominion of those universal laws that regulate prices. If made by law the only le gal tender, such a currency would doubtless occupy the field. But what would be the result ? To a certain ex tent the bonds themselves would be used as currency. The clearing-house banks of New York would doubtless be glad to get interest-bearing bonds instead of the government certificates of indebtedness, bearing no in terest, which, for convenience, they now use in the settlement of their balances. The reserves of public and private banks," which now amount to more than two hundred million dollars, would largely be held in these interest-bearing bonds. Thus the first step would result in compelling the government to pay interest on a large portion of the reserves of all the banks, public, and private. It will hardly be claimed, however, that anybody will part with his property for bonds of tkis HIS FINANCIAL RECORD. 319 description, to hold as a permanent investment. Capi tal in this country is worth more than 3.65 per cent. How, then, will the new currency be set afloat? The treasury can pay it out only in exchange for the new bonds or in payment of public dues. Shall we violate public faith by paying the gold bonds already oustand- ing in this new and greatly depreciated paper? Or shall we, as some of the soft money men have proposed, enter upon a vast system of public works in order to put the new currency in circulation ? No doubt means would be found to push it into circulation, so long as enterprise or speculation should offer a hope of greater profits than 3.65 per cent. Once out, it would inevita bly prove a repetition of the old story: an artificial stimulation of business and of speculation ; large issues of currency; inflation of prices, depreciation of paper, delirium, prostration ; ' up like a rocket, then down like a stick.' They tell us that this cannot happen, because as the volume of paper increases, the rate of interest will fall, and when it reaches 3.65 per cent, the currency will be exchanged for bonds. But all experience is against them. Inflation has never brought down the rate of interest. In fact, the rate is always highest in countries afflicted with irredeemable paper money. For all practical purposes, the proposed currency would be unredeemed and irredeemable ; and this is what its ad vocates desire. General Butler sees ' no more reason for redeeming the measure of value than for redeeming the yardstick or the quart-pot.' This shows the utmost confusion of ideas. We do not redeem the yardstick or the quart-pot. They are, in reality, what they profess 320 JAMES A. GARFIELD : to be. There is nothing better for measuring yards than a yardstick. But, in regard to the yardstick, we do what is strictly analogous to redemption when applied to currency. We preserve our yardstick undiminished and unchanged ; and, by the solemn sanction of penal law, we require that it shall be applied to the purchase and sale of all commodities that can be measured by the standard of length. The citizen who buys by a longer yardstick or sells by a shorter one than our standard, is punished as a felon. Common honesty requires that we restore, and with equal care preserve from diminution or change, our standard of value. " It has been already shown that the soft money men desire a vast increase of currency above the present volume. The assumed necessity for such an increase was a leading topic in the debates that preceded the late elections. " The argument, often repeated, ran substantially thus: " Fellow-citizens ! You are in great distress. The smoke of your furnaces no longer ascends to the sky; the clang of your mills and workshops is no longer heard. Your workers in metal and miners in coal are out of employment. Stagnation of trade, depression of busi ness, and public distress are seen on every hand. What has caused these disasters ? Manifestly, a lack of money. Is there any man among you who has money enough ? If there be, let him stand forth and declare it. Is there one who does not need more money to carry on his business ? [Cries of No ! No !] The hard money men We brought you to this distress, by contracting the HIS FINANCIAL RECORD. 321 volume of the currency, by destroying the people's money, your money. And they propose to complete your ruin by forcing the country to resume specie pay ments. We come to save you from this ruin. We in sist that you shall have more money, not less. We are resolved to make and keep the volume of currency ' equal to the wants of trade.' "These assumptions were answered by undeniable facts. It was shown that our large volume of paper cur rency had helped to bring on the crisis of 1873, and had greatly aggravated its effects ; but that the main cause was speculation, over-trading, and, in some branches of business, an over-production beyond the demands of the market. " A striking illustration of the effect of over-produc tion was drawn from the history of one of the interior counties of Northern Ohio. In the midst of a wilder- ness, far away from the centres of trade, the pioneers commenced the settlement of the county at the beginning of the present century. Year by year their number was augmented. Each new settler was compelled to buy provisions for his family until he could raise his first crop. For several years this demand afforded a ready market, at good prices, for all the products of the farm. But in 1818, the supply greatly exceeded the demand. The wheat market was so glutted that twenty bushels were frequently offered for one pound of tea, and often refused, because tea could be bought only for money, and wheat could hardly be sold at all. " If the soft money men of our time had been among those farmers, they would have insisted that more 21 322 JAMES A. GARFIELD : money would raise the price of their wheat and set the ploughboys at work. But the pioneers knew that until the stock on hand was reduced, the production of another bushel to be sold would be labor wasted. The cry for more currency shows that soft money men have confounded credit with capital, and vaguely imagine that if more paper dollars were printed they could be bor rowed without security. " In whatever form the new currency be iposed, whether in the so-called absolute money or e 'in terconvertible paper mpney tokens,' as a relief from dis tress, it is a delusion and a snare. All these schemes are reckless attempts to cut loose from real money — the. money known and recognized throughout the world — and to adopt for our standard that which a great gold gambler of Wall Street aptly called 'phantom gold.' Their authors propose a radical and dangerous innova tion in our political system. They desire to make the National Treasury a bank of issue, and to place in the control of Congress the vast money power of the nation, to be handled as the whim, the caprice, the necessities of political parties may dictate. Federalist as Hamilton was, he held that such a power was too great to be cen tralized in the hands of one body. This goes a hundred leagues beyond any measure of centralization that has yet been adopted or suggested. "In view of the doctrines herein advocated, what shall be said of the present condition of our currency ? It is depreciated. Its purchasing power is less than that of real money, by about fourteen per cent. Our notes are at a discount ; not because the ability of the nation HIS FINANCIAL RECORD. 323 to redeem them is questioned, but partly because its good faith is doubted, and partly because the volume of these notes is too great to circulate at par. What that volume ought to be, no man can tell. Convertibility into coin is a perfect test, and is the only test. NECESSITY OF RESUMPTION. " The duty of the government to make its currency equal to real money is undeniable and imperative. First, because the public faith is most solemnly pledged, and this alone is a conclusive and unanswerable reason why it should be done. The perfidy of one man, or of a million men, is as nothing compared with the perfidy of a nation. The public faith was the talisman that brought to the treasury thirty-five hundred million dollars in loans, to save the life of the nation, which was not worth saving if its honor be not also saved. The public faith is our only hope of safety from the dangers that may assail us in the future. The public faith was pledged to redeem these notes in the very act which created them, and the pledge was repeated when each additional issue was ordered. It was again repeated in the act of 1869, known as the ' act to strengthen the public credit,' and yet again in the act of 1875, promising redemption iD 1879. " Second. The government should make its currency equal to gold because the material prosperity of its peo ple demands it. Honest dealing between man and man requires it. Just and equal legislation for the people, safety in trade, domestic and foreign, security in busi- 324 JAMES A. GARFIELD : ness, just distribution of the rewards of labor — none of these are possible until the present false and uncertain standard of value has given place to the real, the certain, the universal standard. Its restoration will hasten the revival of commercial confidence, which is the basis of all sound credit. " Third. Public morality demands the re-establish ment of our ancient standard. The fever of speculation which our fluctuating currency has engendered cannot be allayed till its cause is destroyed. A majority of all the crimes relating to money, that have been committed in public and private life since the war, have grown out of the innumerable opportunities for sudden and inordinate gains which this fluctuation has offered. " The gold panic of 1869, which overwhelmed thou sands of business men in ruin, and the desperate gamb ling in gold which is to-day absorbing so many millions of capital that ought, to be employed in producing wealth, v. Gic maue possible only by the difference between paper and gold. Resumption will destroy all that at a blow. It will enable all men to see the real situation of their affairs, and will do much toward dissipating those unreal and fascinating visions of wealth to be won without in dustry, which have broken the fortunes and ruined the morals of so many active and brilliant citizens. " My limits will not allow a discussion of the hard ship and evils which it is feared will accompany the res toration of the old standard. Whatever they may be, they will be light and transient in comparison with those we shall endure if the doctrines of soft money prevail. I am not able to see why the approach to specie may not HIS FINANCIAL RECORD. 325 be made so gradual that the fluctuation in any one month will be less than that which we have suffered from month to month since 1869. We have travelled more than half the distance which then separated us from the gold stand ard. " A scale of appreciation like that by which England resumed in 1821 would greatly mitigate the hardships arising from the movement. Those who believe that the volume of our currency is but little above its normal level need not fear that there will be much contraction ; for, with free banking, they may be sure that all the paper which can be an actual substitute for money will remain in circulation. No other ought to circulate. " The advocates of soft money are loud in their de nunciation of the English resumption act of 1819, and parade the distorted views of that small and malignant minority of English writers who have arraigned the act as the cause of the agricultural distress of 1822, and the financial crash which followed, in 1825. The charge is absolutely unjust and unfounded. In 1822 a committee of the House of Commons, having investigated the causes of the agricultural distress of that and the preceding year, found that it was due to the operation of the corn laws, and to the enormous wheat crops of the two preceding ' seasons. Their report makes no reference to the resump tion act as a cause of the distress. In both that and the following year, a few of the old opponents of hard money offered resolutions in the House of Commons, declaring that the resumption act was one of the causes of the public distress. The resolution of 1822 was defeated by a vote of one hundred and forty-one to twenty-seven, and 326 JAMES A. GARFIELD : that of 1823 was defeated by the still more decisive vote of one hundred and ninety-two to thirty. An overwhelm ing majority of intelligent Englishmen look back with pride and satisfaction upon the act of resumption as a just and beneficent measure. "But methods and details of management are of slight importance in comparison with the central purpose so often expressed by the nation. From that purpose there should be no retreat. To postpone its fulfilment beyond the day already fixed is both dangerous and useless. It will make the task harder than ever. Re sumption could have been accomplished in 1867 with less difficulty than it can be in 1879. It can be accom plished more easily in 1879 than at any later date. It is said that we ought to wait until the vast mass of private debts can be adjusted. But when will that be done ? Horace has told us of a rustic traveller who stood on the bank of a river, waiting for its waters to flow by, that he might cross over in safety. ' At Me labitur et labetur in omne volubilis cevum.' The succession of debts and debt ors will be as perpetual as the flow of the river. " We ought to be inspired by the recent brilliant ex ample of France. Suffering unparalleled disasters, she was compelled to issue a vast volume of legal-tender notes in order to meet her obligations. But so soon as the great indemnity was paid, she addressed herself reso lutely to the work of bringing her currency up to the standard of gold. During the last two years she has reduced her paper currency nearly seven hundred and fifty million francs ; and now it is substantially at par. " Amidst all her disasters she has kept her financial HIS FINANCIAL RECORD. 327 credit untarnished. And this has been her strength and her safety. To meet the great indemnity, she asked her people for a loan of three billion francs ; and twelve and a half times the amount was subscribed. In August, 1874, the American Minister at Paris said, in one of his despatches, ' Though immense amounts were taken abroad, yet it seems they are all coming back to France, and are now being absorbed in small sums by the com mon people. The result will be, in the end, that almost the entire loan will be held in France. Every person in the whole country is wishing to invest a few hundred francs in the new loan, and it has reached a premium of four and one half to five per cent.' " Our public faith is the symbol of our honor and the pledge of our future safety. By every consideration. of national honor, of public justice, and of sound policy, let us stand fast in the resolution to restore our currency to the standard of gold." On the 5th of April, 1880, Mr. Weaver, the leader of the Greenback party in the House, arose and addressed the Speaker as follows : " I move to suspend the rules and adopt the resolu tions which I send to the desk. " The Clerk read as follows : " 'Resolved, That it is the sense of this House that all currency, whether metallic or paper, necessary for the use and convenience of the people should be issued and its volume controlled by the Government, and not by or through the bank corporations of the country ; and when so issued should be a full legal tender in payment of all debts, public and private. 328 JAMES A. GARFIELD : " ' 2. Resolved, That, in the judgment of this House, that portion of the interesWbearing debt of the United States which shall become redeemable in the year 1881, or prior thereto, being in amount $782,000,000, should not be refunded beyond the power of the Government to call in said obligations and pay them at any time, but should be paid as rapidly as possible, and according to contract. To enable the Government to meet these obligations, the mints of the United States should be operated to their full capacity in the coinage of standard silver dollars, and such other coinage as the business interests of the country may require.' " As soon as the Clerk had finished reading the resolu tions. General Garfield rose, and said : " Mr. Speaker. — I never heard the provisions of this resolution until it was read from the desk a few moments ago. It has, however, attained some historical importance by being talked about a good deal in the newspapers, and by blocking the other business of the House for some weeks. As I listened to its reading I noticed that it is one of those mixed propositions which has some good things in it which everybody would probably like and vote for if they were separated ; but the good things are used to sugar over what, in my judgment, is most pernicious. " There are three things in this resolution to which I wish to call the attention of the House before they vote. The first is a proposition of the largest possible propor tion, that all money, whether of coin or paper, that is to circulate in this country, ought to be manufactured and issued directly by the Government. I stop there. I want to say on that proposition to the majority in this House, HIS FINANCIAL RECORD. 329 who are so strongly opposed to what they call centraliza tion, that never was there a measure offered to the Con gress of so vast and far-reaching centralism. It would convert the Treasury of the United States into a manu factory of paper money. It makes the House of Repre sentatives and Senate, or the caucus of the party which happens to be in the majority, the absolute dictator of the financial and business affairs of this country. This scheme surpasses all the centralism and all the Csesarism that were ever charged upon the Republican party in the wildest days of the war, or in the events growing out of the war. " Now, I say, without fear of contradiction, that prior to 1862 the wildest dreamer in American finance was never wild enough to propose such a measure of central ization as that single proposition implies. The Govern ment should prescribe general laws in reference to the quality and character of our paper money, but should never become the direct manufacturer and issuer of it. " The second point involved in this resolution is that the Government of the United States shall pay all its public debts in this manufactured money, manufactured to order at the Treasury factory. Notwithstanding the solemn and acknowledged pledge of the Government to pay the principal and interest of its public debt in coin, this resolution declares that in this legal-tender paper the public debt shall be payable. " The third point I wish to call attention to — " Mr. Ewing. — Will my colleague allow me to inter rupt him for a moment ? "Mr. Garfield. — Certainly. 330 JAMES A. GARFIELD : " Mr. Ewing. — You certainly misunderstand the reso lution. It declares that all public debts of the United States shall be paid in the money of the contract, and not in any coin or money the Government may choose to pay them in. "Mr. Garfield. — Any money the Government ma} issue is by this resolution declared to be lawful money and, therefore, is to be made the money of the contract by the legislation proposed to-day. " Mr. Ewing. — That is a mere quibble based on a total misconstruction of the resolution. "Mr. Garfield. — Answer in your own time. " Now, the third point in this resolution is that there shaU be no refunding of the $782,000,000 to fall due this year and next, but all that shall be paid. How ? Out of the resources of the nation ? Yes ; but the money to be manufactured at the Treasury is to be called part of these resources. Print it to death — that is the way to dispose of the public debt, says this res olution. " I have only to say that these three make the triple- headed monster of centralization, inflation, and repudia tion combined. This monster is to be let loose on the country as the last spawn of the dying party that thought it had a little life in it a year ago. It is put out at this moment to test the courage of the two political parties ; it is offered at this point when the roar of the Presiden tial contest comes to us from all quarters of the country. In a few moments we shall see what the political parties will do with this beast. All I have to say, for one, is, meet and throttle it; in the name of honesty, in the HIS FINANCIAL RECORD. 331 name of the public peace and prosperity, in the name of the rights of individual citizens of this country against centralism, worse than we ever dreamed of, meet it and fight it like men. Let both parties show their courage by meeting boldly and putting an end to its power for mischief. Let the vote be taken." On the 10th of April, 1880, the House being in Committee of the Whole on the Appropriation Bill, the following debate occurred between General -Garfield and Mr. McMahon, of Ohio : " Mr. McMahon (Dem.), of Ohio, submitted an amend ment repealing the sections of the statutes providing for the biennial examination of pensioners, but leaving with the commissioner power to order special examinations when necessary and to increase or reduce pensions in accordance with right and justice, but no pension shall be reduced without notice to the pensioner. The amend ment concludes as follows : " ' In order to provide for the payment of arrears of pensions the Secretary of the Treasury is directed to issue immediately in payment thereof, as they may be adjusted, the $10,000,000 in legal tender currency now in the United States Treasury, kept as a special fund for the redemption of fractional currency.' " Mr. Garfield, of Ohio, raised the point of order that the amendment was not germane to the bill, changed ex isting law, and did not retrench expenditures. If the amendment could be ruled in order a proposition to break wholly through the whole resumption business could be also ruled in order." 332 JAMES A. GARFIELD : SPEECH OF MR. McMAHON. " Mr. McMahon, of Ohio, in advocacy of that por tion of the amendment providing for the reissue of the $10,000,000 in the Treasury, said that he had been asked to go farther in that direction than he proposed ; but he had offered a proposition which, he thought, would be entirely unobjectionable on the Republican side of the vHouse. Why should this $10,000,000 of idle money be kept in the Treasury when it was clear that all of the fractional currency (for the redemption of which this money was ostensibly held) had been redeemed ? Why should the pensioners be told that there was a defi ciency in the Treasury, and that, therefore, their arrear ages of pensions could not be paid ? He had been sur prised to hear the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Garfield) make a point of order against the pensioners of the coun try, because he had supposed that that gentleman owed an allegiance to them which was superior to that which he owed to Wall Street. He made use of that language advisedly, because there were no people interested in keeping that $10,000,000 in the Treasury except those who were in favor of contracting the currency. The Secretary of the Treasury was a good deal like his col league (Mr. Garfield), and was always in favor of ac tion in the interest of capital. As an illustration of Mr. Sherman's financial policy he said, that if that gentleman were dying his last words would be ' Borrow money on government bonds to put up a tombstone over me.' The Treasury was loaded down with a reserve of $330,000,- 000 in gold and currency, and yet the Secretary of the HIS FINANCIAL RECORD. 333 Treasury told the people that there must be either addi tional taxes or an additional issue of bonds. Here were $10,000,000 now in the Treasury, a part of the reserve authorized by law. The purpose for which it has been placed there has long since passed away, and it should now be put out to pay the arrears of pensions instead of issuing $10,000,000 of bonds of which the interest would amount to $400,000 a year." REPLY OF MR. GARFIELD. " Mr. Garfield, of Ohio, said that the attempt of his colleague (Mr. McMahon) to set himself up as the cham pion of the pensioners, was quite too thin a disguise to deceive anybody. The Republican side of the House had tried again and again to authorize the Secretary of the Treasury to extend the sales of four per cent, bonds suffi ciently to cover the matter of the payment of the arrears of pensions, and the House, at the last session had been brought to a vote on that subject at least twice, and but for the resistance on the Democratic side of the House that proposition would have prevailed and the pensioners would have been paid their arrearages. The responsi bility for not paying them rested, therefore, on those who resisted that proposition, not on those who made it. No man could torture anything which he had said to-day on the point of order into an unwillingness that the pension ers should have their pensions paid or that all remedial legislation should be adopted to make their payment easy. It was quite too late in the day for his colleague to intimate that there was objection on his (Mr. Gar field's) part to have the pensioners paid. He had made 334 JAMES A. GARFIELD : the point of order simply because he looked upon the amendment as an entering wedge, the general purpose of which was to break down the system of reserves, on which the maintenance of resumption depended. His colleague, whose distinguished knowledge as a financier no one would question, had amazed him very much by saying that the subsidiary currency played no part in the general problem of resumption. Did not his colleague know perfectly well that a subsidiary currency went to make up the bulk of circulating medium, just as much as greenbacks did, and just as much as gold did ? The re lations between himself and his colleague had never been such as to warrant either in using an impolite or indecent expression toward the other, and therefore his colleague had no more right to say, either as a matter of fact or as a matter of fair inference, that he (Mr. Garfield) owed his allegiance to Wall Street than he would have a right to say that his colleague owed his allegiance to the grog- geries and whiskey shops of Dayton. And as he (Mr. Garfield) would not say that, he did not think that his colleague was entitled to say the other. " Mr. McMahon stated that he was tolerably familiar with his colleague's public career, and he asked his col league whether in all the discussions that had taken place in this country on the financial question his colleague could show one vote of his that was not based upon the idea of speedy resumption, no matter at what cost, even when his colleague's own party had separated from him on that point in the forty-third Congress ? " Mr. Garfield replied that, according to hig own notions of proper legislative praise, his colleague could HIS FINANCIAL RECORD. 335 not counterpraise him any more than in stating that he (Mr. Garfield) had always cast his vote in favor of the resumption of specie payment. If he ever had cast a vote which was not against all schemes to delay that un necessarily, or to prevent it, then he had cast a vote of which his conscience and his judgment disapproved. [Applause on the Republican side.] He had cast as many votes as any member on the floor against Wall Street and against the business of gold gambling, which had been destroyed by resumption — gold gambling that had locked up $10,000,000 from the business capital of the country for fifteen years, locked it up away from all profitable investment and converted Wall Street into a faro hell. (Applause.) " Mr. Bright (Dem.), of Tennessee. — Has not Wall Street been simply transferred to the Treasury of the United States. "Mr. Garfield. — I hope that enough of the gold and silver of the country that has been hitherto locked up in Wall Street for gold gambling purposes has been trans ferred to the Treasury of the United States to break down the bulls and bears of Wall Street permanently and to maintain honest money in the country. (Applause.) " Mr. McMahon inquired if it was wrong to order the $10,000,000 to be reissued, when under the law they should be paid out in redemption of fractional currency. . " Mr. Garfield replied that if his colleague would in quire and find out how much of that $10,000,000 could ne spared, leaving enough to meet all the obligations of the reserve, he would be willing to vote that surplus for the purpose of paying arrears of pensions." CHAPTER IX. the credit mobilier and de golter charges — general Garfield's triumphant vindication. History of the Credit Mobilier Scheme — The Pacific Railway — Government Aid extended to H. Oakes Ames' Connection with the Road — Congress Investigates the Credit Mobilier — General Garfield's sworn Testimony before the Committee — He denies all Improper Connection with the Scheme — Publishes a Review of the Case — An Exhaustive Discussion of the Case — Testimony in the Matter — General Garfield's Response to the Charges of 1872 — Mr. Ames' Testimony Analyzed — Mr. Ames' Memoranda — The Check on the Sergeant-at-Arms — General Garfield's In terviews with Mr. Ames during the Investigation — Conclusions — Trium phant Vindication of General Garfield — All the Charges against him — Letter of Judge Poland — General Garfield Unanimously Acquitted of Wrong-doing — The De Golyer Pavement Company — Charges against General Garfield — His Triumphant Vindication of his Course — The Truth established at last. It could hardly be expected that one who had taken such an active and prominent part in our public affairs should escape the attacks of slander. General Garfield has ex perienced the fate of most public men. He has been misjudged, and false charges have been brought against him. Inasmuch as these charges have been made, it seems but just that we should reproduce them here, and then present General Garfield's triumphant and masterly vindication of his course. It was charged that he was a sharer in the unjust CREDIT MOBILIER TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 337 profits of the Credit Mobilier ring in Congress. To un derstand this question thoroughly it will be necessary to relate the history of that iniquitous scheme. One of the great public works of the Union, of which the whole country is justly proud, is the Pacific Rail road, extending from the Missouri River to the Pacific Ocean. The early history of the great road is a story of constant struggles and disappointments. It seemed to the soundest capitalists a mere piece of fool-hardiness to undertake to build a railroad across the continent and over the Rocky Mountains, and, although Government aid was liberally pledged to the undertaking, it did not, for a long time, attract to it the capital it needed. At length, after many struggles, the. doubt which had attended the enterprise was ended. Capital was found, and with it men ready to carry on the work. In Sep tember, 1864, a contract was entered into between the Union Pacific 'Company and H. W. Hoxie, for the build ing by said Hoxie of one hundred miles of the road from Omaha west. Mr. Hoxie at once assigned this contract to a company, as had been the understanding from the first. This company, then comparatively unknown, but since very famous, was known as the Credit Mobilier of America. The company had bought up an old charter that had been granted by the Legislature of Pennsylvania to another company in that State, but which had not been used by them. " In 1865 or 1866, Oakes Ames, then a member of Congress from the State of Massachusetts, and his brother Oliver Ames, became interested in the Union Pacific Company, and also in the Credit Mobilier Coin- 22 338 JAMES A. GARFIELD. pany, as the agent for the construction of the road. The Messrs. Ames were men of very large capital, and of known character and integrity in business. By their ex ample and credit and the personal efforts of Mr. Oakes Ames, many men of capital were induced to embark in the enterprise, and to take stock in the Union Pacific Company, and also in the Credit Mobilier Company. Among them were the firm of S. Hooper & Co., of Boston, the leading member of which (Mr. Samuel Hooper) was then and is now a member of the House ; Mr. John B. Alley, then a member of the House from Massachusetts, and Mr. Grimes, then a senator from the State of Iowa. Notwithstanding the vigorous efforts of Mr. Ames and others interested .with him, great difficulty was expe rienced in securing the required capital. "In the spring of 1867, the Cridit Mobilier Company voted to add fifty per cent, to their capital stock, which was then $2,500,000 ; and to cause it to be readily taken, each subscriber to it was entitled to receive as a bonus an equal amount of first mortgage bonds of the Union Pacific Company. The old stockholders were entitled to take this increase, but even the favorable terms offered did not induce all the old stockholders to take it, and the stock of the Credit Mobilier Company was never considered worth its par value until after the execution of the Oakes Ames contract hereinafter mentioned. On the 16th day of August, 1867, a contract was executed between the Union Pacific Railroad and Oakes Ames, by which Mr. Ames contracted to build 667 miles of the Union Pacific Road at prices ranging from $42,000 to $96,000 per mile, amounting in the aggregate to CREDIT MOBILIER — TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 339 $47,000,000. Before the contract was entered into, it was 'understood that Mr. Ames was to transfer it to seven trustees who were to execute it, and the. profits of the contract were to be divided among the stockholders in the Credit Mobilier Company, who should comply with certain conditions set out in the instrument transferring the contract to the trustees. Subsequently, all the stock holders of the Credit Mobilier Company complied with the conditions named in the transfer, and thus became entitled to share in any profits said trustees might make in executing the contract. All the large stockholders in the Union Pacific were also stockholders in the Credit Mobilier, and the Ames contract and its transfer to trustees were ratified by the Union Pacific and received the assent of the great body of stockholders, but not of all. After the Ames contract had been executed, it was expected by those interested that, by reason of the enormous prices agreed to be paid for the work, very large profits would be derived from building the r^ad, and very soon the stock of the Credit Mobilier was un derstood to be worth much more than its par value. The stock was not in the market, and had no fixed market value, but the holders of it, in December, 1867, considered it worth at least double the par value, and in January or February, 1868, three or four times the par value ; but it does not appear that these facts were generally or publicly known, or that the holders of the stock desired they should be." As will be seen from the above statement, the stock holders of the Credit Mobilier were also stockholders in the Union Pacific Company. 340 JAMES A. GARFIELD. Like all great corporations of the present day, the Union Pacific Road was largely dependent upon the aid furnished by the Government for its success. The man agers of the company, being shrewd men, succeeded in placing all the burdens and risks of the enterprise upon the General Government, while they secured to them selves all the profits to be derived from the undertaking.* 'The Railroad Company was endowed by Act of Con gress with twenty alternate sections of land per mile, and had Government-loans of $16,000 per mile for about 200 miles ; thence $32,000 per mile through the Alkali Desert, about 600 miles, and thence in the Rocky Moun tains $48,000 per mile. The railroad company issued stock to the extent of about $10,000,000. This stock was received by stockholders on their payment of five per cent, of its face. When the Credit Mobilier came on the scene, all the assets of the Union Pacific were turned over to the new company in consideration of full paid shares of the new company's stock and its agreement to build the road. The Government, meanwhile, had al lowed its claim for its loan of bonds to become a second instead of a first mortgage, and permitted the Union Pacific Road to issue first mortgage bonds, which took precedence as a lien on the road. The Government lien thus became almost worthless, as the new mortgage, which took precedence, amounted to all the value of the road. The proceeds of this extraordinary transaction went to swell the profits of the Credit Mobilier, which had nothing to pay out except for the mere cost of con struction. This also explains why some of the dividends of the latter company were paid in Union Pacific bonds CREDIT MOBILIER TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 341 As a result of these processes, the bonded debts. of the railroad exceeded its cost by at least $40,000,000." Mr. Ames was deeply interested in the scheme, be ing, indeed, one of its principal managers. Being a mem ber of Congress, he was peculiarly prepared to appre ciate the value of Congressional assistance in behalf of the Credit Mobilier. It would seem that the object of the Credit Mobilier was to drain money from the Pacific road, and consequently from the Government, as long as possible. Any legislation on the part of Congress de signed to protect the interests of the Government, would, as a matter of course, be unfavorable to the Credit Mo bilier, and it was the aim of that corporation to prevent all such legislation. The price agreed upon for building the road was so exorbitant, and afforded such an iniqui tous profit to the Credit Mobilier, that it was very cer tain that some honest friend of the people would demand that Congress should protect the Treasury against such spoliation. It was accordingly determined to interest in the scheme enough members of Congress to prevent any protection of the national treasury at the expense of the unlawful gains of the Credit Mobilier. Mr. Oakes Ames, being in Congress, undertook to secure the desired hold upon his associates. The plan was simply to secure them by bribing them, and for this purpose a certain portion of the Credit Mobilier stock was placed in the hands of Mr. Ames, as trustee, to be used by him as he thought best for the interests of the company. Provided with this stock, Mr. Ames went to Wash ington, in December, 1867, at the opening of the session of Congress. "During that month," say the Poland 342 JAMES A. GARIIELD. Committee in their report, " Mr. Ames entered into con tracts with a considerable number of members of Con gress, both senators and representatives, to let them have shares of stock in the Credit Mobilier Company at par, with interest thereon from the first day of the pre vious July. It does not appear that in any instance he asked any of these persons to pay a higher price than the par value and interest, nor that Mr. Ames used any spe cial effort or urgency to get these persons to take it. In all these negotiations Mr. Ames did not enter into any de tails as to the value of the stock, or the amount of divi dend that might be expected upon it, but stated generally that it would be good stock, and in several instances said he would guarantee that they should get at least ten per cent, on their money. Some of these gentlemen, in their conversations with Mr. Ames, raised the question whether becoming holders of this stock would bring them into any embarrassment as members of Congress in their legisla tive action. Mr. Ames quieted such suggestions by say ing it could not, for the Union Pacific had received from Congress all the grants and legislation it wanted, and they should ask for nothing more. In some instances those members who contracted for stock paid to Mr. Ames the money for the price of the stock, par and interest; in others, where they had not the money, Mr. Ames agreed to ' carry ' the stock for them until they could get the money, or it should be met by the dividends. Mr. Ames was at this time a large stockholder in the Credit Mobilier, but he did not intend any of those transactions to be sales of his own stock, but intended to fulfil all these contracts from stock belonging to the company." CREDIT MOBILIER TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 343 " It is very easy, " says the New York Tribune, " to see that under these circumstances the stock of the Credit Mobilier was a very handsome investment, provided it could be purchased at par. Here was wherein Oakes Ames was such a profitable friend to Congressmen and senators. He let them in, as he phrases it, on the ground floor. They got their stock at par, and the divi dends which were ready to be paid were more than enough to pay for the stock. This is what is called in Wall Street parlance making one hand wash the other. The actual value of the stock thus sold at $100 a share would have been to anybody out of the circle of Oakes Ames' friends not purchasable for less than $300 or $400. But there was a film of decency thrown over the transactions by Mr. Ames, in charging several months' interest upon the stock at the time it was sold to the members of Congress. This interest had accrued while he was holding it to see where it could be placed to the best advantage." The motive of Mr. Ames in thus " placing," as he termed it, this immensely1 profitable stock among the members of Congress, is thus stated by the Poland Com mittee : " In relation to the purpose and motive of Mr. Ames in contracting to let members of Congress have Credit Mobilier stock at par, which he and all other owners of it considered worth at least double that sum, the committee, upon the evidence taken by them and sub mitted to the House, cannot entertain a doubt. When he said he did not suppose the Union Pacific Company would ask or need further legislation, he stated ^hat 344 JAMES A. GARFIELD. he believed to be true, but he feared the interests of the road might suffer by adverse legislation, and what he desired to accomplish was to enlist strength and friends 'in Congress who would resist any encroachment upon or interference with the rights and privileges already secured, and to that end wished to create in them an interest identical with his own. This purpose is clearly avowed in his letters to McComb, copied in the evi dence, where he says he intends to place the stock ¦ where it will do the most good to us,' and again, ' We want more friends in this Congress.' In his letter to McComb, and also in his statement prepared by coun sel, he gives the philosophy of his action, to wit : That he has found there is no difficulty in getting men to look after their own property. The committee are also satisfied . that Mr. Ames entertained a fear that when the true relations between the Credit Mobilier Com pany and the Union Pacific became generally known, and the means by which the great profits expected to be made were fully understood, there was danger that Congressional investigation and action would be in voked. The members of Congress with whom he dealt were generally those who had been friendly and favor able to a Pacific railroad, and Mr. Ames did not fear or expect to 'find them favorable to movements hostile to it, but he desired to stimulate their activity and watch fulness in opposition to any unfavorable action, by giv ing them a personal interest in the success of the enter- piise, especially so far as it affected the interest of the Credit Mobilier Company. " On the 9th day of December, 1867, Mr. C. C. CREDIT MOBILIER — TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 345 Washburn, of Wisconsin, introduced in the House a bill to regulate by law the rates of transportation over the Pacific railroads. Mr. Ames, as well as others interested in the Union Pacific Road, were opposed to this, and desired to defeat it. Other measures ap parently hostile to that company were subsequently introduced into the House, by Mr. Washburn, of Wis consin, and Mr. Washburn, of Illinois. The committee believe that Mr. Ames, in his distribution of the stock had specially in mind the hostile efforts of the Messrs. Washburn, and desired to gain strength to secure their defeat. The reference in one of his letters, to Wash burn's move makes this quite apparent." " The more recent legislation," says the New York Tribune, "which Ames' transactions with members of Congress had reference to, may be stated in a few words. Secretary Boutwell insisted that half the earn ings of the road in carrying mails and troops for the Government should be applied to the payment of in terest on the loans that the Government had made to the road. The legislation obtained overruled the Sec retary and enabled the road to postpone payment of interest until the bonds fell due — some thirty years hence. To sum up, it may be briefly stated that the Uuion Pacific and Credit Mobilier together got the pro ceeds of liberal United States land grants, of donations of communities near the road, and the entire subsidy of Government bonds, as a clear profit. The proceeds of the mortgage bonds which displaced the Government lien, were sufficient to have built the road. To the Original stockholders in the Union Pacific, the profit 346 JAMES A. GARFIELD. was something almost incredible. A share bought for $5 subscription became $100 Credit Mobilier, which paid, as we have seen in the evidence concerning the legislators who received it, dividends that amounted to at least treble its nominal value. It is, of course, evident that all legislation which favored the Union Pacific Railroad swelled the profits of the legislators who became stockholders in the Credit Mobilier. The awkwardness of this position was vastly increased by the thin disguise of purchase being torn away, under which the profit-bearing stock had been really the gift of Oakes Ames. The denial of the facts converted the transaction into a criminal act." Reduced to plain English, the story of the Credit Mobilier is simply this : The men entrusted with the management of the Pacific Road made a bargain with themselves to build the road for a sum equal to about twice its actual cost, and pocketed the profits, which have been estimated at about Thirty Millions of Dol lars — this immense sum coming out of the pockets of the taxpayers of the United States. This contract was made in October, 1867. " On June 17,1868, the stockholders of the Credit Mobilier received 60 per cent, in cash, and 40 per cent. in stock of the Union Pacific Railroad; on the 2d U July, 1868, 80 per cent, first mortgage bonds of the Union Pacific Railroad, and 100 per cent, stock ; July 3,1868, 75 per cent, stock, and 75 per cent, first mort gage bonds ; September 3, 1868, 100 per cent, stock, and 75 per cent, first mortgage bonds ; December 19, 1868, 200 per cent, stock} while, before this contract CREDIT MOBILIER — TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 347 was made, the stockholders had received, on the 26th of April, 1866, a dividend of 100 per cent, in stock of the Union Pacific Railroad ; on the 1st of April, 1867, 50 per cent, of first mortgage bonds were dis tributed; on the 1st of July, 1867, 100 per cent, in stock again." After offering this statement, it is hardly necessary to add that the vast property of the Pacific Road, which should have been used to meet its engagements, was soon swallowed up by the Credit Mobilier. This is the story of the Credit Mobilier, as far as the facts have been permitted to become known. We shall now see how it came to make such a noise in the world. Mr. Ames was not the only member of the company engaged in " placing " the stock where it would benefit the corporation. Dr. Durant, the President of the Pacific Railway, was engaged in securing his friends in the same way, and he received a portion of the stock to be used in this manner. Mr. Henry S. McComb, of Delaware, who was also interested in the scheme, now put in his claim for a part of the stock, which was being used as a cor ruption fund, " for his friends." His claim involved him in a quarrel with Oakes Ames, and Colonel McComb had the mortification of seeing the stock he claimed assigned to Mr. Ames, for the use of his friends. In the summer of 1872, in the midst of the Presiden tial campaign, the quarrel between Ames and McComb reached such a point, that it was impossible to keep it quiet. McComb made public the facts in the case, and published a list of the Congressmen with whom, Ames had said he had '' placed " the slock, naming the number 348 JAMES A. GARFIELD. of shares sold to each. These were : — Schuyler Colfax, Vice-President of the United States ; Henry Wilson, Sen ator from Massachusetts ; James W. Patterson, Senator from New Hampshire ; John A. Logan, Senator from Illinois; James G. Blaine, Member of Congress from Maine, and Speaker of the House of Representatives; W. D. Kelley, of Pennsylvania; James A. Garfield, of Ohio ; James Brooks, of New York ; John A. Bingham, of Ohio ; Henry L. Dawes, of Massachusetts ; Glenni W. Scofield, of Pennsylvania, and one or two others, who were not at the time of the exposure members of Con gress. As may be supposed, the publication of the charges, and the list of names, created a storm of excitement throughout the country. The members implicated, as a rule, indignantly denied the charge of having purchased or owned Credit Mobilier stock. They declared them selves incapable of holding such stock, as it would have been, they said, a high crime against morality and de cency to be connected in any way with the Credit Mo bilier. These denials were generally accepted. The per sons making them had always borne high characters for veracity and integrity. Partisan orators and newspapers made the most of the charges, and made them so odious that the persons implicated repeated their denials with more earnestness. When Congress assembled, in December, 1872, Mr. Blaine, the Speaker of the House, wishing to vindicate his character, which he declared had been unjustly as sailed, asked the House of Representatives to appoint a eoinmittee to inquire into the charges of Ames and CREDIT MOBILIER TRIUMFHANT VINDICATION. 349 McComb, and to report the result of their investigations. The committee was appointed, with Mr. Poland, of Ver mont, as its chairman. An effort was made to conduct the investigation in secret ; but the indignant public de manded and obtained an open trial. On the 18th of February, 1873, the committee reported to the House the result of its investigation. » General Garfield was one of those charged with par ticipating in the corrupt profits of the Credit Mobilier. He made public an emphatic denial of the charge, and cordially aided in the effort to have the charges investi gated and the truth brought to light. Feeling that he had nothing to conceal, he was anxious that the most searching inquiry should be made into the matter.' On the 14th of January, 1873, he appeared before the in vestigating committee, and testified as follows, under oath : " The first I ever heard of the Credit Mobilier was sometime in 1866 or 1867 — I cannot fix the date — when George Francis Train called on me and said he was or ganizing a company to bo known as the Credit Mobilier of America, to be formed on the model of the Credit Mobilier of France ; that the object of the company was to purchase lands and build houses along the line of the Pacific Railroad at points where cities and villages were likely to spring up ; that he had no doubt that money thus invested would double or treble itself each year ; that subscriptions were limited to $1,000 each, and he wished me to subscribe. He showed me a long list of subscribers, among them Mr. Oakes Ames, to whom he referred me for further information concerning the enter- 350 JAMES A. GARFIELD. prise. I answered that I had not the money to spare, and if I had I would not subscribe without knowing more about the proposed organization. Mr. Train left me, saying he would holu a place open for me, and hoped I would conclude to subscribe. The same day I asked Mr, Ames what he thought of the enterprise. He expressed the opinion tfyat the investment would be safe and profit able. " I heard nothing further on the subject for a year or more, and it was almost forgotten, when sometime, I should say during the long session of 1868, Mr. Ames spoke of it again, said the company had organized, was doing well, and, he thought, would soon pay large divi dends. He said that some of the stock was left, or was to be left, in his hands to sell, and I could take the amount which Mr. Train had offered me by paying the $1,000 and accrued interest. He said if I was not able to pay for it he would hold it for me until I could pay or until some of the dividends were payable. I told him I would consider the matter, but would not agree to take any stock until I knew, from an examination of the char ter and the conditions of the subscription, the extent to which I would become pecuniarily liable. He said he was not sure, but thought a stockholder would only be liable for the par value of his stock ; that he had not the stock and papers with him, but would have them after awhile. From the case as presented I should probably have taken the stock if I had been satisfied in regard to the extent of pecuniary liability. Thus the matter rested, I think, until the following year. During that interval I under stood that there were dividends due amounting to nearly CREDIT MOBILIER— TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 351 three times the par value of the stock. But in the mean time I had heard that the company was involved in some controversy with the Pacific Railroad and that Mr. Ames' right to sell the stock was denied. When I next saw Mr. Ames I told him I had concluded not to take the stock. There the matter ended, so far as I was con cerned, and I had no further knowledge of the company's operations until the subject began to be discussed in tho newspapers last fall (1872). Nothing was ever said to me by Mr. Train or Mr. Ames to indicate or imply that the Credit Mobilier was or could be in any way con nected with the legislation of Congress for the Pacific Railroad or any other purpose. Mr. Ames never gave nor offered to give me any stock or other valuable thing as a gift. I once asked and obtained from him, and afterwards repaid to him, a loan of $300 ; that amount is the only valuable thing I ever received from or delivered to him. I never owned, received, or agreed to receive any stock of the Credit Mobilier or of the Union Pacific Railroad, nor any dividends or profits arising from either of them." Not content with denying the charges against him under oath, General Garfield, on the 3d of March, 1873, gave notice in the House that he should publish a review of the matter, and a full vindication of his course. In May, 1873, he published the following review. We reproduce it entire, notwithstanding its length, as it is of the greatest importance to those who would know the true history of the case. The old charges will be revived and used during the Presidential campaign by partisan enemies of the Republican candidate, and it is 352 JAMES A. GARFIELD. only right that every friend of General Garfield should have his masterly and unanswerable vindication at hand. The review was prefaced with the following note : " Since this review was written, the telegraph has announced the death of Mr. Ames. This circumstance may raise a question as to the propriety of publishing this paper ; but I gave notice in the House of Repre sentatives, on the 3d of March last, that I should pub lish such a review, and I then indicated its scope and character. Furthermore, justice to the living cannot wrong the memory of the dead. " In revising these pages, as they are passing through the press, I am glad to find no expressions, prompted by a spirit of bitterness, which the presence of death re quires me to erase. " J. A. Garfield." "Washington, D. C, May 8, 1873." REVIEW OF THE TRANSACTIONS OF THE CREDIT MOBILIER COMPANY, And an Examination of that Portion of the Testimony taken by the Committee of Investigation and reported to the House of Representatives at the last session of the forty-second Congress, which relates to Mr. Garfield. The events of the late winter recall forcibly a decla ration made more than twenty-two centuries ago, by a man who possessed a profound knowledge of human na ture and society. In answering a grave charge made CREDIT MOBILIER — TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 353 against his public conduct, he said he did not stand on equal ground with his accusers, for the reason that people listen to accusation more readily than to defence. This remark has sometimes been thought cynical and unjust; but there is much in our recent history that gives it force. In no period of the political life of this country has the appetite for scandal been keener, or its exercise less restrained, than during the last year. One of our most brilliant and influential journalists, in an address deliv ered a few days since to a convention of his professional brethren in Indiana, while speaking of the present tone of the press, used this emphatic language : The law presumes a man to be innocent until he is proved guilty. The press, not merely usurping the functions of the law in ar raigning a man whom the constable has no warrant to arrest, goes still farther, and assumes him, prima facie, to be guilty. After many weeks, if the case of the accused comes to trial, he is ac quitted ; the law makes him an honest man ; but there is the newspaper which has condemned him, and cannot, with a dozen retractions, erase the impression left and the damage done by a single paragraph. It might not be becoming in a layman, who feels in his own case the force of this paragraph, to volunteer such a declaration ; but it is quite proper for him to tes tify to its truth when thus forcibly stated. This paragraph from the address of the journalist finds a striking illustration in the history of the subject now under review. In the autumn of 1872, during the excitement of the Presidential campaign, charges of the most serious 23 354 JAMES A. GARFIELD. character were made against ten or twelve persons who were then, or had recently been, senators and represen tatives in Congress, to the effect that, five years ago, they had sold themselves for sundry amounts of stock of the Credit Mobilier Company and bonds of the Pacific Railroad Company. The price at which different mem bers were alleged to have bartered away their personal honor and their official influence was definitely set down in the newspapers ; their guilt was assumed, and the public vengeance was invoked not only upon them, but also upon the party to which most of them belonged. CREDIT MOBILIER INVESTIGATION. By a resolution of the House, introduced by one of the accused members, and adopted on the first day of the late session, an investigation of these charges was or dered. The parties themselves and many other wit nesses were examined ; the records of the Credit Mobi lier Company and of the Pacific Railroad Company were produced ; and the results of the investigation were reported to the House on the 18th of February. The report, with the accompanying testimony, was brought up in the House for consideration on the 25th of Feb ruary, and the discussion was continued until the sub ject was finally disposed of, three days before the close of the session. The investigation was scarcely begun before it was manifest that the original charge, that stock was given to members as a consideration for their votes, wras wholly abandoned, there being no proof whatever to support it. But the charge assumed a new form, namely : That CREDIT MOBILIER — TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. -355, the stock had been sold to members, at a price known to be greatly below its actual value, for the purpose of se curing their legislative influence in favor of those who were managing and manipulating the Pacific Railroad for their own private advantage and to the injury both of the trust and of the United States. Eight of those against whom charges had been made in the public press, myself among the number, were still members of the House of Representatives, and were specially men tioned in the report. The committee recommended tho adoption of resolutions for the expulsion of Messrs. Ames and Brooks, the latter on charges in no way con nected with Mr. Ames or the other members mentioned. They recommended the expulsion of Mr. Ames for an attempt to influence the votes and decisions of mem bers of Congress by interesting them in the stock of the Credit Mobilier, and through it in the stock of the Union Pacific Railroad. They found that though Mr. Ames in no case disclosed his purpose to these mem bers, yet he hoped so to enlist their interest that they would be inclined to favor any legislation in aid of the Pacific Railroad and its interests, and that he declared to the managers of the Credit Mobilier Company at the time that he was thus using the stock which had been placed in his hands by the. company. Concerning the members to whom he had sold, or offered to sell, the stock, the committee say that they " do not find that Mr. Ames, in his negotiations with the persons above named, entered into any detail of the relations between the Credit Mobilier Company and the Union Pacific Company, or gave them any specific in- 356 JAMES A. GARFIELD. formation as to the amount of dividends they would be likely to receive farther than has been already stated, [viz., that in some cases he had guaranteed a profit of ten per cent.] . . . They do not find as to the members of the present House above named, that they were aware of the object of Mr. Ames, or that they had any other purpose in taking this stock than to make a profitable investment. . . . They have not been able to find that any of these members of Congress have been affected in their official action in consequence of interest in the Credit Mobilier stock. . . . They do not find that either of the above-named gentlemen in contracting with Mr. Ames had any corrupt motive or purpose himself or was aware Mr. Ames had any. Nor did either of them suppose he was guilty of any impropriety or even in delicacy in becoming a purchaser of this stock." And finally, that " the committee find nothing in the con duct or motives of either of those members in taking this stock, that calls for any recommendation by the committee of the House." (See pp. viii. ix. x.) In the case of each of the six members just referred to, the committee sum up the results of the testimony, and from that summary the conclusions above quoted are drawn. In regard to me, the committee find : That, in December, 1867, or January, 1868, I agreed to pur chase ten shares of Credit Mobilier stock of Mr. Ames, for $1,000, and the accrued interest from the previous July; that in June, 1868, Mr. Ames paid me a check on the Sergeant-at-Arms of the House for $329, as a balance of dividends on the stock, above the purchase- price and accrued interest; and that thereafter, there CREDIT MOBILIER TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 357 were no payments or other transactions between us, or any communication on the subject until the investigation began in December last. (See Report, p. vii.) I took the first opportunity offered by the completion of public business to call the attention of the House to the above summary of the testimony in reference to me. On the 3d of March I made the following remarks, in the House of Representatives, as recorded in the Con gressional Globe for that day : ,Mr. Garfield, of Ohio. — I rise to a personal explanation. Dur ing the late investigation by the committee of which the gentle man from Vermont (Mr. Poland) was the chairman, I pursued what seemed to be the plain path of duty, to keep silence except when I was called upon to testify before the committee. When testimony was given which appeared to be in conflict with mine, I waited, expecting to be called again if anything was needed from me in reference to these discrepancies. I was riot recalled ; and when the committee submitted their report to the House, a con siderable portion of the testimony relating to me had not been printed. In the discussion which followed here I was prepared to sub mit some additional facts and considerations in case my own con duct came up for consideration in the House ; but the whole sub ject was concluded without any direct reference to myself, and since then the whole time of the House has been occupied with the public business. I now desire to make a single remark on this subject in the hearing of the House. Though the committee acquitted me of all charges of corruption in action or intent, yet there is in the report a summing up of the facts in relation to me which I respectfully protest is not warranted by the testimony. I gay this with the utmost respect for the committee, and without intending any reflection upon them. I cannot now enter upon the discussion ; but I propose, before long, to make a statement to the public, setting forth more fully the grounds of my dissent from the summing up to which I have 158 JAMES A. GARFIELD. DO referred. I will only say now that the testimony which I gave before the committee is a statement of the facts in the case as I have understood them from the beginning. More than three years ago, on at least two occasions^ I stated the case to two per sonal friends substantially as I stated it before the committee, and I here add that nothing in my conduct or conversation has at any time been in conflict with my testimony. For the present I de sire only to place on record this declaration and notice. In pursuance of this notice, I shall consider so much of the history of the Credit Mobilier Company as has any relation to myself. To render the discussion intel ligible, I will first state briefly the offences which that corporation committed, as found by the committees of the House. HISTORY OP THE CREDIT MOBILIER COMPANY. The Credit Mobilier Company is a corporation organ ized under the laws of the State of Pennsylvania, and authorized by its charter to purchase and sell various kinds of securities and to make advances of money and credit to railroad and other improvement companies. Its charter describes a class of business which, if honestly conducted, any citizen may properly engage in. Dn the 16th of August, 1867, Mr. Oakes Ames made a contract with the Union Pacific Railroad Com pany to build six hundred and sixty-seven miles of road, from the one hundredth meridian westward, at rates rang ing from $42,000 to $96,000 per mile. For executing this contract he was to receive in the aggregate $47,925,000, in cash or in the securities of the company. On the 15th of October, a triple contract was made between Mr. Ames of the first pari, seven persons as CREDIT MOBILIER TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 359 trustees of the second part, and the Credit Mobilier Com pany of the third part, by the terms of which the Credit Mobilier Company was to advance money to build the road, and to receive thereon seven per cent, interest and two and a half per cent, commission ; the seven trustees were to execute the Ames contract, and the profits there on were to be divided among them, and such other stock holders of the Credit Mobilier Company as should deliver to them an irrevocable proxy to vote the stock of the Union Pacific held by them. The principal stockholders of the Credit Mobilier Company were also holders of a majority of the stock of the Union Pacific Railroad. On the face of this agreement, the part to be per formed by the Credit Mobilier Company as a corporation was simple and unobjectionable. It was to advance money to the contractors and to receive therefor about ten per cent, as interest and commission. This explains how it was that in a suit in the courts of Pennsylvania in 1870, to collect the State tax on the profits of the company, its managers swore that the company had never declared dividends to an aggregate of more than twelve present. The company proper did not receive the profits of the Oakes Ames contract. The profits were paid only to the seven trustees and to such stockholders of the Credit Mobilier as had delivered to them the proxies on their Pacific Railroad stock. In other words, a ring in side the Credit Mobilier obtained the control both of that corporation and of the profits of the Ames contract. By a private agreement made in writing October 16, 1867, the day after the triple contract was signed, the seven trustees pledged themselves to each other so to 360 JAMES A. GARFIELD. vote all the Pacific Railroad stock which they neld in their own right or by proxy, as to keep in power all the members of the then existing board of directors of the railroad company not appointed by the President of the United States, or such other persons as said board should nominate. By this agreement, the election of a majority of the directors was wholly within the power of the seven trustees. From all this it resulted that the Ames con tract and the triple agreement made in October amounted in fact to a contract made by seven leading stockholders of the Pacific Railroad Company with themselves; so that the men who fixed the price at which the road was to be built were the same men who would receive the profits of the contract. The wrong in this transaction consisted, first in the fact that the stockholding directors of the Pacific Rail road, being the guardians of a great public trust, con tracted with themselves ; and, second, that they paid themselves an exorbitant price for the work to be done, a price which virtually brought into their own possession, as private individuals, almost all the property of the rail road company. The six hundred and sixty-seven miles covered by the contract included one hundred and thirty- eight miles already completed, the profits on which inured to the benefit of the contractors. (See Report of Credit Mobilier Committee, No. 2, p. xiii.) The Credit Mobilier Company had already been en gaged in various enterprises before the connection with the Ames contract. George Francis Train had once been the principal owner of its franchises, and it had owned some western lands (Wilson's Report, pp. 497, 8) ; but CREDIT MOBILIER TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 361 its enterprises had not been very remunerative, and its stock had not been worth par. The triple contract of October, 1867, gave it at once considerable additional value. It should be borne in mind, however, that the relations of the Credit Mobilier Company to the seven trustees, to the Oakes Ames contract, and to the Pacific Railroad Company, were known to but few persons until long afterward, and that it was for the interest of the parties to keep them secret. Indeed, nothing was known of it to the general public until the facts were brought out in the recent investigations. In view of the facts above stated, it is evident that a purchaser of such shares of Credit Mobilier stock as were brought under the operation of the triple contract" would be a sharer in the profits derived by that arrangement from the assets of the Pacific Railroad, a large part of which consisted of bonds and lands granted to the road by the United States. The holding of such stock by a member of Congress would depend for its moral qualities wholly upon the fact whether he did or did not know of the arrangement out of which the profits would come. If he knew of the fraudulent arrangement by which the bonds and lands of the United States delivered to the Union Pacific Railroad Company for the purpose of con structing its road were to be paid out at enormously extravagant rates, and the proceeds to be paid out as dividends to a ring of stockholders made the Credit Mo bilier Company, he could not with any propriety hold such stock, or agree to hold it, or any of its proceeds. And for a member of Congress, knowing the facts, to hokl aoder advisement a proposition to buy this stock would 362 JAMES A. GARFIELD. be morally as wrong as to hold it and receive the profits upon it. If it was morally wrong to purchase it, it was morally wrong to hesitate whether to purchase it or not. I put the case on the highest ethical ground, and ask that this rule be applied in all its severity in judging ol my relations on this subject. i PROPOSITIONS TO BE DISCUSSED. The committee found, as already stated, that none oJ the six members to whom Mr. Ames sold, or proposed to sell; the stock, knew of this arrangement. I shall, how ever, discuss the subject only in so far as relates to me, and shall undertake to establish three propositions : First. That I never purchased nor agreed to pur chase the stock, nor received any of its dividends. Second. That though an offer was made, which I had some time under advisement, to sell me $1,000 worth of the stock, I did not then know, nor had I the means of knowing, the real conditions with which the stock was connected, or the method by which its profits were to be made. Third. That my testimony before the committee is a statement of the facts as I have always understood them ; and that neither before the committee nor elsewhere has there been, on my part, any prevarication or evasion on the subject. MR. GARFIELD'S TESTIMONY My testimony was delivered before the investigating committee on the 14th of January. That portion which precedes the cross-examination, I had written out soon CREDIT MOBILIER — TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 363 after the committee was appointed. I quote from it, with the cross-examination, in full, as found recorded oa> pp. 128 to 131 : Washington, D. C, January 14, 1875. J. A. Garfield, a member of the United States House of Repre sentatives, from the State of Ohio, having been duly sworn, made the following statement : The first I ever heard of the Credit Mobilier was sometime in 18C6 or 1867 — I cannot fix the date — when George Francis Train called on me and said he was organizing a company to be known as the Credit Mobilier of America, to be formed on the model of the Credit Mobilier of France ; that the object of the company was to purchase land and build houses along the line of the Pa cific Railroad at points where cities and villages were likely to spring up ; that he had no doubt that money thus invested would double or treble itself each year ; that subscriptions were limited to $1,000 each, and he wished me to subscribe. He showed me a long list of subscribers, among them Mr. Oakes Ames, to whom he referred me for further information concerning the enterprise. I answered that I had not the money to spare, and if I had I would not subscribe without knowing more about the proposed organization. Mr. Train left me, saying he would hold a place open for me, and hoped I would yet conclude to subscribe. The same day I asked Mr. Ames what he thought of the enterprise. He expressed the opinion that the investment would be safe and profitable. I heard nothing further on the subject for a year or more, and it was almost forgotten", when sometime, I should say, during the long session of 1868, Mr. Ames spoke of it again ; said the com pany had organized, was doing well, and he thought would soon pay large dividends. He said that some of the stock had been left or was to be left in his hands to sell, and I could take the amount which Mr. Train had offered me, by paying the $1,000 and the accrued interest. He said if I was not able to pay for it then, he would hold it for me till I could pay, or until some oJ the dividends were payable. I told him I would consider the 364 JAMES A. GARFIELD. matter ; but would not agree to take any stock until I knew, from an examination of the character and the conditions of the sub scription, the extent to which I should become pecuniarily liable. He said he was not sure, but thought a stockholder would be liable only for the par value of his stock ; that he had not the stock and papers with him, but would have them after a while. From the case, as presented, I should probably have taken the stock if I had been satisfied in regard to the extent of pecuniary liability. Thus the matter rested for some time, I think until the following year. During that interval I understood that there were dividends due amounting to nearly three times the par value of the stock. But in the meantime I had heard that the com pany was involved in some controversy with the Pacific Railroad, and that Mr. Ames's right to sell the stock was denied. When I next saw Mr. Ames I told him I had concluded not to take the stock. There the matter ended, so far as I was concerned, and I had no further knowledge of the company's operations until the subject began to be discussed in the newspapers last fall. Nothing was ever said to me by Mr. Train or Mr. Ames to in dicate or imply that the Credit Mobilier was or could be in any way connected with the legislation of Congress for the Pacific Railroad or for any other purpose. Mr. Ames never gave, nor offered to give, me any stock or other valuable thing as a gift. I once asked and obtained from him, and afterwards repaid to him, a loan of $300 ; that amount is the only valuable thing. I ever re ceived from or delivered to him. I never owned, received, or agreed to receive any stock of the Credit Mobilier or of the Union Pacific Railroad, nor any divi dends or profits arising from either of them. By the Chairman : Question. Had this loan you speak of any connection in any way with your conversation in regard to the Cr6dit Mobilier stock ? Answer. No connection in any way except in regard to the time of payment. Mr. Ames stated to me that if I concluded to sub scribe for the Credit Mobilier stock, I could allow the loan to re- CREDIT MOBILIER — TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 365 main until the payment on that was adjusted. I never regarded it as connected in any other way with the stock enterprise. Q. Do you remember the time of that transaction ? A. I do not remember it precisely. I should think it was in the session of 1868. I had been to Europe the fall before and was in debt, and borrowed several sums of money at different times and from dif ferent persons. This loan from Mr. Ames was not at his instance; I made the request myself. I think I had asked one or two per sons before him for the loan. Q. Have you any knowledge in reference to any dealings of Mr. Ames with any gentlemen in Congress in reference to the stock of the Credit Mobilier ? A. No, sir ; I have not. I had no knowledge that Mr. Ames had ever talked with anybody but myself. It was a subject I gave but little attention to ; in fact, many of the details had almost passed out of my mind until they were called up in the late campaign. By Mr. Black : Q. Did you say you refused to take the stock simply because there was a lawsuit about it ? A. No ; not exactly that. I do not remember any other reason which I gave to Mr. Ames than that I did not wish to take stock in anything- that would involve controversy. I think I gave him no other reason than that. Q. When you ascertained the relation that this company had with the Union Pacific Railroad Company, and whence its profits were to be derived, would you have considered that a sufficient reason for declining it irrespective of other considerations ? A. It would have been as the case was afterwards stated. Q. At the time you talked with Mr. Ames, before you rejected the proposition, you did not know whence the profits of the com pany were to be derived ? A. I did not. I do not know that Mr. Ames withheld, intentionally, from me any information. I had derived my original knowledge of the organization of the company from Mr. Train. He made quite an elaborate statement of its purposes, and I proceeded in subsequent conversations upon the supposition that the organization was unchanged. I ought to iay for myself, as well as for Mr. Ames, that he never said any 366 JAMES A. GARFIELD. word to me that indicated the least desire to influence my legis lative action in any way. If he had any such purpose, he cer tainly never said anything to me which would indicate it. Q. You know now, and have known for a long time, that Mr. Ames was deeply interested in the legislation on this subject : A. I supposed that he was largely interested in the Union Pacific Railroad. I have heard various statements to that effect. I can not say I had any such information of my own knowledge. Q. You mean that he did not electioneer with you or solicit your vote ? A. Certainly not. None of the conversations I ever had with him had any reference to such legislation. By Mr. Merrick : Q. Have you any knowledge of any other member of Congress being concerned in the Credit Mobilier stock ? A. No, sir ; I have not. Q. Or any stock in the Union Pacific Railroad ? A. I have not. I can say to the committee that I never saw, I believe, in my life, a certificate of stock of the Union Pacific Railroad Company, and I never saw any certificate of stock of the Credit Mobilier, until Mr. Brooks exhibited one, a few days ago, in the House of Representatives. Q. Were any dividends ever tendered to you on the stock of the Credit Mobilier upon the supposition that you were to bo a subscriber ? A. No, sir. Q. This loan of $300 you have repaid, if I understand you correctly ? A. Yes, sir. By Mr. McCrary : Q. You never examined the charter of the Gr6dit Mobilier to see what were its objects ? A. No, sir ; I never saw it. Q. If I understood you, you did not know that the Credit Mo* bilier had any connection with the Union Pacific Railroad Com pany ? A. I understood from the statement of Mr. Train that its objects were connected with the lands of the Union Pacific Rail road Company and the development and settlements along that road ; but that it had any relation to the Union Pacific Railroad CREDIT MOBILIER — TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 367 other than that, I did not know. I think I did hear also that the company was investing some of its earnings in the bonds of the road. Q. He stated it was for the purpose of purchasing land and ouilding houses ? A. That was the statement of Mr. Train. I think he said in that connection that he had already been doing something of that kind at Omaha, or was going to do it. Q. You did not know that the object was to build the Union Pacific Railroad ? A. No, sir ; I did not. This is the case as I understand it, and as I have always understood it. In reviewing it, after all that has been said and written during the past winter, there are no substantial changes which I could now make, except to render a few points more definite. Few men can be certain that they give with absolute correctness the de tails of conversations and transactions after a lapse of five years. Subject to this limitation I have no doubt of the accuracy of my remembrance concerning this transaction. From this testimony it will be seen that when Mr. Ames offered to sell me the stock in 1867-68, my only knowledge of the character and objects of the Credit Mo bilier Company was obtained from Mr. Train, at least as early as the winter of 1866-67, long before the company had become a party to the construction contract. It has been said that I am mistaken in thinking it was the Credit Mobilier that Mr. Train offered me in 1866-67. I think I am not. Mr. Dnrant, in explaining his con nection with the Credit Mobilier Company, says (pp. 169, 17C) : I sent Mr. Train to Philadelphia. We wanted it (the Credit Mobilier) for a stock operation, but we could not agree what was 368 JAMES A. GARFIELD. to be done with it. Mr. Train proposed to go on an expanded scale, but I abandoned it. I think Mr. Train got some subscrip tions ; what they were I do not know. It has been said that it is absurd to suppose that in telligent men, familiar with public affairs, did not under stand all about the relation of the Credit Mobilier Com pany to the Pacific Railroad Company. It is a sufficient answer to say that, until the present winter, a few men either in or out of Congress ever understood it, and it was for the interest of those in the management of that arrangement to prevent these facts from being known. This will appear from the testimony of the Hon. J. F. Wilson, who purchased ten shares of the stock in 1868. In the spring of 1869 he was called upon professionally to give an opinion as to the right of holders of Pacific Railroad stock to vote their own shares, notwithstand ing the proxy they had given to the seven trustees. To enable him to understand the case, a copy of the triple contract was placed in his hands. He says (page 213; : Down to the time these papers were placed in my hands, 1 knew almost nothing of the organization and details of the Credit Mobilier, or the value of its stock, but then saw that here was abundant ground for future trouble and litigation, and, as one of the results, sold out my interest. And again (p. 216) : Q. Do you, or did you know, at the time you had this nego tiation with Mr. Ames, the value of the Credit Mobilier stock ? A. I did not ; and I wish to state here, in regard to that, that it was a very difficult thing to ascertain what was the value of the stock. Those who, as I say in my statement, possessed the secreta CREDIT MOBILIER TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 369 of the Credit Mobilier, kept them to themselves ; and I never was able to get any definite information as to what the value of the stock was. When, in the winter of 1867-68, Mr. Ames proposed lo sell me some of the stock, I regarded it as a mere repe tition of the offer made by Mr. Train more than a year before. The company was the same, and the amount offered me was the same. Mr. Ames knew it had for merly been offered me, for I had then asked him his opinion of such an investment; and having understood the objects of the company, as stated by Mr. Train, I did not inquire further on that point. There could not be the slightest impropriety in taking the stock, had the objects of the company been such as Mr. Train represented them to me. The only question on which I then hesitated was that of the personal pe cuniary liability attaching to a subscription ; and, to settle that question, I asked to see the charter, and the conditions on which the stock were based. I have no doubt Mr. Ames expected I would subscribe. But more than a year passed without further discussion of the sub ject. The papers were not brought, and the purchase never was made. In the winter of 1869-70, I received the first intima tion I ever had of the real nature of the connection be tween the Credit Mobilier Company and the Pacific Rail road Company, in a private conversation with the Hon. J. S. Black, of Pennsylvania. Finding in the course of that conversation that he was familiar with the history of the enterprise, I told him all I knew about the matter, and informed him of the offer that had been made me He 24 ' 370 JAMES A. GARFIELD. expressed the opinion that the managers of the Credit Mobilier were attempting to defraud the Pacific Railroad Company, and informed me that Mr. Ames was pretend ing to have sold stock to members of Congress, for the purpose of influencing their action in any legislation that might arise on the subject. Though I had neither done nor said an3rthing which placed me under any obligation to take the stock, I at once informed Mr. Ames that if he was still holding the offer open to me he need do so no longer, for I would not. take the stock.. This I did immediately after the con versation with Judge Black, which according to his own recollection as well as mine, was early in the winter of 1869-70. One circumstance has given rise to a painful conflict of testimony between Mr. Ames and myself. I refer to the loan of $300. Among the various criticisms that have been made on this subject, it is said to be a suspi cious circumstance that I should have borrowed so small a sum of money from Mr. Ames about this time. As stated in my testimony, I had just returned from Europe, only a few days before the session began, and the ex penses of the trip had brought me short of funds. I might have alluded in the same connection to the fact, that before going abroad I had obtained money from a banker in New York, turning over to him advanced drafts for several months of my Congressional salary when it should be due. And needing a small sum, early in the session, for current expenses, I asked it of Mr. Ames, for the reason that he had volunteered to put me in the way of making what he thought would be a profitable invest- CREDIT MOBILIER— TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. S71 ment. He gave me the money, asking for no receipt, but saying at the time that if I concluded to take the stock we would settle both matters together. I am not able to fix the exact date of the loan, but it was probably in January, 1868. Mr. Ames seemed to have forgotten this circum stance until I mentioned it to him after the investigation began ; for he said in his first testimony (p. 28) that he had forgotten that he had let me have any money. I neglected to pay him this money until after the conver sation with Judge Black, partly because of my pecu niary embarrassments, and partly because no conclusion had been reached in regard to the purchase of the stock. When I repaid him I took no receipt, as I had given none at the first. Mr. Ames said once or twice, in the course of his testimony, that I did not repay it, although he says in regard to it, on page 358, that he does not know and cannot remember. ADDITIONAL TESTIMONY. On these differences of recollection between Mr. Ames and myself, it is not so important to show that my statement is the correct one, as to show that I have made it strictly in accordance with my understanding of the facts. And this I am able to show by proof entirely independent of my own testimony. In the spring of 1868, the Hon. J. P. Robison, of Cleveland, Ohio, was my guest here in Washington, and Bpent nearly two weeks with me during the trial of the impeachment of Andrew Johnson There has existed 372 JAMES A. GARFIELD. between us an intimate acquaintance of long standing, and I have often consulted him on business affairs. On meeting him since the adjournment of Congress, he in forms me that while he was visiting me on the occasion referred to, I stated to him the offer of Mr. Ames, and asked him his opinion of it. The following letter, just received from him, states the conversation as he remem bers it : Cleveland, Ohio, May 1, 1873. Dear General : — I send you the facts concerning a conversa tion which I had with you (I think in the spring of 1868), when I was stopping in Washington for some days, as your guest, during the trial of the impeachment of President Johnson. While there, you told me that Mr. Ames had offered you a chance to invest a small amount in a company that was to operate in lands and buildings along the Pacific Railroad, which he (Ames) said would be a good thing. You asked me what I thought of it as a busi ness proposition; that you had not determined what you would do about it, and suggested to me to talk with Ames, and form my own judgment; and if I thought well enough of it to advance the money and buy the stock on joint account with you, and let you pay me interest on the one-half, I could do so. But I did not Ihink well of the proposition as a business enterprise, and did not talk with Mr. Ames on the subject. After this talk, having at first told you I would give the sub ject thought, and perhaps talk with Ames, I told you one evening that I did not think well of the proposition, and had not spoken to Ames on the subject. Yours, truly, J. P. ROBISON. Hon. J. A. Garfield. I subjoin two other letters, which were written about the time the report of the committee was made, and to which I refer in my remarks made on the 3d of March in the House of Representatives. The first is from a CREDIT MOBILIER — TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 373 citizen of the town where I reside ; and the time of the conversation to which it alludes was, as near as I can remember, in the fall of 1868, during the recess of Con gress : Hiham, Ohio, February 18, 1873. Dear Sir : — It may be relevant to the question at issue be tween yourself and Mr. Oakes Ames, in the Credit Mobilier inves tigation, for me to state that three or four years ago, in a private conversation, you made a statement to me involving the substance of your testimony before the Poland Committee, as published in the newspapers. The material points of your statement were these : That you had been spoken to by George Francis Train, who offered you some shares of the Credit Mobilier stock ; that you told him that you had no money to invest in stocks ; that subse quently you had a conversation in relation to the matter with Mr. Ames ; that Ames offered to carry the stock for you until you could pay for it, if you cared to buy it ; and that you had told him in that case perhaps you would take it, but would not agree to do so until you had inquired more fully into the matter. Such an arrangement as this was made, Ames agreeing to carry the stock until you should decide. In this way the matter stood, as I understood it, at the time of our conversation. My understand ing was distinct that you had not accepted Mr. Ames's proposi tion, but that the shares were still held at your option. You stated further, that the company was to operate in real property along the line of the Pacific road. Perhaps I should add that this conversation, which I have always remembered very dis tinctly, took place here in Hiram. I have remembered the con versation the more distinctly from the circumstances that gave rise to it. Having been intimately acquainted with you for twelve or fifteen years, and having had a considerable knowledge of your pecuniary affairs. I asked you how you were getting on, and especially whether you were managing to reduce your debts. In reply you gave me a detailed statement, of your affairs, and con cluded by saying you had 'had some stock offered you, which, if 374 JAMES A. GARFIELD. you bought it, would probably make you some money. You then proceeded to state the case, as I have stated it above. I cannot fix the time of this conversation more definitely than to say it was certainly three, and probably four, years ago. Very truly, yours, B. A. Hinsdale, President of Hiram College. Hon. J. A. Garfield, Washington, D. G. The other letter was addressed to the Speaker of the House, and is as follows : Philadelphia, February 15, 1873. My Dear Sir : — From the beginning of the investigation con cerning Mr. Ames's use of the Credit Mobilier, I believed that General Garfield was free from all guilty connection with that business. This opinion was founded not merely on my confidence in his integrity, but on some special knowledge of his case. I may have told you all about it in conversation, but I desire now to repeat it by way of reminder. I assert unhesitatingly that, whatever General Garfield may have done or forborne to do, he acted in profound ignorance of the nature and character of the thing which Mr. Ames was pro posing to sell. He had not the slightest suspicion that he was to be taken into a ring organized for the purpose of defrauding the public ; nor did he know that the stock was in any manner con nected with anything which came, or could come, with the legis lative jurisdiction of Congress. The case against him lacks the scienter which alone constitutes guilt. In the winter of 1869-'70, I told General Garfield of the fact that his name was on Ames's list ; that Ames charged him with being one of his distributees ; explained to him the character, origin, and objects of the CrMit Mobilier ; pointed out the con nection it had with Congressional legislation, and showed him how impossible it was for a member of Congress to hold stock in it without bringing his private interests in conflict with his public duty That all this was to him a perfectly new revelation I am CREDIT MOBILIER — TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 375 as sure as I can be of such a fact, or of any fact which is capable of being proved only by moral circumstances. He told me, then, the whole story of Train's offer to him and Ames's subsequent so licitation, and his own action in the premises, much as he details it to the committee. I do not undertake to reproduce the conver sation, but the effect of it all was to convince me thoroughly that when he listened to Ames he was perfectly unconscious of any thing evil. I watched carefully every word that fell from him on this point, and did not regard his narrative of the transaction in other respects with much interest, because in my view everything else was insignificant. I did not care whether he had made a bar gain technically binding or not ; his integrity depended upon tho question whether he acted with his eyes open. If he had known the true character of the proposition made to him he would not have endured it, much less embraced it. Now, couple this with Mr. Ames's admission that he gave no explanation whatever of the matter to General Garfield ; then re flect that not a particle of proof exists to show that he learned anything about it previous to his conversation with me, and I think you will say that it is altogether unjust to put him on the list of those who, knowingly and wilfully, joined the fraudulent association in question. J. S. Black. Hon. J. G. Blaine, Speaker of the House of Representatives. To these may be added the fact, recently published by Colonel Donn Piatt, of this city, that in the winter of 1869-70 he had occasion to look into the history of the Credit Mobilier Company, and found the same state ojf facts concerning my connection with it as are set; forth in, the letters quoted above. Whether my understanding of the facts is correct or not, it is manifest from the testimony given above that in, the spring of 1868, and in. the autumn of that year, and again in the winter of. 186,9, when I could, b,ave no motive 376 JAMES A. GARFIELD. to misrepresent the facts, I stated the case to these gen tlemen, substantially as it is stated in my testimony be fore the committee. RESPONSE TO THE CHARGE IN SEPTEMBER, 1872. But it has been charged in the newspapers that dur ing the Presidential campaign, I denied any knowledge of the subject, or at least that I allowed the impression to be made upon the public mind that I knew nothing of it. To this I answer, I wrote no letter on the subject and made no statement in any public address, except to deny in the broadest terms, the only charge then made, that I had been bribed by Oakes Ames. When the charges first appeared in the newspapers, I was in Montana Territory, and heard nothing of them until my return on the 13th or 14th of September. On the following day I met General Boj'nton, correspon dent of the Cincinnati Gazette, and related to him briefly what I remembered about the offer to sell the stock. I told him I should write no letter on the subject, but if he thought best to publish the substance of what I had stated to him he could do so. The same day he wrote and telegraphed from Washington to the Cincinnati Ga zette, under date of September 15, 1872, the following, which is a brief but correct report of my statement to him : General Garfield, who has just arrived here from the Indian country, has to-day had *he first opportunity of seeing the charges connecting his name with receiving shares of the Credit Mobilier from Oakes Ames. He authorizes the statement that he never subscribed for a single share of the stock, and that he never re- CREDIT MOBILIER TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 377 ceived or saw a share of it. When the company was first formed, George Francis Train, then active in it, came to Washington and exhibited a list of subscribers, of leading capitalists and some members of Congress, to the stock of the company. The sub scription was described as a popular one of $1,000 cash. Train urged General Garfield to subscribe on two occasions, and each time he declined. Subsequently he was again informed that the list was nearly completed, but that a chance remained for him to subscribe, when he again declined, and to this day has not sub scribed for or received any share of stock or bond of the company. This dispatch was widely copied in the newspapers at the time, and was the only statement I made or author ized. One thing in connection with the case I withheld from the public. When I saw the letters of Oakes Ames to Mr. McComb, I was convinced, from what Judge Black had told me in 1869, that they were genuine, and that Ames had pretended to McComb that he had sold the Credit Mobilier stock for the purpose of securing the influence of members of Congress in any legislation that might arise touching his interests. I might have pub lished the fact that I had heard this, and now believed Ames had so represented it ; though at the time Judge Black gave me the information I thought quite likely he was mistaken. I did not know to what extent any other member of Congress had had negotiations with Mr. Ames ; but knowing the members whose names were published in connection with the charges, and believing them to be men of the highest integrity, I did not think it just either to them or to the party with which we acted, to express my opinion of the genuineness of Ames's letters at a time when a false construction would doubtless have been placed upon it. 378 JAMES A. GARFIELD. Here I might rest the case, but for some of the testi mony given by Mr. Ames in reference to myself. I shall consider it carefully, and shall make quotations of his language, or refer to it by pages as printed in the report, so that the correctness of my citations may, in every case, be verified POINTS OF AGREEMENT AND DIFFERENCE BE TWEEN MR. AMES AND MYSELF, To bring the discussion into as narrow a compass as possible, the points of agreement and difference between Mr. Ames and myself may thus be stated : We agree that, soon after the beginning of the session of 1867-68, Mr. Ames offered to sell me ten shares of the Credit Mobilier stock, at par and the accrued in terest ; that I never paid him any money on that offer ; that I never received a certificate of stock ; that after the month of June, 1868, I never received, demanded, or was offered any dividend, in any form, on that stock. We also agree that I once received from Mr. Ames a small sum of money. On the following points we dis agree : He claims that I agreed to take the stock. I deny it. He claims that I received from him $329, and no more, as a balance of dividends on the stock. This I deny; and assert that I borrowed from him $300, and no more, and afterwards returned it; and that I never received anything from him on account of the stock. In discussing the testimony relating to myself, it be comes necessary, for a full exhibition of the argument, to- cefer to that concerning others. CREDIT MOBILIER — TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 379 MR. AMES'S FIRST TESTIMONY. It has been said that in Mr. Ames's first testi mony, he withheld or concealed the facts generally ; and hence, that what he said at that time concerning any one person is of but little consequence. The weight and value of his first testimony concerning any one person can be ascertained only by comparing it with his testimony given at the same examination concerning others. In that first examination of December 17, as recorded on pp. 15-58, Mr. Ames mentions by name (pp. 19-21) sixteen members of Congress who were said to have had dealings with him in reference to Credit Mobilier stock. Eleven of these, he says in that testimony, bought the stock ; but he there sets me down among the five who did not buy it. He says (p. 21), " He [Garfield] did not pay for it or receive it." He was, at the same time, cross-examined in regard to the dividends he paid to different persons ; and he testified (pp. 23-41) that he paid one or more dividends to eight different members of Congress, and that three others, being original subscribers, drew their dividends, not from him, but directly from the company. To sev eral of the eight he says he paid all the dividends that accrued. But in the same cross-examination he testified that he did not remember to have paid me any dividends, nor that he had let me have any money. The following is the whole of his testimony concerning me, on cross- examination : 380 JAMES A. GARFIELD. Q. In reference to Mr. Garfield, you say that you agreed to get ten shares for him and to hold them till he could pay for them, and that he never did pay for them nor receive them ? A. Yes, sir. Q. He never paid any money on that stock nor received any money from it ? A. Not on account of it. Q. He received no dividends ? A. No, sir ; I think not. He says he did not. My own recollection is not very clear. Q. So that, as you understand, Mr. Garfield never parted with any money, nor received any money on that transaction ? A. No, sir ; he had some money from me once, some three or four hun dred dollars, and called it a loan. He says that is all he ever re ceived from me, and that he considered it a loan. He never took his stock, and never paid for it. Q. Did you understand it so ? A. Yes ; I am willing to so understand it. I do not recollect paying him any dividend, and have forgotten that I paid him any money. — (P. 28). ******* Q. Who received the dividends ? A. Mr. Patterson, Mr. Bingham, James F. Wilson did, and I think Mr. Colfax received a part of them. I do not know whether he received them all or not. I think Mr. Scofield received a part of them. Messrs. Kel ley and Garfield never paid for their stock, and never received their dividends. — (P. 40). Certainly, it cannot be said that Mr. Ames has evinced any partiality for me ; and if he was attempting to shield any of those concerned, it will not be claimed that I was one of his favorites. In his first testimony, he claims to have spoken from memory, and without the aid of his documents. But he did then distinctly testify that he sold the stock to eleven members, and paid dividends to eight of them. He not only did not put me in either of those lists, but distinctly testified that I never took the stock nor re ceived the dividends arising from it. CREDIT MOBILIER — TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 381 MR. AMES'S SUBSEQUENT TESTIMONY. His second testimony was given on the 22d January, five weeks after his first. In assigning to this and all his subsequent testimony its just weight, it ought to be said that before he gave it, an event occurred which made it strongly for his interest to prove a sale of- the stock which he held as trustee. Besides the fact that McComb had already an equity suit pending in Phila delphia, to compel Mr. Ames to account to him for this same stock, another suit was threatened, after he had given his first testimon}', to make him account to the company for all the stock he had not sold as trustee. His first testimony was given on the 17th December, and was made public on the 6th of January. On the 15th of January, T. C Durant, one of the heaviest stock holders of the Credit Mobilier Company, and for a long time its president, was examined as a witness, and said, (p. 173) : " The stock that stands in the name of Mr. Ames, as trustee, I claim belongs to the company yet ; and I have a summons in suit in my pocket waiting to catch him in New York to serve the papers." Ot course, if as a trustee he had made sale of any por tion of this stock, and afterward as an individual had bought it back, he could not be compelled to return it to the conipany. Nowhere in Mr. Ames's subsequent testimony does he claim to remember the transaction between himself and me any differently from what he first stated it to be. But from the memoranda found or made after his first examination, he infers and declares that there was a sale 382 JAMES A. GARFIELD. ofthe stock to me, and a payment to me of $329 on account of dividends. Here, again, his testimony concerning me should be compared with his testimony given at the same time con cerning others. The memoranda out of which his additional testimony grew, consisting of certificates of stock, receipts, checks on the Sergeant-at-Arms, and entries in his diary. I will consider these in the order stated. To two members of Congress he delivered certificates of Credit Mobilier stock, which as trustee he had sold to them (see pp. 267 and 290) ; and in a third case he delivered a certificate of stock to the person to whom a member had sold it. But Mr. Ames testified that he never gave me a certificate of stock ; that I never de manded one; and that no certificate was ever spoken of between us. (See pp. 295, 296.) In the case of five members, he gave to them, or received from them, regular receipts of payment on ac count of stock and dividends. (See pp. 21, 113, 191, 204, 337, 456, and 458.) But nowhere is it claimed or pretended that any receipt was ever given by me, or to me, on account of this stock, or on account of any divi dends arising from it. Again, to five of the members, Mr. Ames gave checks on the Sergeant-at-Arms, payable to them by name ; and these checks were produced in evidence. (See pp. 333, 334, and 449.) In the case of three others, he produced checks bearing on their face the initials of the persons to whom he claimed they were paid. But he nowhere pretended to have or ever to have had anv check CREDIT MOBILIER — TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 383 bearing either my name or my initials, or any mark or indorsement connecting it with me. In regard to dividends claimed in his subsequent tes timony to have been paid to different members, in two cases he says he paid all the dividends that accrued on the stock from December, 1867, to May 6, 1871. (See pp. 191 and 337.) In a third case, all the accretions of the stock were received by the person to whom he sold it, as the result of a resale. (See p. 217.) In a fourth case he claims to have paid money on the 22d September, 1868, on account of dividends (see p. 461) ; and in a fifth case he claims to have paid a dividend in full, January 22, 1869. (See p. 454.) One pur chaser sold his ten shares in the winter of 1868-69, and received thereon a net profit of at least $3,000. Yet Mr. Ames repeatedly swears that he never paid me but $329 ; that after June, 1868, he never tendered to me nor did I ever demand from him any dividend ; and that there was never any conversation betweea us relat ing to dividends. (See pp. 40, 296, and 356.). As an example of his testimony on this point, I quote from page 296. After Mr. Ames had stated that he remembered no conversation between us in regard to the adjustment of these accounts, the committee asked : Q. Was this the only dealing you had with him in reference to any stock ? A. I think so. Q. Was it the only transaction of any kind ? A. The only transaction. Q. Has that $329 ever been paid to you ? A. I have no recol lection of it. Q. Have you any belief that it ever has ? A. No, sir. 384 JAMES A. GARFIELD. Q. Did you ever loan General Garfield $300 ? A. Not to my knowledge : except that he calls this a loan. Q. There were dividends of Union Pacific Railroad stock on these ten shares ? A. Yes, sir. Q. Did General Garfield ever receive these ? A. No, sir. He never has received but $329. . . . Q. Has there been any conversation between you and him in reference to the Pacific stock he was entitled to ? A. No, sir. Q. Has he ever called for it ? A. No, sir. Q. Have you ever offered it to him ? A. No, sir. Q. Has there been any conversation in relation to it ? A. No, sir. The assertion that he withheld the payment of divi dends because of the McComb suit brought in Novem ber, 1868, is wholly broken down by the fact that he did pay the dividend to several persons during a period of two years after the suit was commenced. The only other memoranda offered as evidence are the entries in Mr. Ames's diary for 1868. That book contains a separate statement of an account with eleven members of Congress, showing the number of shares of stock sold or intended to be sold to each, with the in terest and dividends thereon. (See pp. 450 to 461.) Across the face of nine of these accounts, long lines are drawn, crossing each other, showing, as Mr. Ames says, that in each such case the account was adjusted and closed. Three of these entries of accounts are not thus crossed off (see pp. 451, 458, and 459,) and the three members referred to therein testify that they never bought the stock. The account entered under my name is one of three that are not crossed off. Here is the entry in full. (See p. 459 :) CREDIT MOBILIER— TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 385 Garfield. 10 shares Credit M $1,000 00 7 mos, 10 days 43 36 1.043 36 80 per ct. bd. div., at 97 776 00 267 36 Int't to June 20 3 64 271 00 1,000 CM. 1,000 U. P. This entry is a mere undated memorandum, and indi cates neither payment, settlement, or sale. In reference to it, the following testimony was given by Mr. Ames on cross-examination (see p. 460) : Q. This statement of Mr. Garfield's account is not crossed off, which indicates, does it, that the matter has never been settled or adjusted ? A. No, sir ; it never has. Q. Can you state whether you have any other entry in relation to Mr. Garfield ? A. No, sir. Comparing Mr. Ames's testimony in reference to me, with that in reference to others, it appears that when he testified from his memory alone, he distinctly and affirmatively excepted me from the list of those who bought the stock or received the dividends ; and that subsequently^ in every case save my own, he produced some one or more of the following documents as evi dence, viz., certificates of stock ; receipts of money or dividends ; checks bearing either the full names or the initials of the persons to whom they purported to have been paid ; or entries, in his diary, of accounts marked 25 386 JAMES A. GARFIELD. "adjusted and closed." But no one of the classes of memoranda here described was produced in reference to me ; nor was it pretended that any one such, refer ring to me ever existed. In this review, I neither assert nor intimate that sales of stock are proved in the other cases referred to. In several cases such proof was not made. But I do assert that none of the evidences mentioned above exist in reference to me. MR. AMES'S MEMORANDA. Having thus stated the difference between the testi mony relating to other persons, and that relating to me, I now notice the testimony on which it is attempted to reach the conclusion that I did agree to take the stock, and did receive $329 on account of it. On the 22d of January, Mr. Ames presented to the committee a statement of an alleged account with me, which I quote from page 397 : J. A. G. Dr. 1868. To 10 shares stock Credit Mobilier of A $1,000 00 Interest 47 00 June 19. To cash 329 00 $1,376 00 Cr. 1868. By dividend bonds, Union Pacific Railroad, $1,000, at 80 per cent , less 3 per cent . $776 00 June 17. By dividend collected for your account 600 00 1,376 00 CREDIT MOBILIER — TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 387 This account, and other similar ones presented at the same time, concerning other members, he claimed to have copied from his memorandum-book. But when the memorandum-book was subsequently presented, it was found that the account here quoted was not copied from it, but was made up partly from memory and partly from such memoranda as Mr. Ames had discovered after his first examination. By comparing this account with the entry made in his diary, and already quoted, it will fee seen that they are not duplicates, either in substance or form ; and that in this account a new element is added, namely, an al leged payment of $329 in cash on June 19. This is the very element in dispute. THE CHECK ON THE SERGEANT-AT-ARMS. The pretended proof that this sum was paid me is found in the production of a check drawn by Mr. Ames on the Sergeant-at-Arms. The following is the language of the check, as reported on page 353 of the testimony : June 22, 1868. Pay 0. A. or bearer three hundred and twenty-nine dollars, and charge to my account. Oakes Ames. This check bears no indorsement or other mark, than the words and figures given above. It was drawn on the 22d day of June, and, as shown by the books of the Sergeant-at-Arms, was paid the same day by the paying-teller. But if this check was paid to me on the account just quoted, it must have been delivered to me three 388 JAMES A. GARFIELD. days before it was drawn; for the account says that I received the payment on the 19th of June. There is nothing but the testimony of Mr. Ames that in any way connects this check with me. And, as the committee find that the check was paid to me, I call special attention to all the testimony that bears upon the question. When Mr. Ames testified that he paid me $329 as a dividend on account of the stock the following question was asked him (p. 295) : Q. How was that paid ? A. Paid in money, I believe. At a later period in the examination (p. 297) : Q. You say that $329 was paid to him. How was that paid ? A. I presume by a check on the Sergeant-at-Arms. I find there checks filed, without indicating who they were for. One week later, the check referred to above was produced, and the following examination was had (p. 353) : Q. This check seems to have been paid to somebody, and taken up by the Sergeant-at-Arms. Those initials are your own ? A. Yes, sir. Q. Do you know who had the benefit of this check ? A. I cannot tell you. Q. Do you think you received the money on it yourself ? A. I have no idea. I may have drawn the money and handed it tc another person. It was paid in that transaction. It may have been paid to Mr. Garfield. There were several sums of that amount. Q. Have you any memory in reference to this check ? A. 1 have no memory as to that particular check. Still later in the examination occurs the following (p. 354) : CREDIT MOBILIER — 'TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 389 Q. In regard to Mr. Garfield, do you know whether you gave him a check, or paid him the money ? A. I think I did not pay him the money. He got it from the Sergeant-at-Arms. Still later, in the same examination, occurs the fol lowing (p. 355) : Q. You think the check on which you wrote nothing to in dicate the payee must have been Mr. Garfield's ? A. Yes, sir. That is my judgment. On the I lth of February, twelve days later still, the subject came up again, and Mr. Ames said (p. 471) : A. I am not sure how I paid Mr. Garfield. Still later, in a cross-examination in reference to Mr. Colfax, the following occurs (p 471) : Q. In testifying in Mr. Garfield's case, you say you" may have drawn the money on the check and paid him. Is not your an swer equally applicable in the case of Mr. Colfax ? A. No, sir. Q. Why not ? A. I put Mr. Colfax's initials on the check, while I put no initials on Mr.- Garfield's, and I may havedrawn the money myself. Q. Did not Mr. Garfield's check belong to him ? A. Mr. Garfield had not paid for his stock. He was entitled to $329 balance. But Mr. Colfax paid for his, and I had no business with, his $1,200. Q. Is your recollection in regard to this payment to Mr. Col fax any more clear than your recollection as to the payment to Mr. Garfield ? A. Yes, sir ; I think it is. And finally, in the examination of Mr. Dillon, cashier of the Sergeant-at-Arms, the following is recorded (p. 479) : Q. There is a eheck payable to Oakes Ames or bearer. Have you any recollection of that ? A. That was paid to, himself. I have no doubt myself that I paid that to Mr. Ames. 390 JAMES A. GARFIELD. Reviewing the testimony on this point (and I have quoted it all), it will be seen that Mr. Ames several times asserts that he does not know whether he paid me the check or not. He states positively that he has no special recollection of the check. His testimony is wholly inferential. In one of the seven paragraphs quoted, he says he paid me the money ; in another he says he may have paid me the money ; in three of them he thinks, or presumes, that he paid me the check ; and in the other two he says he does not know. The cashier of the Sergeant-at-Arms has no doubt that Mr. Ames himself drew the money on the check. And yet, upon this vague and wholly inconclusive testi mony, and almost alone upon it, is based the assumption that I received from Mr. Ames $329, as a dividend on the stock. I affirm, with perfect distinction of recollec tion, that I received no check from Mr. Ames. The only money I ever received from him was in currency. The only other evidence in support of the assumption that he paid me $329, as a balance on the stock, is found in the entries in his diary for 1868. The value of this* class of memoranda depends altogether upon their charac ter and upon the business habits of the man who makes them. On this latter point the following testimony of Mr. Ames, on page 34, is important : • Q. Is it your habit, as a matter of business, in conducting va rious transactions with different persons, to do it without making any memoranda ? A. This was my habit. Until within a year or two I have had no bookkeeper, and I used to keep all my own matters in my own way, and very carelessly, I admit. The memorandum-book in which these entries were CREDIT MOBILIER TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 391 made was not presented to the committee until the 11th of February, one week before they made their report. This book does not contain continuous entries of current transactions, with consecutive dates. It is in no sense a day-book, but contains a loose, irregular mass of memo randa, which may have been made at the time of the transactions, or long afterward. Mr. Ames says of it in his testimony (p. 281) : Q. What was the character of the book in which the memo randa were made ? A. It was in a small pocket memorandum, and some of it on slips of paper. It is not pretended that this book contains a complete record of payments and receipts. And yet, besides the check already referred to, this book, so made up, contains the only evidence, or pretended evidence, on which it is claimed that I agreed to take the stock. It should be remembered that every portion of this evidence, both check and book, is of Mr. Ames's own making. I have already referred to the undated memorandum of an ac count in this book, under my name, and have shown that it neither proved a sale of stock, or any payment on ac count of it. There are but two other entries in the book relating to me, and they are two lists of names, substantially duplicates of each other, with various amounts set oppo site each. They are found on pages 450 and 453 of the testimony. The word " paid " is marked before the first name on one of these lists, and ditto marks placed un der the word " paid " and opposite the remaining names. Butane value of this entry as proof of payment will be 392 JAMES A. GARFIELD. seen from the cross-examination of Mr. Ames, which in* mediately follows the list (p. 453) : Q. This entry, " Paid S. Colfax $1,200," is the amount which you paid by this check on the Sergeant-at-Arms ? A. Yes, sir. Q. Was this entry upon this page of these various names in tended to show the amount you were to pay, or that you had paid ; was that made at this date ? A. I do not know ; it was made about that time. I would not have written it on Sunday ; it is not very likely. It was made on a blank page. It is simply a list of names. Q. Were these names put down after you had made the pay ments, or before, do you think ? A. Before, I think. Q. You think you made this list before the parties referred to had actually received their checks, or received the money ? A. Yes, sir ; that was to show whom I had to pay, and who were entitled to receive the 60 per cent, dividend. It shows whom I had to pay here in Washington. Q. It says " paid ?" A. Yes, sir ; well, I did pay it. Q. What I want to know is, whether the list was made out before or after payment ? A. About the same time, I suppose ; probably before. The other list, bearing the same names and amounts, shows no other evidence that the several sums were paid than a cross marked opposite each amount. But con cerning this, Mr. Ames testifies that it was a list of what was to be paid, and that the cross was subsequently added to show that the amount had been paid. Neither of these lists shows anything as to the time or mode of payment, and would nowhere be accepted a? proof of payment. By Mr. Ames's own showing, they are lists of persons to whom he expected to pay the amounts set opposite their names. They may exhibit his expec tations, but they do not prove the alleged payments. If CREDIT MOBILIER TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 393 the exact sum of $329 was received by me at the time and under the circumstances alleged by Mr. Ames, it im plies an agreement to take the stock. It implies, fur thermore, that Mr. Ames had sold Pacific Railroad bonds for me "; that he had received also a cash dividend for me, and had accounted to me as trustee for these receipts, and the balance of the proceeds. Now, I affirm, with the firmest conviction of the cor rectness of my statement, that I never heard until this investigation began, that Mr. Ames ever sold any bonds, or performed any other stock transactions on my behalf; and no act of mine was ever based on such a supposition. INTERVIEWS WITH MR. AMES DURING THE INVES TIGATION. The only remaining testimony bearing upon me, is that in which Mr. Ames refers to conversations between him self and me, after the investigation began. The first of these was of his own seeking, and occurred before he or I had testified. Soon after the investigation began, Mr. Ames asked me what I remembered of our talk in 1867- '68 in reference to the Credit Mobilier Company. I told him I could best answer his question by reading to him the statement I had already prepared to lay before the committee when I should be called. Accordingly, on the ibllowing day, I toqk my written statement to the Capi tol, and read it to him carefully, sentence by sentence, and asked him to point out anything which he might think incorrect. He made but two criticisms ; one in re gard to a date, and the other, that he thought it was the 394 JAMES A. GARFIELD. Credit Foncier and not the Credit Mobilier that Mr. Train asked me to subscribe to in .1866-67. When I read the paragraph in which I stated that I had once borrowed $300 of him, he remarked, " I believe I did let you have some money, but I had forgotten it." He said nothing to indicate that he regarded me as having purchased the stock; and from that conversation I did not doubt that he regarded my statement substantially correct. His first testimony, given a few days afterward, confirmed me in this opinion. I had another interview with Mr. Ames, of my own seeking, to which he alludes on pages 357 and 359; and for a full understanding of it, a statement of some pre vious facts is necessary. I gave my testimony before the committee, and in Mr. Ames's hearing, on the morning of January 14. It consisted of the statement I had already read to Mr. Ames, and of the cross-examination which followed my reading of the statement, all of which has been quoted above. During that afternoon, while I was engaged in the management of an appropriation bill in the House, word was brought to me that Mr. Ames, on coming out of the committee-room, had declared in the hearing of several reporters that " Garfield was in league with Judge Black to break him down ; that it was $400, not $300, that he had let Garfield have, who had not only never repaid it, but had refused to repay it." Though this report of Mr. Ames's alleged declaration was subsequently found to be false, and was' doubtless fabricated for the purpose of creating difficulty, yet there were circumstances which, at the, time, led me to suppose that the report was correct CREDIT MOBILIER — TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 395 One was that Judge Black (who was McComb's counsel in the suit against Ames) was present at my examination, and had drawn out on cross-examination my opinion of the nature of Mr. Ames's relation to the Credit Mobilier Company and the Union Pacific Company ; and the other was, that in Mr. Ames's testimony of December 17, he had said (p. 28), " He [Mr. Garfield] had some money from me once, some three or four hundred dollars, and called it a loan." The sum of four hundred dollars had thus been mentioned in his testimony, and it gave plausi bility to the story that he was now claiming that as the amount he had loaned me. Supposing that Mr. Ames had said what was report ed, I was deeply indignant ; and, with a view of drawing from him a denial or retraction of the statement, or, if he persisted in it, to pay him twice over, so that he could no longer say or pretend that there existed between us any unsettled transaction, I drew some money from the office of Sergeant-at-Arms, and, going to my committee-room, addressed him the following note : House of Representatives, January 14, 1873. Sir : — I have just been informed, to my utter amazement, that after coming out of the committee-room this morning, you said, in the presence of several reporters, that you had loaned me four in stead of three hundred dollars, and that I had not only refused to pay you, but was aiding your accusers to injure you in the inves tigation. I shall call the attention of the committee to it, unless I find I am misinformed. To bring the loan question to an im mediate issue between us, I inclose herewith $400. If you wish to do justice to the truth and to me, you will return it and cor rect the alleged statement if you made it. If not, you will keep 396 JAMES A. GARFIELD. the money and thus be paid twice and more. Silence on your part will be a confession that you have deeply wronged me. J. A. Garfield. Hon. Oakes Ames. After the House had adjourned for the day, I found, on returning to my committee-room, that I had omitted to inclose the note with the money, which had been sent to the House post-office. I immediately sougnt Mr. Ames to deliver the note, but failed to find him at his hotel or elsewhere that evening. Early the next morning, Janu ary 15, I found him, and delivered the note. He denied having said or claimed any of the things therein set forth, and wrote on the back of my letter the following : Washington, January 15, 1873. Dear Sir : — I return you your letter with inclosures, and I ut terly deny ever having said that you refused to pay me, or that it was four instead of three hundred dollars, or that you was aiding my accusers. I also wish to say that there has never been any but the most friendly feelings between us, and no transaction in tho least degree that can be censured by any fair-minded person. I herewith return you the four hundred dollars as not belonging to me. Yours, truly, Oakes Ames. Hon. J. A. Garfield. From inquiry of the reporters to whom the remarks were alleged to have been made, I had become satisfied that the story was wholly false, and when Mr. Ames add ed his denial, I expressed to him my regret that I had written this note in anger and upon false information. I furthermore said to Mr. Ames that, if he had any doubt in reference to the repayment of the loan, I wished him to keep the money. He refused to keep any part of it, CREDIT MOBILIER — TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 397 and his conversation indicated that he regarded all trans actions between us settled. Before I left his room, however, he said he had some memoranda which seemed to indicate that the money I had of him was on account of stock ; and asked me if he did not, some time in 1868, deliver to me a statement to that effect. I> told him if he had any account of that sort, I was neither aware of it, nor responsible for it; and thereupon I made substantially the following statement: Mr. Ames, the only memorandum you ever showed me was in 1867-68, when speaking to me of this proposed sale of stock, you figured out on a little piece of paper, what you supposed would be realized from an investment of $1,000 ; and, as I remember, you wrote down these figures : 1.000 1,000 400 2,400 as the amounts you expected to realize. While saying this to Mr. Ames, I wrote the figures as above, on a piece of paper lying on his table, to show him what the only statement was he had made to me. It is totally false that these figures had any other mean ing than that I have here given ; nor did I say anything out of which could be fabricated such a statement as ap pears on pages 358, 359. In his testimony of January 29, Mr. Ames gives a most remarkable account of this interview. Remember ing the fact, by him undisputed, that there had been no communication between us on this subject for more than four years before this investigation began, notice the fol lowing (p. 358) : 398 JAMES A. GARFIELD. Q. Did you have any conversation in reference to the influence this transaction would have on the election last fall ? A. Yes, he said it would be very injurious to him. Q. What else in reference to that ? A. I am a very bad man to repeat conversations ; I cannot remember. That is, he makes me, on the 15th of January, 1873, express the fear that this transaction will injure me in the election of October, 1872 ! Again, pages 357, 358 : Q. You may state whether in conversation with you, Mr. Gar field claims, as he claims before us, that the only transaction be tween you was borrowing $300. A. No, sir, he did not claim that with me. Q. State how he did claim it with you ; what was said ? A. I cannot remember half of it. . . . He [Mr. Garfield] stated that when he came back from Europe, being in want of funds, he called on me to loan him a sum of money. He thought he had repaid it. I do not know ; I do not remember. . . . Q.. How long after that transaction [the offer to sell Credit Mobilier stock] did he go to Europe ? A. 1 believe it was a year or two. . . . Q. Do you not know that he did not go to Europe for nearly two years afterward ? A. No, I do not. It is my impression it was two years afterward, but I cannot remember dates. I should think not, if this testimony is an example of his memory ! It is known to thousands of people that I went to Europe in the summer of 1867, and at no other time. I sailed from New York on the 13th of July, 1867, spent several days of August in Scotland, with Speaker Blaine and Senator Morrill, of Vermont, and returned to New York on the 9th of the following November — three weeks before the beginning of the session of Congress. CREDIT MOBILIER — TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 399 The books of the Sergeant-at-Arms of the House show that, before going, I had assigned several months' pay in advance to a banker, who had advanced me money for the expenses of the trip. To break the weight of this fact, which showed why I came to need a small loan, Mr. Ames says I did not go to Europe till nearly two years afterward. If a reason be sought why he gave such testimony it may perhaps be found on the same page from which the last quotation is made (page 359) : Q. How did you happen to retain that little stray memoran dum ? A. I do not know. I found it in my table two or three days afterward. I did not pay any attention to it at the time, until I found there was to be a conflict of testimony, and I thought that might be something worth preserving. How did he find out after that time that " there was to be a conflict of testimony ?" The figures were made on that piece of paper January 15, the day after I had given my testimony, and four weeks after he had given his first testimony. There was no conflict except what he himself made ; and that conflict was as marked be tween his first statement and his subsequent ones, as be tween the latter and mine. There runs through all this testimony now under con sideration an intimation that I was in a state of alarm, was beseeching Mr. Ames " to let me off easily," "to say as little about it as possible," " to let it go as a loan," " to save my reputation," that I " felt very bad," was " in great distress," " hardly knew what I said," and other such expressions. I should have been wholly devoid of sensibility if I 400 JAMES A. GARFIELD. had not felt keenly the suspicions, the false accusations, the reckless calumnies with which the public mind was filled, while the investigation was in progress. But there is not the smallest fragment of truth in the statement, or rather the insinuation, that I ever asked or wanted any thing' from Mr. Ames on this subject but simple justice and the truth. The spirit in which a portion of the public treated the men whose conduct was being investigated, may be un derstood from the following question, put to Mr. Ames (page 361) in the midst of an examination, not at all re lating to me : Q. In that conversation with Mr. Garfield, was anything said by him about your being an old man, near the end of your career, and his being comparatively a young man ? A. No, sir ; nothing of that sort. It is manifest that this question was suggested by some of the inventive bystanders, in hopes of making an item for a new sensation. The most absurd and exaggerated statements were constantly finding their way into the public press, in reference to every subject and person connected with the investigation, and this question is an illustration. In no communication with Mr. Ames did I ever say anything inconsistent with my testimony before the com mittee. Conscious that I had done no wrong from the begin ning to the end of this affair, I had nothing to conceal and no favors to ask, except that the whole truth should be known. I was in the committee-room but once during CREDIT MOBILIER- —TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 401 the investigation, and I went there then only when sum moned to give my testimony. CONCLUSIONS. From a review of the whole subject, the following con clusions are fairly and clearly established : — ¦ I. That the Credit Mobilier Company was a State corporation regularly organized ; and that neither its charter nor the terms of the contract, of October 15, 1867, disclosed anything which indicated that the com pany was engaged in any fraudulent or improper enter prise. II. That a ring of seven persons inside the Credit Mobilier Company, calling themselves trustees, obtained the control of the franchises, and of a majority of the stock of both the Credit Mobilier and of the Union Pa cific Railroad Company ; and while holding such double control, they made a contract with themselves by which they received for building the road an extravagant sum,. greatly beyond the real cost of construction ; and, in ad justing the payments, they received stock and bonds of the railroad company, at a heavy discount, and by these means virtually robbed and plundered the road,, which was in great part built by the aid of the United States. That these exorbitant profits were distributed, not to the stockholders of the Credit Mobilier proper, but to the ring of seven trustees and their proxies — holders of this ring stock — and that this arrangement was kept, a close secret by its managers. III. That in 1867-68, Mr. Ames- offered to sell. small amounts of this stock to several leading members of Con- 26 402 JAMES A. GARFIELD. gress, representing it as an ordinary investment promis ing fair profits ; but in every such offer he concealed from such members the real nature of the arrangement by which the profits were to be made, as well as the .-amount of dividends likely to be realized. While thus offering this stock, he was writing to one of his ring associates that he was disposing of the stock "where it would do most good," intimating that he was thereby igaihing influence in Congress, to prevent investigation jnto the affairs of the road. His letters and the list of names which he gave to McComb represent many per sons as having bought the stock who never did buy or .agree to buy it, and also represent a much larger amount sold than he did actually sell. Mr. Ames's letters and testimony abound in contradictions, not only of his own statements, but also of the statements of most of the .other witnesses; and it is fair, in judging of its credi bility, to take .into account his interests involved in the .controversy. JY. That in reference to myself the following points are clearly established by the evidence : 1. That I neither purchased nor agreed to purchase the Credit Mobilier stock which Mr. Ames offered to sell me ; nor did L receive any dividend arising from it. This appears from my own testimony; and from the first tes timony given by Mr. Ames, which is not overthrown by his subsequent statements ; and is strongly confirmed by the fact that in the case of. each of those who did pur chase the stock, there was produced as evidence of the sale, either a certificate of stock, , receipt of payment, a check drawn in the name of the payee, or entries in Mr. CREDIT MOBILIER — TRIUMPHANT VINDI8ATI0N. 403 Ames's diary of a stock account marked " adjusted and closed ;" . but that no one of these evidences exists in reference to me. This position is further confirmed by the subsequent testimony of Mr. Ames, who, though he claims that I did receive $329 from him on account of stock, yet he repeatedly testifies that beyond, that amount I never received or demanded any dividend, that he did not offer me any, nor was the subject alluded to in con versation between us. Mr. Ames admits, on page 40 of the testimony, that after December, 1867, the various stock and bond divi dends, on the stock he had sold, amounted to an aggre gate of more than 800 per cent. ; and that between Jan uary, 1868, and May, 1871, all these dividends were paid to several of those who purchased the stock. My con duct was wholly inconsistent with the supposition of such ownership ; for, during the year 1869, I was bor rowing money to build a house here in Washington, and was securing my creditors by giving mortgages on my property ; and all this time it is admitted that I received no dividends and claimed none. The attempt to prove a sale of the stock to me is wholly inconclusive ; for it rests, first, on a check paya ble to Mr. Ames himself, concerning which he several times says he does not know to whom it was paid ; and second, upon loose undated entries in his diary, which neither prove a sale of the stock nor any payment on account of it The only fact from which it is possible for Mr. Ames to have inferred an agreement to buy the stock was the loan to me' of $300. But that loan was made months be- 404 JAMES A. GALFIELD. fore the check of June 22, 1868, and was repaid in the winter of 1869; and after that date there were.no trans actions of any sort between us. And finally, before the investigation was ended, Mr Ames admitted that on the chief point of difference be tween us he might be mistaken. On page 356 he said he "considered me the pur chaser of the stock, unless it was borrowed money I had of him;" and on page 461, at the conclusion of his last testimony, he said : Mr. Garfield understands this matter as a loan ; he says I did not explain it to him. Q. You need not say what Mr. Garfield says. Tell us what you think. A. Mr. Garfield might have misunderstood me. ... I supposed it was like all the rest, but when Mr. Garfield says he mistook it for a loan ; that he always understood it to be a loan ; that I did not make any explanation to him, and did not make any statement to him ; I may be mistaken. I am a man of few words, and I may not have made myself understood to him. 2. That the offer which Mr. Ames made to me, as I understood it, was one which imrolved no wrong or im propriety. I had no means of knowing and had no rea son for supposing that behind this offer to sell me a small amount of stock, lay hidden a scheme to defraud the Pacific Railroad and imperil the interests of the United States. I was not invited to become a party to any soheme of spoliation, much less was I aware of any at tempt to influence my legislative action, on any subject connected therewith. And on the first intimation of the real nature of the case, I declined any further considera tion of the subject. CREDIT MOBILIER — TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 405 3. That whatever may have been the facts in the case, I stated them in my testimony as I have always understood them; and there has been no contradiction, prevarication, or evasion on my part. This is demonstrated by the fact that I stated the case to Mr. Robison, in the spring of 1868, and to Mr. Hinsdale in the autumn of that year, and to Judge Black in the winter of 1869-70, substantially as it is stated in my testimony before the committee. I have shown that during the Presidential campaign I did not deny having known anything about the Credit Mobilier Company ; 'that the statement published in the Cincinnati Gazette, September 15, is substantially in ac cord with my testimony before the committee ; and fi nally that during the progress of the investigation there was nothing in my conversation or correspondence with Mr. Ames in any way inconsistent with the facts as given in my testimony. To sum it up in a word : out of an un important business transaction, the loan of a trifling sum of money, as a matter of personal accommodation, and out of an offer never accepted, has arisen this enormous fabric of accusation and suspicion. If there be a citizen of the United States who is wil ling to believe that for $329 I have bartered away my good name, and to falsehood have added perjury, these pages are not addressed to him. If there be one who thinks that any part of my public life has been gauged on so low a level as these charges would place it, I do not address him. I address those who are willing to believe that it is possible for a man to serve the public without personal dishonor. I have endeavored in this review, to 406 JAMES A. GARFIELD. point out the means by which the managers of a corpora tion, wearing the garb of honorable industry, have robbed and defrauded a great national enterprise, and attempted, by cunning and deception, for selfish ends, to enlist in its interest those who would have been the first to crush the attempt had their objects been known. If any of the scheming corporations or corrupt rings that have done so much to disgrace the country by their attempts to control its legislation, have ever found in me a conscious supporter or ally in any dishonorable scheme, they are at full liberty to disclose it. In the discussion of the many grave and difficult questions of public policy which have occupied the thoughts of the nation during the last twelve years, I have borne some part ; and I confidently appeal to the public records for a vindication of my conduct. JAMES A. GARFIELD. If anything were needed to add weight to the above masterly defence it would be found in the following letter from Judge Poland, of Vermont, to ex-Governor Ryland Fletcher, of the same State. Judge Poland, it will be remembered, was the chairman of the Credit Mobilier Investigating Committee : " St. Johnsbury, Vt., July 2, 1880. "I have mislaid or lost my copy of the evidence taken by the Credit Mobilier Investigating Committee and their report, and although I have a very clear recol lection of the general features of the whole matter, I should not attempt to say anything in regard to details without a re-perusal of the volume. But if I had it CREDIT MOBILIER TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 407 before me, it does not seem to me that there is occasion or need that I should review it for the purpose of reply ing to such attacks on General Garfield as you have copied from the New York Express, or similar ones which may be found in many other Democratic papers The transactions of Mr. Ames in Credit MobiKer stock were more than a dozen years ago ; the full investigation of the matter by the committee of which I was chairman was over eight years ago. At the time of the investiga tion the public mind was greatly excited on the subject, and it involved the character and reputation of so many prominent men that probably no mere personal matter ever was so thoroughly canvassed and discussed by the reading and intelligent people of the country. After the most exhaustive discussion and reflection, the judgment of the people of this country was made up as to each man who was named as connected with it. Saying nothing in regard to any other man, I think I may most truthfully say that this public and popular judgment fully and absolutely acquitted General Garfield of all wrong, either in act or intent, in relation to the matter. No man could have been continued in public life, and constantly risen in public standing and in the public estimation, by the consent and approval of the best men of both parties, as General Garfield .has, if there existed a suspicion of wrong-doing against him. I re gard this popular and continued verdict of the people as conclusive. Every effort to reopen and unsettle it will, in my judgment, only recoil upon those who at tempt it. In my judgment, the Republican press and Republican speakers who may spend their time in re- 408 JAMES A. GARFIELD. arguing a matter so many years ago passed into final judgment will only waste their breath. The great is sues between the parties, which so largely affect the welfare »f the people and the country, are the topics to be discussed and decided in the coming campaign. These are what the people desire to be enlightened upon; they are already satisfied that the $329 case Wiis finally and properly decided many years ago. I presume you have seen a short note I sent to the State Convention. In that I said all I wished to say. " Luke P. Poland." Another charge brought against General Garfield was that in 1872 he received a fee of five thousand dol lars for securing an appropriation in favor of a certain contract for paving certain streets of Washington City. This contract was in favor of what is known as the De Golyer pavement. At this time General Garfield was chairman of the Committee on Appropriations, and it was charged that he was pmd this sum to secure his influence for the De Golyer Company. The truth was that the fee was paid him for services rendered as a lawyer, after the adjournment of Congress, and had no connection whatever with the appropriation granted by Congress. Grave charges having been brought against the De Gol yer company, the House of Representatives appointed a committee to investigate the matter. Before this com mittee General Garfield appeared in February, 1879, and made the following statement which explains his true connection with the matter, and places the facts in the case so fairly and plainly before the public that the most CREDIT MOBILIER — TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 409 inveterate enemy must, if honest, acknowledge the suc cess of his vindication, and acquit him of either intentional or actual wrong-doing. " Mr. Garfield. — Mr. Chairman, I never saw this con tract before, but I want to say a word in regard to the word ' appropriation' used in it. It has no more refer ence to Congress than it has to Great Britain. The Board of Public Works, under the general law and the legislation of the District government, made the appro priations themselves, and taxed the people of the Dis trict along the streets where these improvements were made, by the front foot; and I in common with other property-holders of the District, paid my assessment levied by the Board of Public Works for the improve ments made in front of my property ; and the appropria tion here referred to is the appropriation by the District government, either out of the funds that it had raised by bonds issued on the credit of the District or by assess ments by the District authorities upon the people whose property was improved. The only connection that the United States had with it in reference to appropriations vas this : — Whenever the Board of Public Works laid a pavement on a street upon which any United States building or ground was situated, Congress, as a matter of course, as it does in every other city of the Union, paid its quota of the assessment per front foot. That is the only relation that Congress had to any\)f these improvementsj except in so far as we have been compelled subsequently to advance money to pay the interest on their bonds which of course was a matter that nobody could have foreseen. 410 JAMES A. GARFIELD. " Mr. Nickerson. — Allow me to ask you a question " Mr. Garfield.— Certainly. " Mr. Nickerson. — In view of your explanation, I ask you to state what this provision in this award in relation to that fifty thousand square yards refers to — what ap propriation that refers to, around the parks or anywhere else? " Mr. Garfield. — I cannot be expected to explain the language of this contract which I have never seen, but if the chairman will look at the Appropriation Bill, espe cially in 1873, he will find that there were three appro priations made ; one ($180,000, I think) to reimburse the old Washington corporation previous to the creation of the Board of Public Works, for work that was done around the Government reservation. The old canal had been filled up and the Smithsonian grounds had been bettered by that improvement, and there was an appro priation to reimburse the old corporation for that part of their improvements which lay opposite the public grounds of the United States ; and in the same bill there was also an appropriation made to reimburse the Board of Public Works for the Government's share of the improvements made in front of the public buildings and grounds. " The Chairman. — Do you recollect the amount of that appropriation ? "Mr. Garfield.— I think it was about $180,000. I ought to say, however, that that was put on, not in the House but in the Senate. I was not on the conference ; I had nothing to do with it. It was perfectly right if 1 had been on the committee, but I was not. That had no more to do with anybody's pavement, or with any par- CREDIT MOBILIER — TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 411 ticular contract for any particular patent or pavement, than with the man in the moon. " Mr. Nickerson. — You haven't answered my question. If your explanation is correct, can you say why it is that that 50,000 square yards is made absolutely contin gent upon an appropriation to be made by Congress ? That is a matter that would necessarily come directly before Congress. " Mr. Garfield. — Not at all. It would come from the appropriation of the district authorities. Mr. Chairman, I never saw this contract before in my life, and I had nothing whatever to do with its terms, and therefore I am not responsible for any meaning that anybody may attribute to its language. "Now, the whole story is plainly and briefly told. A day or two before the adjournment of the Congress which adjourned in the latter part of May or the first part of June, 1872, Richard C. Parsons, who was a practising lawyer in Cleveland, but was then the Marshal of the Supreme Court, and an old acquaintance of mine, came to my house and said that he was called away summarily by important business ; that he was retained in a case on which he had spent a great deal of time, and that there was but one thing remaining to be done, to make a brief ofthe relative merits of a large number of wooden- pave ments ; that the Board of Public Works had agreed that they would put down a certain amount of concrete, and a certain amount of other kinds of pavement; that they had fixed the price at which they would put down each of Ihe different kinds, and that the only thing remaining was to determine which was the best pavement of each 412 JAMES A. GARFIELD. of the several kinds. He said he should lose his fee unless the brief on the merits of these pavements was made, and that he was suddenly and necessarily called away home ; and he asked me to prepare the brief. He brought his papers to my house and models of the pave ment. I told him I could not look at the case, until the end of the session. When Congress adjourned I sat down to the case, in the most open manner, as I would prepare a brief for the Supreme Court, and worked upon this matter. There were perhaps forty kinds of wood pave ment and several chemical analyses of the ingredients of the different pavements. I went over the whole ground carefully and thoroughly, and prepared a brief on the relative claims of these pavements for the consideration of the board. This was all I did. I had nothing to do with the terms of the contract, I knew nothing of its conditions, and I never had a word to say about the con ditions, and I never had a word to say about the price of the pavement. I knew nothing about it ; I simply made a brief upon the relative merits of the various patent pavements ; and it no more occurred to me that the thing I was doing had relation to a ring, or to a body of men connected with any scheme, or in any way connected with Congress, or related in any way to any of my duties in connection with the Committee on Appropriations, than it occurred to me that it was interfering with your per sonal rights as a citizen. I prepared the brief and went ljome. Mr. Parsons subsequently sent me a portion of his }wn fee. A year later, when the affairs of the District of Columbia came to be overhauled, Congress became satisfied that the government of the District had better CREDIT MOBILIER — TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 413 be abolished, and this whole matter was very thoroughly investigated by a committee of the two Houses. They went into the question of the merits of the pavement, some claiming that it was bad, and some claiming that the Government had paid too much for it. Mr. Chitten den was called as a witness. I ought to say here that I never saw Mr. Chittenden until about the time I made the brief; I did not and do not know De Golyer and McClelland ; I would not know them on the street ; I am not aware that I ever saw Mr. Nickerson before ; and if anybody in this business had any scheme relating to me, it was never mentioned to me in the remotest way. It never was suggested to me that this matter could relate to my duties as a member of Congress in any way what ever. All that I did was done openly. Everybody who called oa me could have seen what I was doing, and if there was any intention or purpose on the part of any body to connect me in any way with any ring or any dishonorable scheme it was sedulously concealed from me. As I have said, three years ago a joint committee of the two Houses investigated this matter thoroughly. Mr. Parsons was summoned, and was examined, and cross-ex amined ; Mr. Chittenden was examined ; Mr. Nickerson was examined. When I heard that my name was being used in the matter, I went to the chairmen on both sides — for it was a joint committee. Senator Thurman, of my own State, was on the committee ; Mr. Jewett, now President of the Erie Railway, was on the committee. 1 said to the chairmen that, if there was anything in con nection with the case which reflected upon me, and that they thought I ought to answer, I would be obliged to 114 JAMES A. GARFIELD. them if they would inform me. The chairman on the part of the House, Mr. Wilson, said that he had looked the matter all over, and that what I had done was per fectly proper ; but if anything should occur to make any explanation necessary, I could appear before the commit tee ; he would send me word. He never did send for me. Very soon after that my political campaign in Ohio opened. " Every man in public life is blessed with enemies as well as friends ; and no sooner had my campaign opened than the New York Sun published thirteen columns, I believe, containing almost every form of public and private assault upon me, among other things quoting this testi mony in such a way as to make it appear that what I had done compromised my position as Chairman of the Committee on Appropriations. I went before the people of my district and discussed the whole matter; and in a speech which was printed and circulated by thousands, every part and parcel of this charge was made as public as anything could be. It was revived to some extent in the campaign last fall, and all possible new light thrown upon it. In the course of the campaign of 1874 a gentle man from my district wrote in regard to it to Mr. Wilson, the chairman of the joint committee on the part of the House, and received a letter in reply, which I read : — " ' Connellsville, Ind., Aug. 1, 1874. " ' Hon. George W. Steele — Dear Sir : — To the re quest for information as to whether or not the action of General Garfield, in connection with the affairs of the District of Columbia, was the subject of condemnation in the committee that recently had those affairs under con- CREDIT MOBILIER TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 415 sideration, I answer that it was not ; nor was there, in my opinion, any evidence that would have warranted any un favorable criticism upon his conduct. " ' The facts disclosed by the evidence, so far as he is concerned, are briefly these : " ' The Board of Public Works was considering the question as to the kind of pavements that should be laid. There was a contest as to the respective merits of va rious Wooden pavements. Mr. Parsons represented, as attorney, the De Golyer and McClellan patent, and being called away from Washington about the time the hearing was to be had before the Board of Public Works on this subject, procured General Garfield to appear before the board in his stead and argue the merits of his patent. This he did, and this was the whole of his connection in the matter. It was not a question as to the kind of con tract that should be made, but as to whether this particu lar kind of pavement should be laid. The criticism of the committee was not upon the pavement in favor of which General Garfield argued, but was upon the contract made with reference to it; and there was no evidence which would warrant the conclusion that he had anything to do with the latter. Very respectfully, etc., " < J. M. Wilson.' " I want to say this, further : That if anybody in the world holds that my.fee in connection with this pavement, even by suggestion or implication, had any relation what ever to any appropriation by Congress for anything con nected with the District, or with anything else, it is due to me, it is due to this committee, and it is due to Con- 116 JAMES A. GARFIELD. gress, that that person be summoned. If there be a man on this earth who makes such a charge, that man is the most infamous perjurer that lives, and I shall be glad to confront him anywhere in this world. I am quite sure this committee will not allow hearsay and contradictory testimony to raise a presumption against me. Now, I will say very frankly to the committee that, if I had known or imagined that there was an intent such as this witness insinuates, on the part of anybody, that my em ployment by a brother lawyer to prepare a brief on a perfectly legitimate question — a question of the relative merits of certain lawful patents — had any connection whatever, or any supposed connection in the mind of any man, with my public duties, I certainly would have taken no such engagement. I would have been a weak and very foolish man to have done so, and I trust that gentle men who know me will believe that I would at least have had too much respect for my own ambition to have done such a thing. " By the Chairman — Q. What was the amount that Mr. Parsons did pay you of his fee ? A. Five thousand dollars. I do not think he mentioned any sum at the time he asked me to make the argument. He said that he was to receive a large fee, and he would share it with me. I am not sure that he then mentioned the amount, or what he would pay me, but he said that the fee was a large one, and that there was a large amount involved. When I made the argument I went home to Ohio, and some time in the month of July, I think, or perhaps a month afterwards, Mr. Parsons deposited in bank to ray credit $5,000. CREDIT MOBILIER — TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 417 By Mr. Cuibertson — Q. Who paid those fees. A. I do not know. I never knew anything about that at all. Mr. Parsons engaged me. Nobody else spoke to me about it. The only relation I had to it at all was with him. Mr. Parsons' testimony on the subject is very full, iind is true, as I remember it. " By the Chairman — Q. Did Mr. Parsons say to you that his fee or yours would be contingent on the award of a contract for 200,000 square yards of pavement? A. Oh, no, sir ; I do not think he said that. He said : ' I am in danger of losing au important fee unless I make this argu ment, and I cannot do it; I must go away, and I will pay you a share of what I get if you will make the brief.' I don't remember that he said whether it was contingent or absolute. I simply acted on his request. " Q. Your brief was made and filed ? A. Certainly. I Libored over the case a good many days. I remember among other papers which I examined wrere some pam phlets giving an account of the working of this pavement in California, and, I think, ia Chicago. There were two or three chemical analyses of the materials used I had to examine ; I think nearly forty of the different patents. The understanding w.*is that the merils of the different competing pavements were to be laid before the board in order that they might determine their relative merits. I do not think I knew anything about the price that was to be paid per square yard ; certainly it was none of my affair ; I had nothing to do with it or to say about it. "By Mr. Pratt— Q. It was not involved in the question submitted to you ? A. It was not involved in the question at all, because, as I understood, the 418 JAMES A. GARFIELD. Board of Engineers had beforehand determined that for wood pavements they would pay so much, for concrete so much, and for other kinds so much. The property- holders on a street made a request for whichever pave ment they preferred — concrete, Belgian, or wooden — and, when the petitions of the property- holders were filed with the board, they gave the different streets the kinds of pavement asked for by the people. " By the Chairman — Q. Had you any knowledge at the time that the Advisory Board had passed a condem natory judgment upon this ? A. I had not, nor have I now. I only knew that there was a considerable amount of wooden pavement to be laid, because the citizens had asked for it. I had no knowledge of the matter except what I had got from the papers before me. I recollect among other things, that it was certified from the Board of Public Works of Chicago that this pave ment had stood there better than any other wooden pavement they had ever had, and I believe there was similar testimony from the city authorities of San Fran cisco. " Q. Had you any previous knowledge as an expert in the qualities of different pavements? A. I had had considerable experience in patents and patent law gen erally ; I had been engaged in the Goodyear rubber case in the Supreme Court, and I was familiar with patent iaw. I have been practising in the Supreme Court here since 1866; I do practice constantly, as much as my public duties allow. " Q. Do you recollect whether at the subsequent session of Congress there was $1,200,000 appropriated CREDIT MOBILIER — TRIUMPHANT VINDICATION. 419 for the Board of Public Works ? A. I remember that there was a large appropriation made for improvements made by the Board of Public Works in front of the public buildings and grounds, but none was made for any particular pavement or contract. I do not remem ber how large the appropriation was, for it was put on in the Senate, in the last hours of the session, while I was on a conference on the unfortunate salary bill, and was adopted while I was out, and I knew nothing at all about its origin or progress. I know that in one of the bills that I had charge of at about that time there was a restrictive clause upon the board inserted, because we thought it had begun to do too much. " The Chairman. — I don't think, Mr. Garfield, that it has been testified here, directly, that any proposition, in bO many words, was made to you in relation to any appropriation made by Congress, but there have been put in evidence here extracts from letters, which were written by Chittenden from this city to De Golyer and McClelland, after interviews with you. " Mr. Garfield. — Of course, Mr. Chairman, you will see the utter impossibility of one man being made re sponsible for what another man writes about him. I cannot, of course, say what has been written about me. If I had it all before me, it would be a very mixed chapter, I have no doubt, as it would be in the case ol any of us. " The Chairman. — There has been no direct testi mony that any such proposition was ever made to you. "Mr. Garfield. — If there is any testimony of that sort it is false, and I shall be obliged if you will let me know." CHAPTER X. THE CHICAGO CONVENTION. GENERAL GARFIELD NOMINATE!: FOR PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. The Chicago Convention — Description of the Hall — General Garfield a Del egate from Ohio — Cordial Receptiou by the Convention — Opening of the Proceedings — The First Day's Work — Events of the Second Day — The Struggle between Grant and Blaine — Parliamentary Skirmishing — Proceedings of the Third Day — Report of the Committee on Credentials — The Evening Session — The Fight over Illinois — The Fourth Day's Session — The Grant Lines show Signs of Weakness — Garfield's Mas terly Management of the Ohio Delegation — Nomination of Candidates — Blaine and Grant Presented — General Garfield Nominates Jol'.n Sher man—A Noble Speech — The Fifth Day's Session — Balloting for the Presidential Candidates — A Stubborn Fight — A Detailed Statement of the Ballots — The Sixth and Last Day — Wisconsin Votes for Garfield — Tlie General endeavors to Stop the Movement in his Favor — He is un successful—The Break to Garfield— The Thirty-sixth Ballot— Garfield Nominated for the Presidency — Exciting Scenes in the Convention — The Nomination Made Unanimous — Nomination of Vice-President— How Garfield's Nomination was brought about — Platform of the Re publican Party for 1880. The National Convention of the Republican party met at Chicago, on the 2d of June, 1880. General Garfield attended it as the leader of the delegation from Ohio. The place of meeting was the large hall of the Ex position Building. The correspondent of the New York Herald said of it on the day the convention assembled : " The entire building is divided into sections — A, 13, CHICAGO CONVENTION — NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 421 C, and so on. Each section has its door, each door its official, each official the Chicago courtesy, passing which, the visitor finds himself in a hall 300 feet long and 150 feet wide. The platform is in the south end and the seats for delegates and alternates on the main floor run ning from the platform back about two hundred feet. On the other side of this, and running entirely round the building, are commodious galleries capable of seating in the neighborhood of nine thousand people. This, with the space for delegates, gives a seating capacity of be tween ten thousand and eleven thousand persons. The crowd outside is immense, and has been since early morning; but as the rules of admission are rigidly en forced the outsiders are compelled to content themselves with cheers and shouts and an occasional growl. The delegations which had been bothered beyond conception in getting tickets of admission were very slow in arriving. At half-past eleven there was no one in the hall "beyond a large and very active band and a few enterprising cor respondents who remembered the luck of the early bird. " Little banners, shield-shaped, with Alabama, Ari zona, and so on, printed on them, indicated the situation of each delegation. The A's sat in the front benches, and the rest of the alphabet followed seriatim. The con sequence is that Texas, West Virginia, and the other low down letters are much nearer the band and the rear than they fancy. To compare it with Madison Square Garden, imagine the stage placed at the Madison Avenue end and benches phiced on the floor back to the cascade, where the band forms the lower line of a high stretch of seats {or the public. The Alabama delegates are in the uppet 122 JAMES A. GARFIELD. left-hand corner, having all of seat 1 and part of- seat 22. Then follow, in order, down the left side, including all of the first row and a portion of the second, Arkan sas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, and Illinois, ending with Indiana in the lowei left corner. Iowa commences with the right end ol No. 45 and left end of No. 69. Then, in order, Kan sas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachu setts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, ending with Arizona, and the District of Columbia on- seat No. 46. Nebraska commences on No. 70, then follow down Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Dakota, Idaho and Montana, ending with New Mexico on No. 93. Utah is on the lower right corner. Then follow up on the right side, in order, Washington Territory, Texas, Penn sylvania, Tennessee, Vermont, Virginia, West Virginia, ending with Wisconsin in upper right corner on seat No. 96. Alternates are arranged in strictly alphabetical order. Commencing with Alabama, on seat No. 115, they follow down to No. 144, then commence with No. 174, running up to No. 145. Next comes No. 175, run ning down to No. 204, where the Wisconsin alternates will be seated." General Garfield's appearance in the Convention was greeted with enthusiastic applause from the delegates and the audieuce. After the organization of the Con vention he was appointed one of the Committee on Rules This appointment was received with applause. A de spatch to the New York Herald from Chicago that nighty said: CHICAGO CONVENTION — NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 423 " The name of General Garfield is also assuming [rominence as a possible nomination of the Ohio delega tion, should it be necessary to withdraw the name of Mr. Sherman. General Garfield will present the name of Mr. Sherman, and his speech and manner, it is thought, wiK make a very favorable impression on the Convention. The applause which greeted the name to-day when it was announced that he had been selected by the Ohio delega tion to serve in the Committee on Rules was a marked compliment to him, which has not been forgotten to-night in the calculations of the thoughtful men." The hour appointed for the meeting of the Conven tion was twelve o'clock Wednesday, June 2, 1880. " The Alabama delegation," says Mr. A. K. McClure, writing to the Philadelphia Times, " was first to file in as a body, and its two rows of President-makers nestled down in front of the stage, displaying every shade of complex ion, from the pure white to the genuine African. Arkan sas fell in greatly behind Alabama, with the familiar face of ex-Senator Dorsey at the head. Meantime the places allotted to the various States were being rapidly filled up by the rank and file of the delegations. But the leaders were slow in getting to their respective commands. The dignitaries who had been assigned to the seats for dis tinguished guests began to swarm in, and Frye, of Maine, and Chandler, of New Hampshire, buzzed them as they gathered in little knots to discuss the situation. General Beaver, chairman of the Pennsylvania delegation, swung himself along the side aisle on his crutches and sat down at the post of honor for his State, with Quay close by his side, and Cessna flitted hither and thither as if uneer- 424 JAMES A. GARFIELD. tain that anything would be Avell done unless he gave it a helping hand. McManes dropped in Lite, a little paled by illness, but with all his Scotch-Irish doggedness writ ten in hi3 face. Jewell and Creswell, both of the Grant cabinet, came in about the same time, the first hoping to look down on the defeat of his old chief from the gallery of distinguished guests, and the other marshalling hia delegation to give him back his Old Commander. " Both look fresh and rosy as they did when they hugged their portfolios and enjoyed the hollow homage that is paid to honor at the Capital. The tall, sturdy form of ' Long John ' Wentworth towered over all as he joined his delegation. He is stouter, redder, grayer and balder than eight years ago, when he rebelled against Grant. He has returned to his first love, and now wilts down his collars early in the morning working and cheer ing for the Silent Man. " Just when the building had pretty nearly filled up there was a simultaneous huzzah throughout the hall and galleries, and it speedily broke out in a hearty applause. The tall and now silvered plume of Conkling was visible in the aisle, and he strode down to his place at the head of his delegation with the majesty of an emperor. He recognized the compliment by a modest bow, without lift ing his eyes to the audience, and took his seat as serenely as if on a picnic and holiday. He has aged rapidly dur ing the last year, and his once golden locks are thinned and whitened, while hard lines dispel the brightness of his finely-chiselled face. The Grant men seemed to be more comfortable when they found him by their 3ide and evi deutly ready for the conflict. The sable Grant men from CHICAGO CONVENTION — NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 425 the South, who believe Grant to be their political savior look upon Conkling as his prophet, and they worship him as a demigod. Logan's swarthy features, flowing mous tache and Indian hair were next visible on the eastern aisle, but he stepped to the head of his delegation so quietly that he escaped a special welcome. He sat as if in sober reflection for a few moments and then hastened over to Conkling to perfect their counsel on the eve of battle. The two senatorial leaders held close conference until the bustle about the chair gave notice that the op posing lines were about to begin to feel each other and test their position. '• Cameron had just stepped upon the platform with the elasticity of a boy, and his youthful but strongly- marked face was recognized at. once. There was no ap plause. They all knew that he never plays for the gal leries and that cheers are wasted upon him. The man who can bring him votes when he is in want of them can make his cold gray eyes kindle and his usually stolid features toy with a smile, but no man in the land more justly estimates the crowd that ever cheers the coming guest than does Cameron. He quietly sat down for ten minutes, although the time for calling the convention to order had passed by an hour, and he looked out upon the body so big with destiny for himself and his Grant asso ciates. Passing by I asked him : ' What of the battle ?' To which he answered : ' We have three hundred to start with, and we will stick until we win.' " It was said with all the determination that his posi tive manner and expression could add to language, and it summed up his whole strategy. While he waited the 126 JAMES A. GARFIELD. vacant places were fast filling up. Generals Sewell and Kilpatrick took their posts at the head of the New Jersev men, and just behind them the rosy faces of Garfield an 1 Foster and the tall, spare form of Dennison were holding a hasty last council of the Sherman wing of the opposi tion. The youthful olive-shaded features of Bruce, of Mississippi, were visible in the centre of his delegation, and the dream of the Vice-Presidency made him restless and anxious. "At five minutes after one Cameron quickly rose from his chair, advanced to the front and brought his gavel down gently upon the speaker's desk. At once the confused hum of voices began to still, and the nearly ten thousand people present settled into perfect order. Cam eron stood for half a minute after silence had been ob tained, apparently free from all embarrassment, and finally said, in a clear voice : " ' The convention will come to order, and will be opened with prayer.' " The prayer followed, and was a very satisfactory test of the acoustic qualities of the hall. Then followed the reading of the call by Secretary Keogh, when Cam eron enlisted the utmost attention by adjusting his eye glasses and drawing from his coat-pocket a single sheet of foolscap paper. All knew that he would speak briefly, if at all, and that if he had anything to say he would say it with directness, and none were mistaken. In a speech of not over two minutes he got in some most telling blows for Grant, which were warmly cheered. He read his speech, and the delivery was clear and forcible. " He closed by nominating Hoar for temporary chair CHICAGO CONVENTION — NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 427 man and put the question at once, and the unanimous ap proval of the convention, as evinced by its mingled votes and cheers, transferred the organization of the body tc the anti-third -term combination. They breathed more freely when they saw Cameron out of the chair and Hoar in his place. But Cameron retired complacently, and both sides seemed to understand that victory to either depend ed upon the skill or accidents of future conflicts. Sen ator Hoar's benignant face and clerical cloth of the mod ern Puritan pattern were presented to the convention, and hearty applause greeted them. Mr. Hoar delivered an appropriate address, which was well received, and the work of the convention began. " Hale, of Maine, first took the floor as Blaine's chief lieutenant. Every one waited eagerly to hear whether he was about to open the battle, but he simply offered the usual resolutions for a call of States to report committee men. Routine business dragged along for some time, when Frye, of Maine, arose on the platform and called attention to the omission of Utah from the committee on credentials. He is Hale's fellow-lea'der of the Blaine men, and he is a fluent and skilful debater. His motion to have Utah represented in»the committee was soon under stood to be an attack on a vital part of the Graut line. As Conkling rose in his majestic and peaceful way to re ply, a storm of applause welcomed him as the ' leader of leaders.' He at once locked horns with the gritty Blaine advocate. He made a most plausible special plea for the omission of Utah along with Louisiana, but Frye camo back with the statement of the secretary of the National Committee that the omission was an accident and a mis- 428 JAMES A. GARFIELD. take, and called out the ever-ready enthusiasm of the Blaine side. Conkling saw that his position was untena ble, and he fell back in excellent order. The fiery Logan mounted his chair and offered a resolution for the admis sion of the five hundred veteran soldiers who are attend ing tbe convention. He knows just how to make a clap trap speech for the veterans, and as they are generally Grant men, who were brought here to help the cause along, he played his veteran card for all that was in it. General Kilpatrick, who loves to speak on all questions, and especially on behalf of the soldiers, seconded Logan's effort. The anti-Grant men did not dare to offer opposi tion to the Grant reserves, for the galleries and Logan car ried his motion, with generous applause from the Grant men. " That ended the skirmishing in the field for the day, and Conkling hastened an adjournment until to-morrow at eleven o'clock without a contest. The battle was then transferred back to the lobbies of the hotels. " The convention reassembled at eleven o'clock on the morning of the 3d of June. Conkling strode majestically down the aisle, bowed to the cheers which greeted him on every side, and the smile thai played upon his face told that his antagonists, with a clear majority against hira, had given him another day to lash them and a chance to return them defeat for their blunder. Cameron was with his delegation on the floor, as were Logan, Cresswell, and Boutwell, and they all displayed the self-satisfaction of repulsed chieftains who felt confident of fearfully punish ing if not routing the Blaine men before the battle closed. Hamlin's dark face deepened the lines of age by the anx- CHICAGO CONVENTION — NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 429 lefy that he could not conceal about the result of a battle that had to be fought for a day in skirmishes against superior strategists. A general engagement would give them certain victory if it could be forced at once. Fryo "and Hale were nervous and fretful under their now visible mistake, and attempted to relieve their error only to be defeated by Garfield finally coming in against their un protected flank. After they had forced him into the ac tion Conkling opened what he knew could be only an affair of outposts and one in which he must suffer least. With utmost coolness and all the air of a master he rose and moved a recess until six o'clock, giving the plausible reasons that the committee on credentials could not report earlier than four, and that the convention should not at tempt any important business until its membership was ascertained. Hale sprang to his feet to grapple with the half-vanquished but yet fearfully dangerous Grant cham pion. He pleaded against delay, and quoted the prece dent of Cincinnati in 1876, when the committees on rules and organization reported before the committee on cre dentials. He spoke well, but illy concealed the knowl edge that Conkling was seeking to profit as large and as conspicuously as possible by a Blaine blunder. " Conkling's reply was masterly in its unexpressed contempt and scathing sarcasm. His keen arrow struck just where he had aimed it, and Hale's irritation broke his voice so that his reply was unimpressive. But he got in a parting shot at his antagonist that allowed him to cover his retreat in a storm of applause. Both exhibited the utmost bitterness, but Conkling's polished oratory made even his venom sublime. Hale won on the first vote by 430 JAMES A. GARFIELD, defeating Conkling's motion, and while the now growing Blaine enthusiasm shouted over the victory, Conkling smiled and coolly waited his time, that he knew was near at hand. The report of the committee on organiza tion was %ade and disposed of in a few minutes. When they came to the front to retrieve the Blaine folly of de- la3'ing the committee on credentials, by moving that tho "committee on rules be instructed to report, both sides knew what the report was, and that it contained one rule limiting speakers to five minutes. If they could carry that report, before the report of the committee on con tested seats, the blunder of delay would be partially cor rected, as it would prevent the debate against time that the Grant men mean to make on the disputed delegations. Logan tried to drive Frye back by points of order, but failed, and when General Sharpe, the New York member of the committee, said that he was instructed to make a minority report, and that the committee had voted to withhold the majority report until after the contested seats were disposed of, Conkling's grim smile told how he enjoyed Frye's discomfiture. But they foolishly appealed to General Garfield, chairman of the committee, and Gar field was compelled, but with evident reluctance, to sus tain the statements made by General Sharpe. Frye was now completely unhorsed, and had to withdraw his own motion, and followed it with a motion to adjourn until five o'clock. " This brought Conkling to his feet to enjoy his vic tory, and, in one of his grandest flights of irony, he congratulated the Maine man on having kept ten thou sand people in uncomfortable seats for two hours to ao- CHICAGO CONVENTION — NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 431 somplish just what he proposed to accomplish when the convention met. All of Conkling's bitterness was thrown into his effort to portray the littleness of Blaine's leaders, and he sat down amidst thunders of applause. The vast audience had seen the first blood drawn by the gladiator and they wanted more. They called for Frye and Hale until Frye mounted his chair for a farewell broadside at his dreaded antagonist, and he got it in neatly and stopped at the right point. With a good imitation of Conkling's patronizing manner, he returned the thanks of the Maine delegation to the gentleman from New York for his con gratulations, and he added that he hoped when the work of the convention shall have been concluded, Mr. Conk ling would send his congratulations to the gentleman from Maine. It was a fair hit, and even Conkling joined the audience in its shouts of laughter. The convention then adjourned. " When it reassembled at 5 o'clock in the afternoon, it was announced that the committee on contested seats would not be ready to report until late in the evening. This fretted the Blaine leaders, who have held the Grant men as the under-dogs all day, and had the gal leries fully impressed with the belief that Blaine would be nominated as soon as a vote could be reached. They felt that they had blundered by delay, and they plunged in to multiply their blunders, in the vain hope that they could recover their lost opportunity. Henderson, of Iowa, opened the Blaine fire by renewing Frye's motion of the morning session to instruct the committee on rules to report. The sable gentleman in that Blaine wood-pile is hidden in the rule known to have been adopted by the 132 JAMES A. GARFIELD. committee limiting debate to five-minute speeches, and if that rule could be established before the report of the committee on credentials, it would cut off the expected long debate on the disputed seats. It was a desperate and awkward struggle of the Blaine men to regain the golden hours they had thrown away, but it provoked a running debate in which they suffered greatly. Logan and Boutwell made earnest protests, but Gen. Harrison, who has a wistful eye on the Vice-Presidency, crushed out the petty strategy of Handerson by a manly and elo quent appeal for fair play and free debate. General Sharpe followed and put the Blaine men in the attitude of seeking to violate the plighted faith of the entire com mittee, by which it was agreed that their report should not be made until the contested seats were settled, and thus avoid the arbitrary limitation of debate on the great preliminary battle. General Garfield, chairman of the committee on rules, sustained General Sharpe as to the action of the committee, but invited the convention to instruct him to report. General Sharpe followed by a shrewd exhibition of strategy in the shape of an amend ment requiring the committee on contested seats to re port at once. " This brought the opposing forces face to face. When he demanded a vote by call of the States it forced the first test of the strength of the Grant and combined opposition factions, and the most intense ex citement aud repeated outbreaks of applause attended the roll-call. The unit-rule question was speedily set tled when the first State was called. The chairman of the Alabama delegation reported the vote as 20 for the CHICAGO CONVENTION — NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 433 Sharpe amendment, but when a colored delegate pro tested and said that he wished his vote recorded in the negative, President Hoar answered : ' The vote will be so recorded,' and the unit rule disappeared amidst vocif erous cheers. The vote for Sharpe's amendment was a clean Grant vote, outside of Vermont, whose dele gation erected a very legible finger-board to lead the Grant men to Edmunds as the dark horse by voting solid with the Grant men. It made a visible flutter throughout the convention, and sent a chill to many of the ardent Blaine men. It proved that Cameron, Conk ling, and Edmunds understood each other, and that Ed munds is the heir apparent of the Grant dynasty. Penn sylvania voted 31 to 23, showing that Blaine has made no progress in his native State to-day, with all the ap parent tide in his favor and the ebb of the Grant cause ; and when Conkling reported exactly the same number of Blaine men in New York, the stubborn staying qualities of the defeated Grant men greatly sobered the leaders, who believed the nomination of Blaine to be assured by the general disintegration of the third-termers. The vote footed up 318 for Sharpe's amendment, and 406 against it, exhibiting 308 positive Grant votes, leaving out Vermont, and but 88 majority for the combined Blaine, Sherman, Washburne, and Windom opposition. When the vote was analyzed it became apparent that the actual Blaine vote was fifty less than the vote for Grant, and that of the opposition vote about forty from Massachusetts, Connecticut, and elsewhere were cast by Edmunds men. Brandagee, of Connecticut, followed the vote by a motion to lay the HendorsOn original motion 28 434 JAMES A. GARFIELD. on the table, and the Blaine men were again signally defeated in their ill-advised strategy by the success of Brandagee's movement, and an adjournment until ten o'clock to-morrow was then speedily carried." The third day's session opened at ten o'clock on fhe morning of the 4th of June. , ''Conkling struck out boldly when time was called in the morning, and he disconcerted Hale by his resolution declaring that all delegates should be bound to give a cordial support to the nominee of the convention. It was a resolution that Hale could not oppose, and yet he knew that all under: stood it as a public notice from the imperious Grant leader, that if Grant was beaten Blaine would share discomfiture with him. Conkling did it with the grand est dramatic effect, and it gave inspiration to the Grant followers, while it chilled the whole Blaine army and exposed the weak point of the allies. The resolution prevailed without opposition, but Conkling demanded a call of the States and made the most out of Mr early spanking of Hale. Three West Virginia Sherman men voted against the resolution, and Conkling at once swung the party lash to stripe them before the multitude, but after a rambling debate of an issue he withdrew his whip and let the dissenters pursue their go-as-you-please plan. " Finally the committee on credentials reported, and the changes made in, the Pennsylvania cases were th strongest evidence of the loss of vim and leadership in the Blaine men. They had reconsidered the Lancaster case and lost two votes, and the Pollock-Campion and the Brown-Buch cases had been allowed to remain as CHICAGO CONVENTION — NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 435 the Grant men had fixed them. Night before last the Blaine committee started out to decide all doubtful cases, if not all cases, in their own favor, and the Grant men ruefully prepared for such a fate ; but a day was lost to Blaine when the tide was at its flood, and the tide ebbed before Blaine has come to victory, as could have been done by anything like skilful management. A general relaxation and shuffling off followed, and even the Blaine credentials committee gate Grant four votes in Pennsylvania which they could have retained on plausible grounds in two cases, and in obedience to the mandate of the Lancaster Republicans in the other two cases. It is not surprising, therefore, that the proceed ings of to-day exhibited only a succession of irritating skirmish attacks from the Grant managers and little or no manly resistance from the Blaine side. "After Coukling had played with the Blaine men until he wearied of it Logan scored a brilliant triumph over the credentials committee on an appeal to the con vention. A protest had been sent to the committee by some Illinois outsiders, alleging that the Springfield con vention was not a regular body, and that there were no properly elected delegates-at-large from the State. The committee received the protest, unanimously decided against it, and reported that the Logan delegates were entitled to their seats. Logan resented the mere refer ence to his right to his place by the committee as a wanton imputation upon it when he had no contestant, and General Sharpe followed with a motion to expunge all reference to the delegates-at-large from the report. I'he Blaine leaders fought shy of the issue. Hale and 43t3 JAMES A. GABFIBLD. Frye were silent, but their delegation did a good share of applause when opportunity for it offered. The allies were distrustful of their power, and they did not ventuie to get into line of battle. The result was that Logan bore off his laurels in triumph. " Altogether the session was a succession of defiant advances against the Blaine outposts, and when adjourn ment was reached the Grant men were victors in all the skirmishes of the day. " The evening session brought the factious belligerents face to face on the question of contested seats, and Gen eral Harrison voiced the impatience of delegates and au ditors by proposing to limit debate to forty minutes in each case. With little preliminary spitting the conven tion got down to work, taking up the Alabama contest. The Grant men were at a disadvantage that they well ap preciated, as they were compelled to break their line or array themselves against the popular principle of direct representation of the people through the district, but they proved their perfect discipline by standing up squarely to the rack and accepting the issue. They knew that they must lose some, as one of the Grant delegates from ALibaraa made an earnest appeal in favor of the rights of districts, and Vermont could not be held on such a test. The debate was weak on the minority side, as Conkling, Logan, and the Grant dictators left the hopeless battle to their Southern friends, while Conger, Bateman, and other Blaine and Sherman orators, defended their cause on the floor. Three broke in Alabama, six of the Ver mont men joined the allies, and there were straggling losses in Georgia, Texas, and North Carolina ; but the CHICAGO CONVENTION — NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 437 Grant column stood up 306 strong on the severest test that could be imposed, while the allies polled 449. By this decision the Grant men lose two votes in Alabama, and they will next lose eighteen in Illinois and gain four in Kansas. When the contested seats shall all have been settled the nett loss to Grant will be eighteen, which will leave the Grant men an available vote of nearly three hundred that can be handled as a solid body. It will be solid for Grant, or for the man who may take the place of Grant all the time. " The Illinois case followed also, and it was the sig nal for the giants to come to the front Logan opened the fight, with his usual pluck, against the motion to limit debate to an hour. He blundered outside of the record, and made a telling Grant speech, calling out the strong est eruption of enthusiasm for the ' old soldier ' that had yet been exhibited. He would have made a strong hit, but he unfortunately called out Haymond, of California, to answer a question, and the Golden Star orator deliv ered a broadside for Blaine that enabled the Blaine gal leries to outdo the Grant applause immensely. It was kept up for five minutes, all the Blaine delegates and a large majority of the galleries rising and joining in the successive thunders of applause. Logan faced it grace fully like a man, but his speech was love's labor lost. He gained his point, however, by gaining two hours for the description of the Illinois case, besides his own speech of a full half hour. " The debate on the Illinois factions was opened by Conger, chairman of the credentials committee, in defence of the report and in favor of unseating eighteen Grant 438 JAMES A. GARFIELD. delegates. His speech was much the same as a half dozen others he had delivered during the day, and the vast audience sympathized with the convention in its weariness of that speech of Conger's. Raum, one of the sitting delegates, followed and threw much life into the dry details he gave of Republican precedents, but An thony, a contestant, answered with equal ability, and he moulded Republican history in just the opposite way. Storrs followed in defence of the Grant delegates, and made some strong points, but he spoke with that heavi ness that is common when a man faces palpable and in evitable defeat until he accidentally struck the Blaine chord, by saying in a conciliatory tone, 'Nominate James G. Blaine, if you will,' when the Blaine galleries broke out in a tempest of applause that was kept up for sev eral minutes. He waited patiently until order was re stored, when he countered with a beautiful tribute to the old soldier, and the Grant men simultaneously rose and stormed the convention with deafening applause for fully fifteen minutes. ' Long John* Wentworth threw up his hat, Conkling and Tom Murphy answered from New York, and the excitement was soon brought to such a pitch that hats, handkerchiefs, and umbrellas were sent flying in the air. Some of the colored delegates jerked off their coats and whirled them around in the most frantic manner. In noise, earnestness, and endurance it threw all previous Blaine demonstrations in the shade, and clearly outlined the unconquerable determination of the Grant followers. When the storm was just begin ning to calm a little, the Alabama delegation struck up the song of ' Marching through Georgia,' and the galleries CHICAGO CONVENTION NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 439 took up the refrain. Hoar looked on complacently and waited, patiently for the volcano to quiet itself, but just when things seemed likely to settle the Blaipe men started in fresh, and as they had two-thirds of the gal leries they shouted and cheered louder than their oppo nents, and kept it up quite as long. The ten thousand people present, who had been weary or worn out by te dious debate, were easily fired by one side or the other. A perfect pandemonium followed, and it was a full hour before the yelling ceased from sheer exhaustion. The riotous applause lasted a full hour, each side cheering in turn. " When the convention finally settled down the Presi dent attempted to put the question, but the only response was a fresh confusion of cheers for Blaine and Grant. Raum at last diverted the shouters by proposing three cheers for the nominee of the convention, which were given with a will. Storrs then attempted to proceed, but he incidentally named Sherman, and the Sherman men took a brief tilt at applause, but it was feeble and soon wore itself out. He then finished his speech at a quar ter, to one. •" Pixley, of California, followed with a brief speech that somewhat sobered the convention. He character' ized the demonstrations as worthy only of France and the Commune Butterworth moved to adjourn until ten o'clock and demanded a call of the roll. It was finished at 1.10 A. M,, and the adjournment was defeated by the overwhelming vote of 653 to 1Q3. " The vote was then about to be taken on the Illinois contest, when Clayton of Arkansas, moved to substitute 440 JAMES A. GARFIELD, the minority report relating to the First Congressional district, and a call of the roll was ordered, resulting in the defeat of the amendment by 387 to 353; Many of the delegations had one or more absentees, worn out by the protracted session and exhausting cheering, and Kansas declined to vote. As the Blaine sauce for Illinois throws out four Blaine men in that State, the result was received with vociferous applause from the Grant men, as it nearly annihilated the allied majority. Sixteen in Ohio broke, which is regarded as the Grant strength there as against Blaine. The question then recurred on the original re port, seating the contesting anti-Grant delegates from the first district of Illinois, and Logan demanded the call of the roll. It was concluded at 1.45 a. m., and the ma jority report was adopted by 384 to 356. Pennsylvania voted 34 on the Logan side and 24 against it. Logan then called a division of the question on the eight dis tricts, but the variance was not material from the test vote in the first district. The eighteen anti-Grant men were certain of being seated, and as they were admitted they swelled the sadly cut down allied majority. A motion to adjourn to eleven o'clock on Saturday was carried at half-past two. " President Hoar did not call the convention to order on the morning of the fourth day, June 5th, until a quar ter before twelve o'clock. The Kansas contest was the first business and it was an embarrassing issue to both sides. The Blaine-Sherman men were compelled to vote aut four of their men and- give their seats to Grant men to justify their action in the Illinois case, and the Grant men had to vote against the admission of their own CHICAGO CONVENTION — NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 441 friends to maintain their consistency. The Blaine-Sher man men preserved their intention and voted out their own men, but some of the fierce Grant men stood obsti nately to their guns aud voted against the addition of four to their number. Logan rose and, in dramatic style, cast the votes of his Illinois followers against his friends. The overwhelming vote of 476 to 184 showed, however, that separate district representation is hence forth to be the accepted law of the party. The next question brought about a sudden change of partners in the national waltz. Two Sherman men contested the seats of the Blaine delegates from West Virginia, and the Sherman men were thrown into an alliance with Grant as if by magic. The cut came from Massachusetts, and the Blaine leaders saw that an unexpected and serious danger threatened them. They threw out their flanks to stay the union between the Sherman and Grant forces, but it was Grouchy after Blucher over again. The Sherman men filed in with the Grant army, and Blaine was com pelled for the first time to face the field alone, as Grant had to meet it in several previous conflicts. An active rally was made along the Blaine lines, but the vote of every divided delegation proved that many who were bitterly against Grant were as bitterly against Blaine, and the ballot footed up 417 for the new Grant-Sherman combination and 312 against. " This was the first show of the positive Blaine stren-th, and it presented a majority of 84 against him, but it also showed that Blaine had more positive strength than Grant in the convention. The next test vote was yet a more severe trial for Blaine. The Utah contest 442 JAMES A. GARFIELD. was between the Grant contestants and the Blaine sitting members, and, to the surprise of the Blaine leaders, Massachusetts again gave the hint to the convention that the field would again combine against Blaine. The issue seemed to be extremely perilous to Blaine, but they had no way to escape. They had no chance for retreat and none for victory, and they had to stand up as bravely as possible and receive the shock. The prestige of the We'st Virginia vote was with the field, against Blaine, and it had its effect, as was shown by the increased anti- Blaine vote. The Grant-Sherman combination increased its vote for the admission of the square Grant delegates to the seats of two square Blaine clelegates from 417 ou the West Virginia to 426 on the Utah nine, and the Blaine vote was reduced from 330 to 312. These votes indicated a rapid crystallization of the field against Blaine, and the Blaine leaders would have floundered in definitely had not the Grant leaders reinspired them by forcing their battle too fast and too far. When General Garfield moved the adoption of the report on rules, Gen eral Sharpe, one of the staunchest and ablest of the Grant managers, threw the Blaine men into consternation by moving to proceed at once to the general nomination of candidates for President. Sharpe made his motion de liberately, and he evidently had a two-fold purpose in offering it. He hoped that the new Sherman allies would Btand by the Grant men in forcing the fight and thus de moralize the Blaine lines, or, failing in that, he desired to demonstrate the exact strength of Grant against both Blaine and Sherman and the necessity of uniting on a candidate against Blaine. CHICAGO CONVENTION — NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 443 " General Garfield at once met General Sharpe wifh an order for his allies to fall back into the Blaine camp again, and that gave notice that the scenes were suddenly shifted and that the Blaine-Sherman combination would at once resume business. When a roll-call was demanded there was a general bustle among the delegations, and all stragglers were hastily summoned into line. The result proved that Grant had 276 votes against the field and that the field had 479 against Grant. The result was received with a storm of applause from the well-crowded Blaine galleries, and the Blaine leaders were again re stored to the command of the convention by the bold movement of General Sharpe. It was not a distinct Blaine victory ; but it was a decisive Grant defeat, and it was accepted as a formal judgment that Grant was out side the pale of success. The Blaine men were timid not withstanding their substantial recovery from the disaster suffered in the West Virginia and Utah cases, and they feared to press the struggle. Both sides considered Pierre- pont's platform leisurely, as if each was afraid to precipi tate the great battle, and when the tedious resolutions had jogged through a sluggish debate on civil service re form, with nobody exhibiting any disposition to hasten results, the Blaine men were afraid to go on and afraid to move to adjourn. Ex-Postmaster General Creswell came to the relief of both sides at 4:50 p. m., by a motion to ad journ until seven o'clock. All the preliminary work was out of the way, and the convention had to face a direct struggle on the nomination or adjourn. A few feeble noes were given on the question, but nobody demanded a roll-call, and the three jarring elements of the conveu- 444 JAMES A. GARFIELD. ' tion rushed out to see which could best plot and counter* plot to destroy the others. " The probability that the final struggle was at hand attracted an eager crowd to the evening session. The galleries were jammed before the hour of meeting, and every place that would allow of a man to be crowded into it was occupied before President Hoar's gavel fell. The scene was the most brilliant of all the many brilliant ex hibitions given in the great hall during the last four days. There were no laggards among the delegates and the com manders were at their posts on sharp time. The ladies largely increased their numbers among the spectators, and on every side the most intense interest was manifested. The Blaine men were hopeful, but they did not conceal their apprehensions that their bitter battle against Grant might recoil upon them fearfully to-night. It has been clear since early in the day that the contest would be 'be tween Blaine and the field, and in every preliminary trial the field had won, but the Blaine men feel confident that they can command a clear majority against any one man. Such were the hopes and expectations of the Blaine leaders when seven o'clock summoned them to the final grapple with their foes. The Grant men came into ac tion with little or no hope of success for their favorite, but they have taken their hist stand to make Blaine share their defeat. Both the Sherman and Grant managers feel that delay will be in their favor. They do not want to betray their position by forcing an adjournment over till Monday, but their policy will be to protract the ballots and wear out the night session. Such was the attitude of the belligerents when the convention opened this evening. CHICAGO CONVENTION— NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 445 "Hale, the chief Blaine leader, took the floor as soon as the convention was ready for business, and there was a sudden hush, followed by applause as soon as he was recognized. It was regarded as the signal for a deter mined advance of the Blaine men, but the disappointment was general among his followers when he made what was, under the circumstances, a dilatory motion. With two hours certain to be occupied in speeches presenting can didates, not more than two hours would remain for ballot ing, as the advent of Sunday will adjourn the body at twelve. It was accepted by all sides as indicating hesi tation oii the part of the Blaine chieftains. When the name of Cameron was reported as the unanimous choice of Pennsylvania for the national committee, he received his first hearty cheers from the galleries. " Both Illinois and Maine made no response when called to nominate a candidate for President, but when Michigan was called, Mr. Joy at once rose and nominated Blaine. . " After some desultory sparring over the national committee had been lazily disposed of there was nothing left but to go to Presidential nominations, and Halo was compelled to lead off because the others would not and could afford to wait. He finally rose and moved the call of the States for general nominations for President. When Illinois was called, being the first State in alpha betical order that has candidates, there was no response, and like silence followed the call of Maine, but when Michigan was called, Mr. Joy rose to nominate Blaine. It was one of the many blunders of the Blaine leaders, as his speech was dry, uninspiring, and never elicited a cheee, 446 JAMES A. GARFIELD. except twice when he named Blaine. Long-continued' cheers followed, and at one time a repetition of the last night yelling blockade was apprehended. Colonel Pixley, of California, seconded the nomination; He improved on Joy, but fell far short of the expectations of the Blaine people. Indeed, so indifferently had Blaine been advo cated, that Frye, had to come forward and ask to be heard by a suspension of the rules. It was granted, of course, and he gave the Blaine men a taste of what they wanted. His five-minute speech was grand, bold, and eloquent, and Blaine was redeemed. When Minnesota was called, Mr. Drake, of Minnesota, came forward and named Windom, but it was a failure. He did not fill his ten minutes, aud the audience gave him a few parting cheers. " New York was soon called, and Conkling rose and quickly stepped upon the platform. It was the signal for thunders of applause. With difficulty silence was finally restored, and the vast gathering suddenly hushed into perfect stillness. Couscious that his cause was a hopeless one, he spoke with all the inspiration of one who was about to gather the garland of victory. He was sublimely eloquent. His polished blows at Blaine were as terrible as they were elegant, and his epigram matic tributes to Grant exhausted the power of language. Nearly every sentence was interrupted by an ovation. When he said that Grant had no appliances and no tele graph running from his house to this convention the Blaine galleries sent up a flood of hisses aud jeers and calls for ' time,' as he had exceeded his ten minutes. For some time tho galleries would not allow him to be heard, but he stood calmly, with folded arms, until the CHICAGO CONTENTION— NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 447 opposition exhausted itself. Then he said, as only Conk ling could say it, ' Go on, if you will ; it doesn't come out of my time.' It then occurred to the Blaine fol lowers, even in the galleries, that the night. was passing, and that they were themselves aiding to postpone a nomination until Monday. Ho was then allowed to finish, and he retired amid a tempest of cheers. The speech was equal to Ingersoll's speech for Blaine in 1876 in eloquence and power. " It was fully twenty minutes after Conkling left the platform before order could be restored. The Grant men in convention and galleries took a regular jubilee, and President Hoar had to sit down and let disorder tire itself out. The Grant delegation ' pooled ' the flags which mark their States, marched around the aisles, cheering and yelling as if bedlam had broken loose. Finally, Bradley, of Kentucky, was allowed to speak, seconding the nomination of Grant ; but it was tame after Conkling. " Garfield next rose and the audience started a new 6torm of applause. As soon as he could be heard he nominated Sherman and delivered an eloquent and im pressive appeal for his candidate, but neither galleries nor convention had half as much applause for Sherman as they had for Garfield himself." The following is the full text of General Garfield's speech : " Mr. President : I have witnessed the extraordi nary scenes of this convention with deep solicitude. No emotion touches my heart more quickly than a sen timent in honor of a great and noble character. But 448 JAMES A. GARFIELD. as I sat on these seats and witnessed these demonstra tions, it seemed to me you were a human ocean in a tempest. I have seen the sea lashed into fury and tossed into a spray, and its grandeur moves the soul of the dullest man. But I remember that it is not the billows, but the calm level of the sea from which all heights and depths are measured. When the storm has passed and the hour of calm settles on the ocean, when sunshine bathes its smooth surface, then the astronomer and surveyor takes the level from which he measures all terrestrial heights and depths. Gentlemen of the con vention, your present temper may not mark the health ful pulse of the people. " When our enthusiasm has passed, when the emo tions of this hour have subsided, we shall find the calm level of public opinion, below the storm, from which the thoughts of a mighty people are to be measured, and by which their final action will be determined. Not here, in this brilliant circle, where 15,000 men and women are assembled, is the destiny of the Republic to be decreed ; not here, where I see the enthusiastic faces of 756 delegates waiting to cast their votes into the urn and determine the choice of their party ; but by J>,000,000 Republican firesides, where the thoughtful fathers, with wives and children about them, with the calm thoughts inspired by love of home and love of country, with the history of the past, the hopes of the future, and the knowledge of the great men who have adorned and blessed our nation in days gone by, — there God prepares the verdict that shall determine the wis dom of our work to-night. Not in Chicago, in the heat CHICAGO CONVENTION — NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 449 of June, but in the sober quiet that comes between now and November, in the silence of deliberate judgment, will this great question be settled. Let us aid them to-night. " But now, gentlemen of the convention, what do we want? Bear with me a moment. Hear me for this cause, and, for a moment, be silent that you may hear. Twenty-five years ago this Republic was wearing a triple chain of bondage. Long familiarity with the traffic in the body and souls of men had paralyzed the consciences of a majority of our people. The baleful doctrine of State sovereignty had shocked and weak ened the noblest and most beneficent powers of the national government, and the grasping power of slavery was seizing the virgin Territories of the West and drag ging them into the den of eternal bondage. At that crisis the Republican party was born. It drew its first inspiration from the fire of liberty which God has lighted in every man's heart, and which all the powers of ig norance and tyranny can never wholly extinguish. The Republican party came to deliver and save the Repub lic. It entered the arena when the beleaguered and as sailed Territories were struggling for freedom, and drew around them the sacred circle of liberty, which the demon of slavery has never dared to cross. It made them free forever. " Strengthened by its victory on the frontier, the young party, under the leadership of that great man, who on this spot, twenty years ago, was made its leader, entered the national capital and assumed the high duties of the Government. The light which shone from its 29 450 JAMES A. GARFIELD. banner dispelled the darkness in which slavery had en shrouded the Capitol and melted the shackles of every slave, and consumed, in the fire of liberty, every slave- pen within the shadow of the Capitol. Our national industries, by an impoverishing policy, were themselves prostrated, and the streams of revenue flowed in such feeble currents that the treasury itself was well nigh empty. The money of the people was the wretched notes of 2,000 uncontrolled and irresponsible State bank corporations, which were filling the country with a cir culation that poisoned rather than sustaiued the life of business. "The Republican party changed all this. It abol ished the babel of confusion and gave the country a cur rency as national as its flag, based upon the sacred faith of the people. It threw its protecting arm around our great industries, and they stood erect as with new life. It filled with the spirit of true nationality all the great functions of the Government. It confronted a rebellion of unexampled magnitude, with a slavery behind it, and, undt r God, fought the final battle of liberty until victory was won. Then, after the storms of battle, were heard the uweet, calm words of peace uttered by the conquer ing nation, and saying to the conquered foe that lay pros trate at its feet, ' This is our only revenge, that you joia us in lifting to the serene firmament of the Constitution, to shine like stars forever and forever, the immortal prin ciples of truth and justice, that all men, white or black, shall be free and stand equal before the law.' Then came the questions of reconstruction, the public debt, and the public faith. CHICAGO CONVENTION — NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 451 " In the settlement of these questions the Republican pany has completed its twenty-five years of glorious ex istence, and it has sent us here to prepare it for another lustrum of duty and of victory. How shall we do this great work? We cannot do it, my friends, by assailing our Republican brethren. God forbid that I should say one word to cast a shadow upon any name on the roll of our heroes. This coming fight is our Thermopylae. We are standing upon a narrow isthmus. If our Spartan hosts are united we can withstand all the Persians that the Xerxes of Democracy can bring against us. "Let us hold our ground this one year, for the stars in their courses fight for us in the future. The census to be taken this year will bring re-enforcements and con tinued power. But, in order to win this victory now, we want the vote of every Republican, of every Grant Re publican in America, of every Blaine man and every anti- Blaine man. The vote of every follower of every candi date is needed to make our success certain ; therefore I say, gentlemen and brethren, we are here to calmly coun sel together, and inquire what we shall do. [A voice ' Nominate Garfield.' — Great applause.] " We want a man whose life and opinions embody all the achievements of which I have spoken. We want a man who, standing on a mountain height, sees all the achievements of our past history, and carries in his heart the memory of all its glorious deeds, and who, looking forward, prepares to meet the labor and the dangers to come. We want one who will act in no spirit of uukind- ness toward those we lately met in battle. The Repub lican party offers to our brethren of the South the olivo 452 JAMES A. GARFIELD. branch of peace, and wishes them to return to brother hood, on this supreme condition, that it shall be admitted, forever and for evermore, that, in the war for the Union, we were right and they were wrong. [Cheers.] On that supreme condition we meet them as brethren, and no other. We ask them to share with us the blessings and honors of this great Republic. " Now, gentlemen, not to weary you, I am about to present a name for your consideration — the name of a man who was the comrade, and associate, and friend of nearly all those noble dead whose faces look down upon us from these walls to-night [cheers] ; a man who began his career of public service twenty-five years ago, whose first duty was courageously done in the days of peril on the plains of Kansas, when the first red drops of that bloody shower began to fall which finally swelled into the deluge of war. He bravely stood by young Kansas then, and, returning to his duty in the national legisla- ture, through all subsequent time his pathway has been marked by labors performed in every department of legis lation. " You ask for his monuments. I point you to twenty- five years of the national statutes. Not one great benefi cent statute has been placed on our statute books with out his intelligent and powerful aid. He aided these men to formulate the laws that raised our great armies and carried us through the war. His hand was seen in the workmanship of those statutes that restored and brought back the unity and married calm of the States. His hand was in all that great legislation that created, the war currency, and in a greater work that redeemed the prom- CHICAGO CONVENTION — NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 453 ises of the Government, and made the currency equal to gold. And when, at last, called from the halls of legisla tion into a high executive office, he displayed that expe rience, intelligence, firmness, and poise of character which has carried us through a stormy period of three years. With one half the public press crying { Crucify him ! ' and a hostile Congress seeking to prevent success — in all this he remained unmoved until victory crowned him. % "The great fiscal affairs of the nation and the great business interests of the country he has guarded and pre served, while executing the law of resumption, and effect ing its object, without ajar, and against the false prophe cies of one half of the press and all the Democracy of this continent. He has shown himself able to meet with calmness the 'great emergencies of the Government for twenty-five years. He has trodden the perilous heights of public duty, and against all the shafts of malice has borne his breast unlmnned. He has stood in the blaze of " that fierce light that beats against the throne," but its fiercest ray has found no flaw in his armor, no stain on his shield. " I do not present him as a better Republican, or as a better man than thousands of others we honor, but I present him for your deliberate consideration. I nomi nate John Sherman, of Ohio." " Elliot, the colored orator of South Carolina, varied the monotony of the generally indifferent speeches nomi nating candidates by an eloquent and well-delivered ap peal for Shennan, and ex-Governor Smith, of Vermont, then smarted the Edmunds, boom, which was seconded by Sandford, of Massachusetts. The convention and the 454 JAMES A. GARFIELD. galleries were both wearied of the oratory and fireworks, and repeated manifestations of impatience were given. As soon as it became probable that a ballot must go over till Monday, the interest of the vast audience visibly flagged, and empty seats became visible as crowds rushed to escape the heat of the hall. At 11.30, Cassidy, of Wisconsin, rose to nominate Washburne, but Oonkling, „Frye, and Garfield had made all ordinary speeches stale and unprofitable, and neither Cassidy nor his theme in spired enthusiasm. " Brandagee, of Connecticut, infused fresh spirit into the jaded audience by a sprightly, eloquent seconding of Washburne. He closed at 11.50 p. m., leaving Sunday but ten minutes off. The nominations were then finished, and a motion to adjourn until ten o'clock on Monday was carried just as the midnight hour was struck." When the doors of the convention were opened on the morning of Monday, June 7th, " hurried streams of humanity poured in at every entrance, aud when the houi arrived for President Hoar to swing his gavel, all the por tions of the hall within possible hearing of the proceed ings were jammed to the uttermost. Even the reserved platform of the correspondents was invaded by the crowd until communication with the hundred batteries which maintained their ceaseless clicking hard by was almost entirely interrupted. The ladies gave their wealth of smiles upon the conflict of the political giants in greater profusion than at any previous session, and the distin guished guests were wedged in upon each other as if they were no more than common flesh and blood. " Hoar came in ahead of time and looked serene as a CHICAGO CONVENTION — NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 455 summer morning that welcomed him to his task, and his face was fresh as the roses which shed their exquisite tints and fragrance on his table. He has borne himself so well, so impartially, and so intelligently, that all felt assured of a faithful umpire in the desperation of the last charge of the contending hosts. Alabama, as usual, was first to present a full delegation, and Arkansas, just be hind her, speedily followed. The colored troops were generally among the first to the front, and they evidently meant to fight nobly. Conkling was mindful of the po tency of dramatic strategy, and knew that he would meet his grandest welcome as he passed before his allies to lead them in the hand-to-hand struggle. He waited until just before the time for calling to order, and then strode into the hall with that magnificent bearing that none of his rivals can imitate. As soon as his tall form and sil vered crown were visible, the shout went up that all un derstood, and it was heartier and longer than before. He walked down the aisle with the utmost exposure, and gracefully bowed his recognition of the homage tendered him. Garfield is the member of the convention who di vides with Conkling the popular welcome at every open ing. He has evidently studied the graces for such occa sions less, and therefore appears to have studied them more ; while Conkling is either so complete in his culture or so gifted in the perfection of manner, that he seems to be a born leader and grandly conscious of it. Conkling's dress has the appearance of the most elegant negligence, while Garfield comes with his carefully adjusted tie and collar, closely buttoned frock-coat and displaying a gen teel mixture of mirror poses and Western go-as-you-please. 456 JAMES A. GARFIELD. "He received a royal welcome when he entered, and his strong, rugged features lightened like the rippled lake with its dancing sunshine. Cameron was active, silent and determined as ever. He flitted hurriedly among the distinguished guests, before the signal gun was fired, and then retired to his immediate command. Hale and Frye were among the first to take their position, and hope and fear were plainly wrestling with each other on their faces. Hale was pale with anxiety, and the usu ally flushed features of Frye were redder than are their wont. Both seemed well poised and reasonably self- reliant, but the contrast between their nervous apprehen sions and the calm defiance of Conkling was a study for the intelligent observers of men. Chandler was rest less, and his little face seemed to have shrunk away behind his eye-glasses. " Logan was calm as the dark cloud that is just waiting to hurl its thunderbolt. He sat as still as a statue, his swarthy features appearing darker than usual, and his fierce black eyes now and then darting out their most defiant flashes. He seemed conscious that his leader was beaten, but he was evidently resolved that there should be a costly retreat for the pursuing hosts. Garfield, Foster, Dennison, Bateman, Butterfield, and other Ohio leaders, were to be seen in little knots of their delegation, as if they feared defection at an early stage of the contest, and there was evident unrest among the Indiana men. General Harrison's short form and sharply- cut features were shaded with anxiety. He feared Grant, and now that Grant seemed to be beaten, he was im pressed with the possibility of the grandson of a Presi- CHICAGO CONVENTION — NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 457 dent being the choice of exhausted factions. General Sewell sat in front of Conkling, and his youthful face exhibited the coolness and determination which charac terized him in the heat of battle. As far as faces could be distinguished in the great arena, all seemed to be soberly anxious for the order to advance. "When President Hoar called the convention to order there was a speedy hush, and the vast multitude was seated with wonderful alacrity. All seemed anxious for the fight to begin. The minister who opened with prayer shared the general appreciation of the value of the fleeting moments, and his petition had the merit of brevity. President Hoar at once called the combatants to the arena, and gave notice that there should be no delay, no debate, no tricks by changing votes after once cast ; and he faithfully enforced, the rules. Hale came promptly to the front by moving to proceed to a ballot. His manner was courageous, and the Blaine men sent up a cheer to encourage him. Conkling followed, and seconded the motion with an air that plainly told his followers he was ready for the fray, and the Grant gal leries welcomed him with a storm of applause. The roll-call was at once begun amidst most intense anx iety, many of the leaders exhibiting painful suspense. " Alabama opened for Grant by giving him nearly a solid vote, and Arkansas followed with an entirely solid vote for him. There was faint applause, but all sides joined in hissing it down. Next came California with a united vote for Blaine, which was announced by Pixley in a dramatic way and with a clap-trap sentence for the galleries, but the } resident rose and notified the chairmen 458 JAMES A. GARFIELD. of delegations that no comment of any kind would be allowed. The ballot then ran along in a regulation way until Connecticut was called, when there was breathless silence to hear the response, and when it gave Blaine but three and Grant none, there was a double disap pointment. The next State that excited special attention was New York, and when Conkling rose to announce the vote, every one strained forward to catch his words. In a distinct voice he slowly responded : ' Two votes are reported for Sherman, seventeen for Blaine, and fifty-one are for Grant.' His emphasis upon the words, ' are for Grant,' was an exhibition of Conkling's own method of impressing himself upon those around him, and but for the common desire to prefer a vote to a hurrah there would have been a storm of cheers. Ohio threw a wet blanket on the Sherman men by casting nine votes for Blaine on the first ballot, and it brightened the faces of a vast majority of the spectators. Pennsylvania was another of the States that silenced the audienee when called, as she was about to declare how Cameron had held the Grant lines there against the impetuous dashes made by the Blaine men. There was evident gratifica tion among the Grant followers and equal disappointment among the Blaine men when General Beaver's clear, strong voice thundered out so that all could hear it : ' Pennsylvania votes thirty-two for Grant, twenty-three for Blaine, and three for Sherman.' There was little variation from the generally understood attitudes of the States called after Pennsylvania, and fie ballot closed in the most orderly manner. "When the secretary announced that Grant had CHICAGO CONVENTION — NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 459 reached 304; Blaine, 284; Sherman, 93 ; Edmunds, 34; Washburne, 30, and Windom 10, there was a spontane ous shout from the Grant ranks, and the Blaine leaders and followers were grievously mortified. Hale and Frye could not conceal their apprehensions that they had mis calculated their strength, and that the defeat of their plumed knight was more than probable. They had con fidently counted on from 305 to 315 for Blaine on the first ballot, and they conceded only 275 to Grant. But the battle was upon them; there was no time allowed to rally or gather up stragglers, and they had to push the fight as best they could with the prestige, on which many hesitating votes depended, clearly against them. The Grant galleries seemed to take in the situation, and to understand that rapid voting rather than boisterous cheering was their policy. The moment the vote was announced by President Hoar he ordered another ballot, holding that nothing was in order but to vote ; and before the leaders could take a look at their lines they were in action again by the prompt roll-call. The Blaine men noted the second ballot with painful interest, as they hoped to receive a large accession to their candidate, and when the result showed that Grant had gained one and that Blaine had lost two there was a visible chill through out the Blaine ranks. The third ballot was precipitated upon the convention immediately after the second had been announced, and the Blaine men hoped that Ohio or Pennsylvania would signal the doubtful vote to come to the popular leader ; but Ohio exhibited no variation, even with Sherman's own delegation divided, and Pennsylvania announced a gain to Grant at the cost of Blaine. 460 JAMES A. GARFIELD. " It was on this ballot that Caleb N. Taylor, of Bucks, started the Harrison boom solitary and alone, but during all the subsequent votes there was no response to it from Indiana. The announcement of 305 for Grant and 282 for Blaine settled all sides down to a wearing contest, and it so continued until' sixteen ballots had been cast, without any material change in the lines. So closely was the voting watched that every change of a single vote was understood at once, and the gain or loss of two or three votes by either Grant or Blaine was the signal for applause when the ballot was closed. During the sixteen ballots Grant carried only from 303 to 309 and Blaine from 280 to 285. The only episode that interfered to re lieve the monotony of the sameness of voting was when Conkling lost a vote in his delegation. He did not dis pute the correctness of the vote returned to him as chair man, but he evidently meant that deserters must uncover themselves. He demanded a call of the roirin open con vention, which required each individual delegate to rise and answer for himself, and Senator McCarthy proved to be the missing Grant man who had taken refuge in the Blaine camp. He was vociferously cheered by the gal leries when he cast his vote, but Conkling looked on com placently and felt assured that he had stopped further straggling. After the sixth ballot General Harrison rose and moved a recess until 5 P. m., but it was howled down before the question could be put. Later on Drake tried to stop what seemed to be a tedious farce by renewing the motion to adjourn, but he fared no better than Harrison. After eighteen ballots, and when more than five hours had been consumed in casting and counting 755 votes, CHICAGO CONVENTION — NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 461 almost without variation, Mr. Buchanan, the Sherman chairman of the Mississippi delegation, moved a recess until seven o'clock, and it was carried without serious opposition. Both the Grant and Blaine leaders are seek ing alliances with Sherman, and when a Sherman manager proposed a truce, the chief opposing forces were unwilling to antagonize him. An adjournment was then hurriedly carried and the weary crowd filed out to dinner. '' The brief recess was actively employed by leaders of all sides to get possession of the incalculable quantity from the South that followed Sherman. It is known to be made up largely of Swiss guards, and so both leading lines feared that the other might capture them. Both have tried most exclusively to get them into camp, and the air is full of stories not at all creditable to the integ rity of either bidders or the doubtful delegates. " When the hour for the evening session drew near there was unreliable understanding between the Sherman wing aud either of the chief belligerents, and both Hale and Conkling had to renew the battle and take the chances of the many accidents which may drift the float ing vote to its final destination. As soon as the doors were open the crowd rushed iu more impetuously than ever before, and for the first time the mob mastered the excellent police force that has so admirably handled the seething mass of humanity that has crowded in and about the Exposition Building. Those admitted to the distant portions of the hall finally made a dash over the feeble partitions and at once filled all the vacant seats nearest the platform. Once in possession it could not be re moved, and those who were too lute had to take seats 462 JAMES A. GARFIELD. which present a view of the convention only in the dim distance. Conkling and Garfield came in late, as usual, and received the regulation cheers, much to the amuse ment of the audience generally, and Hale and Frye were early in their places, still hopeful but evidently not con fident of victory. "President Hoar promptly ordered the nineteenth ballot, and the greatest auxiety was manifested as the States with floating delegates were called. It was ex pected that the recess would result in some combination in favor of Blaine or Grant, but the ballot failed to reveal any material change, and when the next presented about the same result it became apparent that the battle was to be a protracted one. The ballots were hurried along without anything whatever to relieve the tedious same ness of calling the roll and listening to announcements, which would average just about even all around in atiy ten ballots. Grant started at his old 305, buK Blaine fell down to 279, and on next trial Grant forged ahead to 308, leaving Blaine at 276. Grant then dropped gradu ally until he got down to 303 and Blaine took a spurt that put him up to 281, but it was evident that the ups and downs between them meant nothing more than stray shots from wandering pickets. The crowded audience was restless. The Grant and Blaine men cheered alter nately, as ballots were announced showing slight gains for their favorites. After the twenty-seventh ballot, at 9.^0 p. m., Morse, of Massachusetts, anti-Grant, moved to ad journ till ten to-morrow. The viva voce was nearly equal, and the chair declared that the ayes appeared to have it ; but Conkling bounced to his feet to demand a call of the CHICAGO CONVENTION — NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 463 roll, which Hale promptly seconded. The motion was then withdrawn, and the session began again. " The twenty-eighth ballot gave Grant 307, within one- of his highest vote, and Blaine 279, being below his aver age. Mr. Morse, another Massachusetts Edmunds man, then reneweil the motion to adjourn, and the chair was about to declare it carried when Conkling rose hastily and demanded a roll-call, which was promptly seconded by the Grant men of Kentucky. The Blaine men were sick of the unequal contest, and Hale, who had joined Conkling half an hour before to oppose adjournment, in order to exhibit pluck, sat still, aud the field was quickly marshalled for a suspension of active hostilities." The following table shows the result of the day's bal loting, the first ballot being given in detail : States. < 5 i V5< 3 a 7> s 'fi aa !3o < .. u a a¦a< 16 12 6 's 6 24 1 4 20 8i 3 i ia 30 '8 10 2«32 G 1 2 14 7 3 '8 236 *2 2 2 20 •• 7 8 1 1 115 118 2(5 23 17 401 JAMES A. GARFIELD. States. 'A< (5< < a6 aa 00 00 w s gn a < 115 1 G 2951 6 32 131G 11 18 1 1 'i iill 118 21 '4 G6 101G 17 9 6 23 86 23 872 1 1 222 1 1 1 26 G 2 14 34 3 i1 2 i '3 22 16 io 17 Minnesota 1 New Hampshire 2 Ohio i 9 Utah Total 304 284 93 34 10 30 2d. 3d. 4th. 5th. 6th. 7th. 8th. 9th. 10tb. .. 305 305 305 305 805 305 30G 308 305 . . 282 282 93 281 95 281 95 261 95 281 94 284 91 282 90 282 92 .. 32 32 32 32 81 32 31 31 31 31 30 30 31 31 32 32 82 10 10 10 10 10 10 10 10 Garfield 1 1 1 1 2 2 1 2 a Harrison • • • ¦ 1 CHICAGO CONVENTION — NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 465 11th. 12th. 13th. 14th. 15th. 16th. 17th. 18th. 19th Grant 806 304 305 305 308 306 303 305 305 Blaine 281 283 285 285 281 283 284 283 279 ... 92 92 89 89 88 88 90 91 96 ... 31 31 31 31 31 31 81 31 3i ... 32 33 82 35 36 86 86 35 32 ... 11 10 10 10 10 10 10 10 10 Garfield 2 1 1 . . . . . . . , 1 Hartranit. . .. , , . . . . , . . . . . 1 1 .. . .. . .. .. . . McCrary . . 1 .. .... .. . . .. Davis •• :• •• .... •• 1 •• 20th. 21st. 22d. 23d. 24th. 25th. 26th. 27th. 28tb ... 308 305 305 304 305 302 303 30G 807 . . . 276 276 96 275 97 275 97 279 93 281 94 280 93 277 93 979 ... 98 91 ... 31 31 31 31 31 31 31 81 31 Washburne. . ... 35 35 35 36 35 85 3G 36 35 ... 10 10 10 10 10 10 10 10 10 1 1 1 2 2 2 2 2 2 1 1 1 The adjournment was carried over Grant's steady 303, and the battle was transferred again to the lobbies of the Chicago hotels. The convention met again at eleven o'clock on the morning of June 8 th. After the opening prayer the call of the States was ordered for the twenty-ninth ballot for President. There was a disturbance at the outset over the vote of Alabama. It was announced by the chair man, George Turner, as it had been cast all day yester day ; but it appeared that Alexander, one of the Grant delegates, was not in the hall, but had asked the chair man to cast his vote. Objection being made the roll of individual delegates was called, and as no alternate ap peared, Grant lost one vote. It required a quarter of an hour to settle this dispute, and there was no further epi- 30 466 JAMES A. GARFIELD. sode until Massachusetts was reached, when the nineteen Edmunds votes of yesterday were turned over to Sher man and created some excitement as being an indication, though slight, that the convention might break. The split in the Minnesota vote following immediately after, i^nd giving Blaine three of the Windom delegates, was the signal for a renewal of the excitement, and consid erable applause followed. A little farther on the result showed that Grant had got the Sherman votes in Missis sippi, but there was nothing in the ballot to indicate that any such missionary work had been done during the night as to give prompt settlement to the great contro versy. During this call Virginia and West Virginia both insisted upon an individual call, and it transpired that the Sherman delegate from West Virginia who was yes terday missing was on hand. The result of the ballot was loudly cheered by Ohio people and the Sherman men in general. It was getting their favorite ahead. The ballot resulted in 305 votes for Grant, 278 for Blaine, 116 for Sherman, 12 for Edmunds, 35 for Washburne, 7 for Windom, and 2 for Garfield. " There were some indications as the thirtieth ballot progressed that the lesser candidates were giving way. Blaine took two of Washburne's Illinois votes, aud Blaine got three more of the Windom votes from Minnesota, mak ing six of that lot for him. Great amusement was cre ated toward the close of this ballot by the announcement of one vote for Gen. Phil Sheridan in Wyoming. Sheri dan was on the stage, near the chair, and when he was a moment after discovered by the people, a shout went up from all-over the house, and Sheridan finally arose and CHICAGO CONVENTION — NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 467 said that he was very much obliged, but he couldn't take the nomination unless he were permitted to turn it over to his best friend. The galleries saw the point of this, since Sheridan's best friend is Grant, and all the Grant delegates made the best of the opportunity by an out burst of enthusiasm. The chair also detected the point, and said that while the distinguished soldier had been given permission to interrupt the order of the conven tion it would be granted no one else. " On the thirty-first ballot two more of the Indiana votes left Blaine and went to Washburne. The Indi ana men never were very stiff for Blaine, and have been waiting a chance to get away to somebody else. On this ballot also Thompson, of the Pennsylvania delegation, left Garfield and went to Grant, giving the third-termers 35 votes in that delegation. Caleb Taylor had been got around to Blaine, while Grier was holding the Garfield boom level, although he was entirely alone in his vote for the Ohio man. New Mexico kept up the good-nature of the galleries on this ballot by giving Conkling one vote. The result of the ballot was inspiring to the Grant men, and Conkling did his share of the cheering. Five more of Blaine's Indiana votes got away on the succeeding ballot, going to swell the Washburne column. Farther down the list he lost two from Wisconsin in the same way, and a cloud came over the Blaine side of the house. There was a hurried conference of the Maine senator's leaders in the aisle near where the Maine delegates sat, and it was a thoroughly dispirited crowd when the ballot was announced showing Grant's highest and Blaine's lowest. There was no ignoring the fact that the Grant lines 468 JAMES A. GARFIELD. could not be broken, and that the Blaine lines were at this time wavering. It was apparent the convention was on the edge of a break. The thirty-third ballot, which was finished at half-past twelve, was without exciting vent, and with the exception of a little cheer when the Sherman votes of Alabama were cast for Blaine, was monotonous. About this time the Blaine managers be gan to get their men back into the lines, and a few scattering delegates, who were beginning to fear the solidity of the Grant column, turned in from their dark horses to Blaine. They didn't want Blaine, but they were not willing to see him crowded entirely off the track While Grant hung on. " The close of the thirty-fourth ballot was marked by excitement, growing out of Wisconsin's 16 votes for Garfield. It was the beginning of the end. To make up this bunch, Washburne, Blaine, and Sherman had been drawn upon. This ballot brought Grant's vote up to 312, and served to arouse the Grant enthusiasm. Garfield here arose and addressed the chair. The chairman in quired for what purpose the gentleman rose. ' To a ques tion of order,' said Garfield. ' The gentleman will state it,' said the chair. " ' I challenge,' said Mr. Garfield, ' the correctness of the announcement that contains votes for me. No man has a right, without the consent of the person voted for, to have his name announced and voted for in this con vention. Such consent I have not given.' " This was overruled by the chairman amidst laughter against Garfield, who had made the point on the vote -cast for him by Wisconsin. CHICAGO CONVENTION— NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 169 '* The thirty-fifth was the most interesting ballot ot the Jay so far. The call was quick, people had begun to show better spirits, and when the 27 Indianians, who had been looking around for some way out, cast themselves for Garfield, there was a deafening shout, and Garfield's seat was immediately surrounded. Maryland followed with four for the Ohio dark horse, and Wisconsin for a second time turned in sixteen of her votes solid, for him. It was apparent that the Blaine movement had broken up, and the friends of Grant and Garfield had the cheer ing to themselves at the end of this ballot. " The call of the States for the thirty-sixth ballot be gan amidst considerable excitement. Everybody saw that Blaine was now out of the way, and it was a matter of beating Grant so far as the opposition was concerned. It was evident, too, that it would have to be done with Gar field, and Connecticut led off on this ballot with 11 votes for him. The most of the Washburne vote of Illinois fol lowed this, and when Indiana was called, General Harri son cast 29 of her 30 votes for Garfield. The storm at this point broke. The people rose up and gave one tre mendous cheer, and hats and handkerchiefs were tossed high, as they had so often been before. The confusion had not fairly subsided when Iowa followed with 22 votes for Garfield, and the outburst was renewed and gained in force with every fresh start. A little farther down Maine cast her 14 votes for the Ohio man, and the sheering was greater than ever. The confusion was so great that it was almost impossible to go on with the call. The dele gations of Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, and Mississippi each insisted upon an individual roll-call, 170 JAMES A. GARFIELD. and the Blaine and Sherman votes nearly all turned ur for Garfield. Conkling was dodging about a good deal at this time, but it dawned upon the Grant men that all was up with them. They were well disciplined, however, and hung together all the way down the call. It was getting down to Pennsylvania. Cameron sat imperturbable in the midst of his delegates, and was repeatedly urged to cast the solid Pennsylvania delegation for Blaine on this ballot. This would have prevented the nomination of Garfield on that ballot, at least, and might have stayed the Garfield cyclone by getting Blaine back on the track; but Cameron at this time would not acknowledge that Garfield could go through as he did go. " Ohio was finally called. The delegation had been thrown into confusion, and it was some time in getting around, but it finally turned up with forty-three for Gar field, the missing delegate being Garfield himself. The convention relapsed into cheers again, but recovered in a moment to hear General Beaver announce the Pennsyl vania vote as thirty-seven for Grant, twenty-one for Gar field. Gordon had swung around to Grant, and Hays, who had voted for Blaine, felt himself released when Maine virtually put him out of the field, and went with the Grant people. The Grant men got in a little cheer here, but it was of short life. As the call went on, as well as it could in the confusion, the Blaine delegates wheeled into line for Garfield. Vermont was wildly cheered when the ten Edmunds votes swung around, and Wisconsin's eighteen following shortly after, gave the man from Ohio a majority of the whole number. " The thousands had kept tally and knew this. Thew CHICAGO CONVENTION — NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 471 was a momentary hush, as if the seven or eight thousand people were taking breath, and then the storm burst, and while the cheering went on the banners of the several States were borne to the place where Ohio's delegation sat, Garfield in the midst of them, and there was a scene almost equal to that of midnight on Friday. The baud was playing ' The Battle-Cry of Freedom,' at the lower end of the hall, and when the cheering subsided for a mo ment, the air was taken up and sung in chorus by thou sands of voices. Everywhere flags were waving, and on the outside of the building cannon were booming and thousands were cheering. This went on for a quarter of an hour, during which time Conkling sat in his place at the head of his delegation without show of emotion of any sort. Efforts were made to get Garfield out, but he re mained hidden in the midst of his Ohio friends. " After Wisconsin the call of the Territories had little interest, and was conducted in the midst of the greatest confusion. The call for the first time was verified by a re-reading of the votes, and at the announcement of the result there was another outburst. The changes in the vote by which the nomination was reached are shown in the following table : 29th. 30th. 31st. 82d. 83d. 84th. 85th. 36th. Grant 305 306 308 309 309 312 818 308 Blaine 278 279 276 270 270 275 257 42 Sherman 116 120 119 117 110 107 99 3 Edmunds.... 12 11 11 11 U 11 11 Washburne 85 33 81 44 44 80 23 6 Windom 7433443. Garfield 2 3 1 1 1 17 50 899 Sheridan •• 1 •• .. .. .. • • • • Conkling ....,,.,...... . , , . 1 . . . • . . . . •• 472 JAMES A. GARFIELD. "After the announcement the band played the 'Con quering Hero,' and the people again stood upon the benches and hurrahed and yelled in the same old way. In the midst of this the tall form of Logan rose up, and he sought to be heard. Conkling was standing in the aisle, asking the attention ofthe chair. As soon as order was restored, Conkling was recognized, and in a husky voice, sadly in contrast with his tones of the past five days, asked to have the nomination of Garfield made unanimous. He was loudly cheered. His speech was as follows : " ' Mr. Chairman : James A. Garfield, of Ohio, having received a majority of all the votes cast, I rise to move that he be unanimously presented as the nominee of the convention. The chair, under the rules, anticipated me, but being on my feet I avail myself of the opportunity to congratulate the Republican party of the nation on fhe good-natured and well-tempered disposition which has distinguished this animated convention. [Cries of ' Louder ! ' from the galleries.] I should like to speak louder, but having sat here under a cold wind I find myself unable to do so. I was about to say, Mr. Chair man, that I trust that the zeal, the fervor, and now the unanimity of the scenes of the convention will be trans planted to the field of the country, and that all of us who have borne a part against each other will be found with equal zeal bearing the Danners and carrying the 'auces of the Republican party into the ranks of the enemy.' [Applause.] " Conkling was followed by Logan, who spoke in the midst of calls for Garfield, but Garfield could not be CHICAGO CONVENTION — NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 473 induced to show himself, and Logan got a chance finally to go on with a speech after tbe manner of Conkling, He said : " ' Gentlemen of the Convention : We are to be con gratulated at having arrived at a conclusion in respect to presenting the name of a candidate to be the standard- bearer of the Republican party for President of the United States in union and harmony with each other. Whatever may have transpired in this convention that may have produced feelings of annoyance will be, I hope, considered as a matter of the past. I, with the friends of one of the grandest men on the face of the earth, stood here to fight a friendly battle for his nomination, but this convention has chosen another leader, and the men who stood by Grant will be seen in the front of the contest for Mr. Garfield. [Cheers.] We will go for ward in the contest, not with tied hands, not with sealed lips, not with bridled tongues, but to speak the truth in favor of the grandest party that has ever been organized in this country, to maintain its principles, to uphold its power, to preserve its ascendancy, and my judgment is that, with the leader whom you have chosen, victory will perch on our banners. [Cheers.] As one of the Republicans from Illinois I second the nomina tion of James A. Garfield, and hope it will be made unanimous.' [Cheers.] "After this, General Beaver, from the head of the Pennsylvania delegation, was heard. He referred to Pennsylvania as having first put Garfield in nomination, aud stood by him with one vote when there were no others for him, and he promised the largest majority that 474 JAMES A. GARFIELD. Pennsylvania has given at a Presidential election in re cent years. Here is his speech : " ' The State of Pennsylvania having had the honor of first nominating in this convention the gentleman who has been chosen as the standard-bearer of the Republican party in the approaching national contest, I rise to second the motion which has been made to make the nomination unanimous, and to assure this convention and the people of the country that Penn sylvania is heartily in accord with the nomination [cheers] ; that she gives her full concurrence to it, and that this country may expect from her the greatest majority that has been given for a Presidential candidate inmany years.' " Mr. Hale, of Maine, said : ' Standing here to re turn our heartfelt thanks to the many men in this con vention who have aided us in the fight that we made for the Senator from Maine, and speaking for them here, as 1 know that I do, I say this most heartily. We have not got the man whom we hoped to nominate when we came here, but we have got a man in whom we have the greatest and most marked confidence. The nominee of tnis convention is no new or untried man, and in that respect he is no " dark horse." When he came here, representing his State in the front of his delegation and was seen here every man knew him, because of his record ; and because of that and because of our faith in him, and because we were, in the emergency, glad to help make him the candidate of the Republican party for President of the United States, — because, I say, of these things, I shall stand here to pledge the Maine CHICAGO CONVENTION NOMINA1ED FOR PRESIDENT. 475 forces in this convention to earnest effort from now until the ides of November to help carry him to the Presi dential chair.' [Cheers.] " Then Hale brought all the Blaine folk3 into this ap parent love-feast. A Texas delegate, one of those old Whigs who don't intend to cut their hair until Henry Clay is elected President, also agreed to the candidate. But he did go so far as to promise the vote of Texas to him. General Harrison, who said he was the only de feated candidate for President on the floor, because his misguided friend from Pennsylvania, meaning Caleb Tay lor, did not have staying powers, promised Indiana to Garfield. At this time there were immense crowds in every part of the hall, particularly on the stage and the press platform, and when the nomination was made unani mous, people couldn't be made to keep still. Some of those in a hurry wanted to go right on with the nomina tion, but General Harrison, at about half-past two, got a recess till five o'clock, as he said, for consultation." The convention reassembled in the afternoon. The nomination of a candidate for Vice-President of the United States was the business on hand. California presented E. B. Washburne ; Connecticut brought out ex-Governor Jewell ; Florida handed in the name of Judge Settle ; Tennessee urged Horace May nard. But these attracted little attention, and it was not until General Woodford, of New York, arose and nomi nated Chester A. Arthur, that the convention began to wake up. A ballot was finally reached, the galleries cheering every mention of Washburne 's name. The result of the 476 JAMES A. GARFIELD. ballot was so generally foreseen that no particular con cern was manifested over the result. There was some cheering, but the enthusiasm of this extraordinary con vention had about worn out. The ballot stood : Arthur, 468 ; Washburne, 19 ; Maynard, 30 ; Jewell, 44 ; Bruce, 8 ; Woodford, 1 ; Davis, 2. The Pennsylvania vote was given — 47 to Arthur, 11 to Washburne. The nomina tion of Arthur was made unanimous on motion of Cali fornia, and then the convention fell to passing a lot of resolutions of compliment to everybody, after which a committee of one from each State, with Senator Hoar for chairman, was appointed to notify the candidates of their nomination. Filley, of Missouri, then, explaining that life is short, got in a motion to adjourn, which was adopted, and people dispersed for good. The following is the Platform, or Declaration of Prin ciples, adopted by the Convention : " The Republican party in National Convention as sembled, at the end of twenty years since the Federal Government was first committed to its charge, submits to the people of the United States this brief report of its administration. It suppressed rebellion, which had armed nearly a million of men to subvert the national authority. It reconstructed the union of the States, with freedom in stead of slavery as its corner-stone. It transformed four million human beings from the likeness of things to the rank of citizens. It relieved Congress from the infamous work of hunting fugitive slaves, and charged it to see that slavery does not exist. It has raised the value of our currency from thirty-eight per cent, to the par of gold. It has restored upon a solid basis payment in coin for all CHICAGO CONVENTION — NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 477 the national obligations, and has given us a currency absolutely good and equal in every part of our extended country. It has lifted the care of the nation from tho point from where 6 per cent, bonds sold at 86 to that where 4 per cent, bonds are eagerly sought at a premium under its administration ; railways have increased from 31,000 miles in 1860 to more than 82,000 miles in 1879 ; our foreign trade has increased from $700,000,000 to $1,150,000,000 in the same time, and our exports, which were $20,000,000 less than our imports in 1860, were $264,000,000 more than our imports in 1879. Without "esorting to loans it has, since the war closed, defrayed the ordinary expenses of government, besides the accru ing interest on the public debt, and dispersed annually more than $30,000,000 for soldiers' pensions. It has paid $8S8,000,000 of the public debt, and by refunding the balance at lower rates has reduced the annual interest charges from nearly $151,000,000 to less than $89,000,- 000. All the industries of the country have revived, labor is in demand, wiiges have increased, and through out the entire country there is evidence of a coming pros perity greater than we have ever enjoyed. Upon this record the Republican party asks for the continued confi dence and support of the people, and this convention sub mits for their approval the following statements of the principle and purposes which will continue to guide and inspire its efforts : " First. We affirm that the work of the last twenty- one years has been such as to commend itself to the favor of the nation, and that the fruits of the costly victory which we have achieved through immense difficultiea 478 JAMES A. GARFIELD. Bhould be preserved ; after that the peace regained should be cherished ; that the dissevered Union now happily restored should be perpetuated, and that the liberty se cured to this generation should be transmitted undimin ished to future generations ; that the order established and the credit acquired should never be impaired ; that the pensions promised should be extinguished by the full payment of every dollar thereof; that the reviving indus tries should be further promoted, and that the commerce, already so great, should be steadily encouraged. " Second. The Constitution of the United States is a supreme law and not a mere contract. Out of confeder ated States it made a sovereign nation. Some powers are denied to the nation while others are denied to the States, but the boundary between the powers delegated and those reserved is to be determined by the National and not by the State tribunals. " Third. The work of popular education is left to the care of the several States, but it is the duty of the Na tional Government to aid that work to the extent of its constitutional duty. The intelligence of the nation is but the aggregate of the intelligence of the several States, and the destiny of the nation must not be guided by the genius of any one State, but by the average genius of all. "Fourth. The Constitution wisely forbids Congress to make any law respecting an establishment of religion, but it is idle to hope that the nation can be protected against the influence of sectarianism while each State is exposed to its domination. We therefore recommend that the Constitution be so amended as today the same prohibition upon the legislature of each State and to for CHICAGO CONVENTION — NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 479 bid the appropriation of public funds to the support of sectarian schools. "Fifth. We affirm the belief, avowed in 1876, that the duties levied for the purpose of revenue should so discriminate as to favor American labor. That no further grant of the public domain should be made to any rail way or other corporation ; that slavery having perished in the States, its twin barbarity, polygamy, must die in the Territories. That everywhere the protection accorded to citizens of American birth must be secured to citizens by American adoption, and that we esteem it the duty of Congress to develop and improve our watercourses and harbors, but that further subsidies to private per sons or corporations must cease; that the obligations of the Republic to the men who preserved its integrity in the hour of battle are undiminished by the lapse of fifteen years since their final victory ; to do them perpet ual honor is and shall forever be the grateful privilege and sacred duty of the American people. " Sixth. Since the authority to regulate immigration and intercourse between the United States and foreign nations rests with Congress, or with the United States and its treaty-making power, the Republican party, re garding the unrestricted emigration of Chinese as an evil of great magnitude, invoke the exercise of those powers to restrain and limit that immigration by the enactment of such just, humane, and reasonable provisions as will produce that result. " Seventh. That the purity and patriotism which char acterize the earlier career of Rutherford B. Hayes in peace and war, and which guided the thoughts of our im- 4o0 JAMES A. GARFIELD. mediate predecessors to him for a Presidential candidate have continued to inspire him in his career as Chief Ex ecutive, and that history will accord to his administration the honors which are due to an efficient, just, and cour teous discharge of the public business, and will honor his interpositions between the people and proposed partisan laws. " Eighth. We charge upon the Democratic party the habitual sacrifice of patriotism and justice to a supreme and insatiable lust of office and patronage ; that to obtain possession of the National and State Governments and the control of place and position they have obstructed all effort to promote the purity and to conserve the freedom of suffrage, and have devised fraudulent certifications and returns, have labored to unseat lawfully elected members of Congress to secure at all hazards the vote of a majority of the States in the House of Representatives ; have en deavored to occupy by force and fraud the places of trust given to others by the people of Maine, and rescued by the courage in action of Maine's patriotic, sons ; have by methods vicious in principle and tyrannical in practice at tached partisan legislation to bills upon whose .passage the very movements of government depend ; have crushed the rights of individuals, have advocated the principle and sought the favor of rebellion against the nation, and have endeavored to obliterate the sacred memories of the war and to overcome its inestimable valuable results of nation ality, personal freedom, and individual equality. The equal, steady, and complete enforcement of laws and the protection of all our citizens in the enjoyment of all privi leges and communities guaranteed by the Constitution CHICAGO CONVENTION — rNOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 481 are the first duties of the nation. The dangers of a solid South can only be averted by a faithful performance df every promise which the nation has made to the citizens ; the execution of the laws and the punishment of all those who violate them are the only safe methods by which au enduring peace can be secured and genuine prosperity es tablished throughout the South. Whatever promises the nation makes the nation must perform, and the nation cannot with safety delegate this duty to the States. The solid South must be divided by the powerful agencies of the ballot, and all opinions must there find free expres sion, and to this end the honest voters must be protected against terrorism, violence, and fraud. And we affirm it to be the duty and the purpose of the Republican party to use every legitimate means to restore all the States of this Union to the most perfect harmony as may be prac ticable ; and we submit to the practical, sensible people of the United States to say whether it would not be dangerous to the dearest interests of our country at this time to surrender the administration of the National Government to a party which seeks to overthrow the ex isting policy under which we are so prosperous, and thus bring distrust and confusion where there is now order, confidence, and hope." The following resolution was added to the platform : " The Republican party, adhering to the principles affirmed by its last national convention of respect for the constitutional rules governing appointment to office, adopts the declaration of President Hayes, that the re form in the civil service shall be thorough, radical, and complete. To. that end it demands the co-operation of 31 482 JAMES A. GARFIELD. the legislative with the executive departments of the Government, and that Congress shall so legislate that fitness, ascertained by proper practical tests, shall admit to the public service." The correspondent of the New York Tribune wrote as follows concerning the scene attending the nomina tion of General Garfield : " When General Harrison mounted on his chair and called out that Indiana, out of 30 votes, gave 29 for Garfield, neither the convention nor the galleries could contain themselves any longer. There was a universal uproar; half the convention rose to its feet. Leaders of all factions ran hurriedly hither and thither through the convention ; and, while the building was resound ing with loud cheers for Garfield, there was a cluster of excited delegates about the general himself, who, sat quiet and cool in his ordinary place at the end of one of the rows of seats in the Ohio delegation, hav ing his own seat in the middle aisle near the very rear of the convention. " He wore the white badge of an Ohio delegate on his coat, and held his massive head steadily immovable. But for an appearance of extra resoluteness on his face, as that of a man who was repressing internal excite ment, he might have been supposed to have as little interest in the proceedings as any other delegate on the lloor of the convention. He was, in fact, going through one of the most extraordinary experiences ever given to an American citizen. He was being struck by Presi dential lightning while sitting in the body which was to nouihnite him. He was being nominated for Pvcsi CHICAGO CONVENTION — NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 453> dent at half-past one o'clock in the afternoon, when he could hardly have dreamed of such a thing at nine o'clock in the morning. " There ' has been no such dramatic incident in poli tics, for a great many years at least, except possibly the nomination of Horatio Seymour in 1868. Entirely apart from all political considerations, it was an extraordinary and impressive incident to see this quiet man suddenly wheeled by a popular sentiment into the position of standard-bearer to the great Republican party, and in all probability into the Presidency itself, with its great power and world-wide fame. All this while the crowd had been cheering, and the elements of the convention were dissolving and crystallizing in an instant of time. " Where the Sherman vote was going, whether simply by force of drifting or not, was apparent enough when a North Carolina delegate seized the banner of his State and waved it towards the Ohio delegation, all of whom were on their feet. The situation was indeed peculiar. General Garfield had entered the convention as the loyal representative of Secretary Sherman, who was still a candidate. The Ohio delegation, most of whom were warm friends of both men, were in honor bound to support Mr. Sherman so long as there was any possibility of his nomination. General Garfield had, like a truthful and honorable gentleman, set his face from the first against all suggestions that he should become a candidate, feeling that any yielding to such suggestions would be rankly disloyal to the friend he had come to support. Now he was being forced into the field in spite of himself, and the indications were that his own vote 484 JAMES A. OARFIELB. would soon surpass that of his candidate. The Ohio delegation were seen to be in anxious, flurried consulta tion about General Garfield's chair, ex-Governor Den nison, Congressman Butterworth, and Major Bickham being prominent in the group. "Nothing seemed to come of it, however, and when the crowd had been quieted down the secretary was again in his place, ready to resume the roll-call. When he called ' Iowa ' every ear was strained to hear the reply, which had to travel from the farthest limit of the body of delegates. The 22 votes of that State had been cast on ever}r ballot for James G. Blaine, and if these votes should be cast for Garfield, it would prove that the instantaneous fusion of the anti-Grant elements of the convention was complete. When the chairman of the delegation called out that Iowa cast 22 votes for James A. Garfield, a wild storm of cheering broke out, which after a few moments died away, while there was a re newal of the hasty and whispered consultation among the Ohio delegates about General Garfield's chair. Suddenly the Ohio delegation broke out in cries and applause, and an electric cheer spread from them as a centre in an in stant all over the convention, telling without any need of words that Ohio's new candidate had replaced the old; that Secretary Sherman had been withdrawn, and that, with the full consent of his friends, Garfield was a can didate. " From this time the votes split off between Grant and Garfield almost without exception, the roll-call pro ceeding amid the growing exultation of the anti-Grant men, who thought they saw victory before them. Kan- CHICAGO CONVENTION NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 485 sas gave its 6 Blaine votes to Garfield, Grant's 4 votes standing firm. In Kentucky the Blaine votes came to Garfield. Every Garfield vote now was applauded, while Mr. Conkling watched the secretary with a cold eye. Senator Kellogg cast the vote of Louisiana, 8 for Garfield 8 for Grant. When Maine was called, Mr. Hale arose, looking sad, to be sure, but still with his accustomed air of quiet resolution, and cast those 14 votes, that repre sented so much loyal affection for James G. Blaine, for James A. Garfield, of Ohio. There was a great cheer at this for the men from Maine, with man}'' expressions of sympathy for their keen disappointment passing through the throng. Almost the whole body of the convention was up hurrahing at the rate of three times three a minute. Garfield was nominated." CHAPTER XL GENERAL OARFIELD SINCE THE CHICAGO CONVENTION. Hie Nomination unsought by General Garfield — Congratulatory Telegrama — How the News was received in Congress — Scene in the House — Gen eral Garfield notified of his Nomination — His Reply — Returns Home — Reception at Cleveland — General Garfield presides at the Reunion of Hiram College — His Speech on that Occasion — A Glance at the Past — Reception at Mentor — Visit to Painesville — General Garfield addresses his Neighbors — Sunday at Home — Geueral Garfield returns to 'Wash ington City — His Journey— A Serenade at Washington — Speech of Gen eral Garfield — Adjournment of Congress — Fourth of July Speech at Painesville — General Garfield's Letter accepting the Nomination for the Presidency — Personal Characteristics— General Garfield's Washington Home — The Farm at Mentor — The Garfield Family. General Garfield's nomination for the Presidency had come to him entirely unsought. He had loyally sup ported the claims of Secretary Sherman to the office, and had discountenanced all attempts to put himself forward as a candidate for the high honor. The convention, how ever, had seen fit to nominate him in spite of his reluo tance. The nomination gave great satisfaction through out the country, and it was universally admitted that the choice of the convention was the best that could have been made. The following telegrams were received by General Garfield immediatelv after the nomination was made: SINCE THE CONVENTION. 487 " Executive Mansion, Washington, Juno 8. " General James A. Garfield : — You -will receive no heartier congratulation to-day than mine. This both for your own and your country's sake. " R. B. Hates." " Washington, D. 0. " Hon. James A. Garfield : — Accept my hearty con gratulation. The country is to be congratulated, as well as yourself. " C. Schurz." Dispatches to like effect were also received from other members of the Cabinet. ""Washington, June 8. " Hon. James A. Garfield, Chicago : — I congratulate you with all my heart upon your nomination as President of the United States. You have saved the Republican party and the country from a great peril and assured the continued success of Republican principles. " John Sherman." "Washington, Tuesday — 1.45 p. sr. " Hon. James A. Garfield, Chicago : — Maine's vote, this moment cast for you, goes with my hearty concur rence. I hope it will aid in securing your nomination and assuring victory to the Republican party. " James G. Blaine." General Garfield replied as follows : " Chicago, June 8. " Hon. J. G. Blaine, Washington : — Accept my thanks for your generous despatch. " James A. Garfield." 488 JAMES A. GARFIELD. The scene in the House of Representatives, Washing ton, on receipt of the news of Gen. Garfield's nomination, is thus described in the Associated Press despatches : " The House passed a whole batch of private bills to day. Finally a publie-building bill was called up and objected to, whereupon Mr. Hooker emphatically declared his intention of objecting to every proposition presented. A noisy discussion ensued, and the confusion was in creased by the Chicago despatches which were coming in announcing the large additions to Garfield's vote. Order was only secured when Blackburn (Kentucky) presented the report of the conference committee on the post-office appropriation bill, which report was agreed to. Mr. Hooker adhered to his intention of objecting to every proposition, and a motion was made to adjourn. During the calling of the roll there was a great deal of excite ment shown by the members over the convention news, and when Garfield's name was called it was greeted with applause on both the Republican and Democratic side of the chamber. " The announcement which came in soon afterward that Garfield was nominated was received with loud cheers and applause from the members who had assem bled in the lobby back of the Speaker's desk, and the confusion was so great that the roll-call was interrupted. Members gathered in groups and discussed the nomina tion of Garfield, which appeared to meet with almost universal approval from the Republicans, and was con ceded by the Democrats to be a strong one. The second call of Garfield's name was the signal for a burst of ap plause from the Republicans. SINCE THE CONVENTION. 489 " The motion was finally carried, and accordingly, the House at 2.30 adjourned. Cheers for Garfield were then given, while cries of ' Speech from Hawley ' and ' Haw- ley for Vice-President ' went up, but that gentleman did not respond. " Mr. Robeson. — I move that General Hawley take the chair. This was carried unanimously amid loud cheers. When Hawley took the chair the House pre sented a curious sight. Every chair was occupied, the seats of the absent members being filled by spectators who, upon the adjournment, had crowded into the hall, while in the rear of the seats were groups of men evi dently full of excitement. " Mr. Hawley, on taking the chair, said : I beg leave to say that we occupy this floor with the kind consent of our friends on the right, who will have their opportunity by-and-bye. [Laughter. Cries of ' Speech ! Speech !'] " Mr. Hawley. — I have no speech to make. The nomination made at Chicago is its own speech for every Republican of this House, and our personal good-will goes with our old friend and associate, General Garfield. [Ap plause.] I have no doubt from what I have seen and heard, that this event — this consummation — is in the very highest degree satisfactory to every Republican here, whatever may have been his personal preference. [Applause.] We have been warmly divided in the past ; we will be much more warmly united in the future. [Loud applause.] I think one result will be — I am sup posing that there are no Democrats here — to compel an excellent nomination on the other side, so that the coun try we all love will be certain of a good President foi 490 JAMES A. GARFIELD. the next four years, personally, whatever his political opinions may be." (Loud applause, in which the Demo crats joined.) " Mr. Robeson was loudly called. In response, that gen tleman said : "As members of the American Congress — " A Democrat. — Both sides ? " Mr. Robeson, continuing. — Both sides. I think we have a right to congratulate the whole country that a man whom we all know to be a man of character and capacity beyond impeachment, has been nominated by one of the great political parties for the highest office in the gift of the people. [Applause.] Therefore, Mr. Chairman, I speak in acknowledgment in behalf of the House of Representatives that one of our number, con spicuous before the people on account of his services on this floor, has been selected as the standard-bearer of the great political party to which I belong. That is a sentiment which affects neither the politics nor the feel ings of anybody, and I ask everybody within the reach of my voice to join me in giving three cheers for the can didate selected from our body as the candidate of a great party. [The Republicans rose and gave the three cheers with a will, but the Democrats, though joining in the cheering, retained their seats.] I move, Mr. Chairman, that a committee be appointed, and I suggest as its chairman the oldest member of the House, Judge Kelley, of Pennsylvania, to send by telegraph our congratulations to our fellow-Congressman on his nomination. [Ap plause.] Cries then went up for ' Kelley,' and Chairman Hawley stated that Mr. Kelley would have occupied the chair, but that he had not been present." SINCE THE CONVENTION. 491 " Mr. Kelley. — I haAre been in that chair but once, though I have been here nineteen years, and then I felt so like a fool that I never got into it again: [Laughter.] I thank the gentleman from New Jersey (Robeson) and his associates on this floor for having delegated to me ¦he chairmanship of the committee to which has been confided so grateful a duty. I beg leave to inform the chairman and the House that, taking advantage of cir cumstances, I slipped out when Garfield was at 338 and sent the following telegram : ' Accept congratulations and pledge of earnest support.' [Applause.] I rejoice most heartily in this nomination. General Garfield is a man of rare force of character, of wide attainments, of great sim plicity, and a man who adheres as firmly as a true party man even may to his personal convictions ; and our friends on the other side, in the dejection which now overcomes them while a bad nomination for them is possible, will find satisfaction in knowing that they know the man to be one who will administer the government faithfully, fairly, and patriotically after we shall have inaugurated him." (Applause.) The chair appointed Kelley, Robeson, Brownie, Martin (N- C), Page, Richardson (N. Y.), and Henderson (111/) as the committee to send a congratulatory telegram to Garfield. Mr. Richardson was appointed at the suggestion of Mr. Voorhees (N. Y.), who was unwilling that the great State of New York should not be represented on the com mittee, and Henderson at the suggestion of Cannon (III.), who thought that Ilhnois, " the third State-— -always Re publican," should be represented. 492 JAMES A. GARFIELD. The meeting then, after giving three more cheers for Garfield, adjourned. The following is the full text of the telegram imme diately sent to General Garfield : " Washington, June 8, 1880. " To General J. A. Garfield, Chicago : — " Under in struction of your Congressional associates, assembled in the hall of the House of Representatives, General Haw ley in the chair, we congratulate you on your nomination as the candidate of the great Republican party for the Presidency of the United States. " W. D. Kelley, Geo. M. Robeson, Thos. M. Browne, Joseph J. Martin, Horace F. Page, D. P. Richardson, Thomas J. Henderson." The convention appointed a committee to wait upon General Garfield and inform him of his nomination. This committee waited upon him at his rooms at the Grand Pacific Hotel, on the evening of the 8th of June. It was headed by Senator Hoar, the chairman of the con vention. " General Garfield," said Mr. Hoar, " the gentlemen present are appointed by the National Republican Con vention, representatives of every State in the Union, who have been directed to convey to you the formal ceremo nial notice of your nomination as the Republican candi date for the office of President of the United States. It is known to you that the convention which has made this nomination assembled divided in opinion and in council in regard to the candidate. It may not be known to you SINCE THE CONVENTION. 493 with what unanimity of pleasure and of nopes the con vention has received the result which it has reached. You represent not only the distinctive principles and opinion of the Republican party, but you represent also its unity, and in the name of every State in the Union represented on the committee, I convey to you the as surance of the cordial support of the Republican party of these States at the coming election." General Garfield replied : " Mr. President and Gen tlemen : I assure you that the information you have offi cially given me brings the sense of very grave respon sibility, and especially so in view of the fact that I was a member of your body, a fact which could not have been so with propriety had I had the slightest expectation that my own name would be connected with the nomination for the office. I have felt with you great solicitude re garding the situation of our party during the struggle, but believing that you are correct in assuring me that substantial unity has been reached in the conclusion, it gives me gratification far greater than any personal pleas ure your announcement can bring. I accept the trust committed to my hands. As to the work of our party, as to the character of the campaign to be entered upon, I will take an early occasion to reply more fully than I can properly do now. I thank you for the assurances of con fidence and esteem and unity which you have presented me with, and shall hope that we may see our future as promising as are the indications of to-night." General Garfield left Chicago by the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern Railroad, on the morning of June 9th. Cleveland was reached about 8.30 in the evening. The 4 M JAMES A. GARFIELD. journey was an unbroken ovation, General Garfield being received at all the points on the line by large and enthu siastic crowds. Cleveland was ablaze with enthusiasm. After a rousing welcome at the depot, General Garfield was conveyed to the Kennard House as quickly as possi ble, where speeehes were made from the balcony by Gov ernor Foster, General Ed. S. Meyer, and Judge P. F. Young. General Garfield said : " Fellow Citizens of my Native County and of my State : I thank you for this remarkable demonstration of your good-will and enthusiasm on this occasion. I can not at this time proceed upon any speech. All that I have to say is, that I know that all this demonstration means your gladness of the unity and harmony and good feeling of a great political party, and in part your good feeling toward a neighbor, an old friend. For all of these reasons I thank you, and bid you good night." There was great applause and cheers. The 10th of June was passed pleasantly at Cleve land, and on the 11th, General Garfield presided at the reunion of Hiram College. The trains that arrived at Hiram were crowded to overflowing with people, and the enthusiasm for the general completely overshadowed the interest in any of the proceedings where he was not the central figure. The Presidential candidate received in the morning a number of congratulatory and business tele grams and letters, some of the more important of which he answere'd. He did not attend the early forenoon soci ety gathering, but at half-past ten o'clock, with Dr. J. P. Robeson, Captain C. E. Henry, President B. A. Hins dale, of Hiram College, and Mr. William Robeson — all SINGE THE CONVENTION. 495 old friends —he entered the Reunion Hall. There were loud cheers as the general assumed his place on the plat form. Prayer was offered by the Rev. J. Knight, of Wil mington, Ohio, and President Hinsdale arose and intro duced General Garfield as chairman, with explanatory remarks as to why it had been arranged to have the re union. The preparations, Mr. Hinsdale said, were made before the nomination of General Garfield, and he had ac cepted an invitation to preside over the reunion meeting two months ago. On taking the chair, General Garfield was greeted with loud applause. He said : " Mr. President and fellow-citizens : I have been so many years accustomed to visit you that it would be en tirely unbecoming in me to be the cause of disorder and disturbance. I am here, first, because I promised to De here, and second, because I greatly desire to be here, and I will not interfere with the course of your proposed pro gramme. Certainly not at this time, but will begin im mediately by introducing to you the gentleman who was to deliver the regular address of the reunion, the Rev. J. M. Atwater, once a student in this place, and still later the president of the college, and now a distinguished minister." The address of Mr. Atwater related to college matters, and was well received. At the close, General Garfield made a brief speech complimenting the previous addresses and referring to the past history of the college. Tin Rev. A. S. Hay den then spoke, after which General Gar field delivered the following address : " Ladies and gentlemen : There are two chapters in the history of this institution. You have heard the one 496 JAMES A. GARFIELD. relating to the founders. They were all pioneers of this Western reserve, or nearly all. They were all men of knowledge and great force of character. Nearly all were not men of means, but they planned this little institution. In 1850 it was a cornfield, with a solid brick building in the centre of it, and that wa,s all. Almost all the rest has been the work of the institution itself. " Without a dollar of endowment, without a powerful friend anywhere, but with a corps of teachers who were told to go on to the ground and see what they could make out of it, to find their own pay out of the little tuition that they could receive. They invited students of their own spirit to come on the ground and see what they could make of it, and the response has been that many have come, and the chief part of the respondents I see in the faces around and before me to-day. It was a simp/e question of sinking or swimming for themselves. And 1 know that we are all inclined to be a little clannish over our own. We have, perhaps, a right to be ; but ^ do not know of any place, I do not know of any institution that has accomplished more with so little means as has this school on Hiram Hill. " I know of no place where the doctrine of self-help has a fuller development, by necessity as well as finally by choice, as here on this hill. The doctrine of self-help and of force has the chief place among these men and women around here. As I said a great many years ago about that, the act of Hiram was to throw its young mon and women overboard and let them try it for themselves ; and all those men able to get ashore got ashore, and I think we have few cases of drowning anywhere. SINCE THE CONVENTION. 497 " Now, I look over these faces, and I mark the several geological changes remarked by Mr. Atwater so well in his address ; but in the few cases of change of geological fact there is, I find, no fossils. Some are dead and glori fied in our memories, but those who are not are alive — 1 think all. " The teachers and the students of this school built it up in every sense. They made the cornfield into Hiram Campus. Those fine groves you see across the road, they planted. I well remember the day when they turned out into the woods to find beautiful maples, and brought them in; when they raised a little purse to purchase ever green ; when each young man, for himself one, and per haps a second for some young lady, if he was in love, planted two trees on the campus, and then named them after himself. There are several here to-day who remem ber Bolen. Bolen planted there a tree, and Bolen has planted a tree that has a lustre — Bolen was shot through the heart at Winchester. " There are many here that can go and find the tree that you have named after yourself. They are great, strong trees to-day, and your names, like your trees, are, I hope, growing still. " I believe outside of or beyond the physical features of the place, that there was a stronger pressure of work to the square inch in the boilers that run this establish ment than any other that I know of, and, as has been so well said, that has told all the while with these young- men and women. The struggle, wherever the uncouth and untutored farmer boys — a farmer, of cou ce — that came here to try themselves and find what kind of people 32 498 JAMES A. GARFIELD. they were. They came here to go on a voyage of discov ery. Your discovery was yourselves, in many cases. I hope the discovery was a fortune, and the friendships then formed out of that have bound this group of people longer and farther than most any other I have known in ' l.fe. They are scattered all over the United States, in every field of activity, and if I had time to name them, the sun would go down before I had finished. "I believe the rules of this institution limits us to time — I think it is said five minutes. I may have over gone it already. We have so many already that we want to hear from, we will all volunteer. We expect now to wrestle awhile with the work before us. Some of these boys remember the time when I had an exercise that I remember with pleasure. I called a young lad out in a class and said, in two minutes you are to speak to tlie best of your ability on the following subject (naming it), and gave the subject and let him wrestle with it. I was trying a theory, and I believe that wrestling was a good thing. I will not vary the performance save in this. I will call you and restrict you to five minutes, and let you select your theme about the old days of Hiram. " Now, we have a grave judge in this audience, who wandered away from Hiram into the forty-second regi ment into the South, and, after the victory, stayed there. I will call now, not as a volunteer man, but as a drafted man, Judge Clark, of Mississippi." There were other speeches, and early in the evening General Garfield, amid loud cheers, bid adieu to Hiram, and drove to his home in Mentor. On the morning of the 12th, General Garfield was SINCE THE CONVENTION.- 493 given a rousing reception by the citizens of Mentor, at the Lake Shore Railroad depot, where they had erected an arch in his honor. Immediately after dinner, General Garfield stepped into a carriage, with his near friend and neighbor, Dr. J. P. Robinson, and drove toward Paines ville, where another reception by the Lake county people was to take place at Ryder's Hotel, a half-way house be tween Painesville and Mentor. A band of music and a procession of carriages met him. Mayor J. B. Burroughs, of Painesville, brother of Congressman Burroughs, of Michigan, and Mr. A. T. Tinker, president of the Paines ville Garfield Club, were in the van. These two gentle men entered the general's carriage amid loud cheers. As they passed Lake Erie Seminary, the pupils waved hand kerchiefs and applauded General Garfield. The proces sion increased in size and marched through the principal streets of Painesville, finally bringing up at the public square, where there was a throng of people. Mayor Burroughs introduced General Garfield, who, after the applause had subsided, spoke as follows : " Fellow Citizens and Neighbors of Lake County : I am exceedingly glad to know that you care enough to come out on a hot day like this in the midst of your busy work to congratulate me. I know it comes from the hearts of as noble a people as lives on the earth. [Cheers.] In my somewhat long public services there never has been a time, in however great difficulties I may have been placed, that I could not feel the strength that came from resting back upon the people of the Nineteenth district. To know that they were behind me with their intelligence, their critical judgment, their 500 JAMES A. GARFIELD. confidence and their support was to make me strong in everything I undertook that was right. I have always felt your sharp, severe, and just criticism, and my worthy, noble, supporting friends always did what they believed was right. I know you have come here to-day not altogether, indeed not nearly, for my sake, but for the sake of the relations I am placed in to the larger con stituency of the people of the United States. It is not becoming in me to speak nor shall I speak one word touching politics. I know you are here to-day with out regard to politics. I know you are all here as my, neighbors and my friends, and as such I greet you and thank you for this candid and gracious welcome. [Cheers.] Thus far in my life I have sought to do what I could according to my light. More than that I could never hope to do. All of that I shall try to do, and if I can continue to have the good opinion of my neigh bors of this district, it will be one of my greatest satis factions. I thank you again, fellow-citizens, for this cordial and generous welcome." (Applause and cheers.) Mr. Tinker delivered a formal speech of reception and was followed by Dr. Robinson, Judge Reuben Hitchcock, and William Slade. General Garfield then shook hands with hundreds of enthusiastic people, and at dusk left for his home, where he remained quietly over Sunday. On Sunday he attended church in the morning, and was the centre of attraction for hundreds of country eyes. After dinner he endeavored to answer some of the vast amount of letters that have accumulated, but no sooner had he written a few lines than some callers would in- SINCE THE CONVENTION. 501 teirupt him. Many from the surrounding towns and countrj Irove to Mentor to look at the general, and at least tt shake hands, if not to converse at length, and none o aid be absolutely turned away. The general was called on in the evening by friends from far off Cleveland. On the morning of the 14th, General Garfield left Mentor for Washington City. He arrived at Youngs town early in the forenoon and there took the through train on the Pittsburgh and Lake Erie Road and arrived in Pittsburgh at 8.27 p. m. He telegraphed the Bal timore and Ohio authorities, and they held back the through express from 7.55 to 8.35 for him. The pas senger agent of the Pittsburgh and Lake Erie drove him to the Baltimore and Ohio depot, where, notwithstand ing his efforts to avoid recognition, a little crowd soon congregated. " I will not be interviewed," he said, in response to a reporter. Then he received the congratu lations of a long line of admirers and friends, who shook his hand as he passed on through the car. While he was yet returning thanks the train pulled out of the depot, his admirers dismounted and the general was left to the mercy of the newspaper men who stuck by him. He was far more anxious to interview than to be interviewed. He fired questions thick and fast. Buried* in the seclusion of his own home he had not heard the report of Tilden's withdrawal, and when informed of the report he went into a deep study for an instant. He was exceedingly anxious to know how the news of his nomination was received in this neighborhood, and when informed that the enthusiasm was intense he appeared 502 JAMES A. GARFIEL*. greatly gratified. He stated that he had received a grand ovation at Youngstown and other points along the line, considering that he had striven to keep his journey quiet. When the train reached Hazlewood, on the Bal timore and Ohio Road, within the city limits, a stop was made so that the general could show himself to the Garfield Club of that ward. Three rousing cheers were given for the nominee, and the general returned thanks. The cheers were renewed as the train pulled out. Washington was reached the next day, and during the remainder of the session nf Congress Gen. Garfield devoted himself to his duties as a member of the House. On the evening of the 16th of July, a serenade was given to General Garfield, at his quarters at the Riggs House, by the National Veteran Association. The portico of the Riggs House was tastefully draped with flags and bunting, and the surrounding streets were brilliantly illuminated with calcium lights, while at frequent inter vals rockets and other fireworks were set off from the steps of the Treasury Department. As the procession filed past cheers were given for Garfield, and as that gentleman appeared on the platform, accompanied by ex- Secretary Robeson and Attorney-General Devens, they were renewed. General Devens made a short speech, t'n which he referred to the great Republican Presidents, Lincoln, Grant, and Hayes, and each name was greeted with cheers. He then introduced General Garfield as a soldier whose shield is unsoiled and whose sword is spot less ; a statesman on whom rests no stain or dishonor ; a Christian gentleman, respecting the rights of every man because he himself is kind, considerate, and self-respecting SINCE THE CONVENTION. 503 always. General Garfield returned thanks for the dem onstration and said : " I cannot at this time utter a word on the subject of general politics. I would not mar the cordiality of this welcome, to which to some extent all are gathered, by any reference except to the present moment and its significance ; but I wish to say that a large portion of this assemblage to-night are my comrades, late of the war for the Union. For them I can speak with entire propriety, and can say that these very streets heard the measured tread of your disciplined feet years ago, when the imperilled Republic needed your hands and your hearts to save it. And you came back with your num bers decimated, but those you left behind were immortal and glorified heroes forever; and those you brought back came carrying, under tattered banners and in bronzed hands, the ark of the covenant of your Republic in safety out of the bloody baptism of the war [cheers] ; and you brought it in safety to be saved forever by your valor and the wdsdom of your brethren who were at home, and by this you were again added to the great civil army of the Republic. I greet you, comrades and fellow-soldiers and the great body of distinguished citizens who are gathered here to-night, who arc the strong stay and sup port of the business, of the prosperity, of the peace, of the civic ardor and glory of the Republic, and I thank you for your welcome to-night. It was said in a wel come to one who came to England to be a part of h«r glory — and all the nation spoke when it was said : * Normans and Saxons and Danes are we, But all oi' u.i Danes in our welcome of thoe ;' 504 JAMES A. GARFIELD. and we say to-night of all the nation, of all the people, soldiers and civilians, there is one name that welds us all into one, it is the name of American citizen, under the Union and under the glory of the flag that led us to victory and to peace. [Applause.] For this magnificent welcome, I thank you with all there is in my heart." Loud cheers were then given for General Garfield as he retired from the platform, and his place was taken by other speakers. Upon the adjournment of Congress, General Garfield returned to his home at Mentor. The Fourth of July falling on Sunday, the citizens of Lake County celebrated the third in its place, and on that day dedicated, at Painesville, their beautiful monu ment to the memory of the soldiers of the district who fell in defence of the Union. General Garfield was the orator of the day. He said : " Fellow-Citizens : I cannot fail to respond on such an occasion, in sight of such a monument to such a cause, sustained by such men. [Applause and cheers.] While I have listened to what my friend has said, two questions have been sweeping through my heart. One was ' What does the monument mean ? ' and the other ' What will the monument teach ? ' Let me try and ask you for a moment to help me to answer What does the monument mean ? Oh, the monument means a world of memories and a world of deeds, and a world of tears, and a world of glories. You know, thousands know, what it is to offer up your life to the country, and that is no small thing, as every soldier knows. Let me put the question to you for a moment. SINCE THE CONVENTION. 505 " Suppose your country, in the awfully embodied form of majestic law, should stand above you and say, ' I want your life ; come up here on the platform and offer it,' — how many would walk up before that majestic pres ence and say, ' Here I am ; take this life and use it for your great needs ? ' [Applause.] And yet almost two million of men made that answer [Applause], and a monument stands yonder to commemorate their answer. That is one of its meanings. But, my friends, let me try you a little farther. To give up life is much, for it is to give up wife and home and child and ambition. But let me test you this way farther. Suppose this awfully majestic form should eall out to you and say, ' I ask you to give up health and drag yourself, not dead, but half alive, through a miserable existence for long years, until you perish and die in your crippled and helpless con dition. I ask you to volunteer to do that.' It calls for a higher reach of patriotism and self-sacrifice, but hun dreds of thousands of you soldiers did that. That is what the movement means also. But let me ask you to go one step farther. Suppose your country should say, ' Come here on this platform, and in my name and for my sake consent to be idiots. [A voice — " Hear, hear ! "] Consent that your very brain and intellect shall be bro ken down into hopeless idiocy for my sake, — how many- could be found to make that venture ? And yet thou sands, and that with their eyes wide open to the horrible consequences, obeyed that call. "And let me tell how 100,000 of our soldiers were prisoners of war, and many of them, when death was stalking near, when famine was climbing up into their 506 JAMES A.GARFIELD. hearts, and idiocy was threatening all that was left of their intellect, the gates of their prison stood open every day if they would quit, desert their flag, and enlist under the flag of the enemy; and, out of 180,000, not two per cent, ever received the liberation from death, star vation, idiocy, all that might come to them ; but they took all these horrors and all these sufferings in preference to going back upon the flag of their country and the glory of its truth. [Applause.] Great God ! was ever such measure of patriotism reached by any man on this earth before? [Applause.] That is what your monument means. By the subtle chemistry that no man knows, all the blood that was shed by our brethren, all the lives that were devoted, all the grief that was felt, at last crystallized itself into granite, rendered immortal the great truth for which they died — [applause] — and it stands there to-day ; and that is what your monument means. " Now, what does it teach ? What will it teach ? Why, I remember the story of one of the old conquerors of Greece who, when he had travelled in his boyhood over the battle-fields where Miltiades had won victories, and set up trophies — returning, he said : ' These trophies of Miltiades will never let me sleep.' Why ? Something had taught him from the chiselled stone a lesson that he could never forget. And, fellow-citizens, that silent sen tinel, that crowned granite column, will look down upon the boys that will walk these streets for generations tc come, and will not let them sleep when the country jails them. From the dead lips of the bugler on tha field will go out a call that the children of Lake County SINCE THE CONVENTION. 507 will hear after the grave has covered us all and our im mediate children. That is the teaching of your monu ment. That is its lesson, and it is the lesson of endur ance for what we believe, and it is the lesson of sacrifices for what we think ; the lesson of heroism for what we mean to sustain ; and that lesson cannot be lost to a peo ple like this. It is not a lesson of revenge ; it is not a lesson of wrath ; it is the grand, sweet, broad lesson of the immortality of the truth that we hope will soon cover, as with the grand shekinah of light and glory, all parts of this Republic from the lakes to the gulf. [Applause.] " I once entered a house in old Massachusetts, where over its doors were two crossed swords. One was the sword carried by the grandfather of its owner on the field of Bunker Hill, and the other was the sword carried by the English grandsire of the wife on the same field and on the other side of the conflict. Under those crossed swords, in the restored harmony of domestic peace, lived a happy and contented and free family un der the light of our Republican liberties. [Applause.] I trust the time is not far distant when under the crossed swords and the locked shields of Americans, North and South, our people shall sleep in peace and rise in liberty, love, and harmony under the union of one flag of the stars and stripes." (Applause. ) After a short rest at his home, General Garfield for warded to Senator Hoar, the chairman of the Chicago Convention, the following formal letter of acceptance of his nomination by that body for the Presidency of the United States : 508 JAMES A. GARFIELD. "Mentor, Ohio, July 10, 1880. " Dear Sir : — On the evening of the 8th of June last I had the honor to receive from you, in presence of the committee of which you were chairman, the official an nouncement that the Republican National Convention at Chicago had that day nominated me for their candidate for President of the United States. I accept the nomi nation with gratitude for the confidence it implies, and with a deep sense of the responsibilities it imposes. I cordially endorse the principles set forth in the platform adopted by the convention ; on nearly all of the subjects of which it treats my opinions are on record among the published proceedings of Congress. I venture, however, to make special mention of some of the principal topics which are likely to become subjects of discussion without reviewing the controversies which have been settled dur ing the last twenty years, and with no purpose or wish to revive the passions of the late war. It should be said that while Republicans fully recognize and will strenu ously defend all the rights retained by the people and all the rights reserved to the States, they reject the per nicious doctrine of State supremacy, which so long crip pled the functions of the National Government, and at one time brought the Union very near to destruction. They insist that the United States is a nation, with am ple power of self-preservation; that its constitution and laws made in pursuance thereof are the supreme law of the land ; that the right of the nation to determine tho method by which its own legislation shall be created, cannot be surrendered without abdicating one of the fun damental powers of the Government ; that the national since the convention. 509 laws relating to the election of representatives in Con gress shall neither be violated or evaded ; that every elector shall be permitted freely and without intimidation to cast his lawful ballot at such election, and have it hon -estly counted, and that the potency of his vote shall not be destroyed by the fraudulent vote of any other person. " The best thoughts and energies of our people should be directed to those great questions of national well-being in which all have common interest. Such efforts will soonest restore perfect peace to those who were lately in arms against each other, for justice and good-will will outlast passion, but it is certain that the wounds cannot be completely healed and the spirit of brother hood cannot fully pervade the whole country until every citizen, rich or poor, white or black, is secure in the free and unqualified enjoyment of every civil and political right guaranteed by the constitution and the laws. Wherever the enjoyment of this right is not assured, discontent will prevail, immigration will cease, and the social and industrial forces will continue to be disturbed by the migration of laborers and the consequent dimi nution of prosperity. The National Government should exercise all its constitutional authority to put an end to these evils, for all the people and all the States are mem bers of one body, and no member can suffer without in jury to all. The most serious evils which now afflict the South arise from the fact that there is not such freedom and toleration of political opinion and action that the minority party can exercise an effective and wholesome restraint upon the party in power. Without such re straint party rule becomes tyrannical and corrupt. The 510 JAMES A. GARFIELD. prosperity which is made possible in the South by its great advantages of soil and climate, will never be real ized until every voter can freely and safely support any party he pleases. " Next iu importance to freedom and justice is popular education, without which neither justice nor freedom can be permanently maintained. Its interests are entrusted to the States, and the involuntary action of the people. Whatever help the nation can justly, afford shouhl be generously given to aid the States in supporting common schools, but it would be unjust to our people and danger ous to our institutions to apply any portion of the rev enues of the nation or of the States to the support of sectarian schools. The separation of the Church and the State in everything relating to taxation should be abso lute. On the subject of national finances my views have been so frequently and fully expressed that little is needed in the way of additional statement. The public debt is now so well secured, and the rate of annual in terest has been so reduced, by refunding that rigid econ omy in expenditures and the faithful application of our surplus revenues to the payment of the principal of the debt will gradually but certainly free the people from its burdens and close with honor the financial chapter of the war. At the same time the Government can provide for all its ordinary expenditures, and discharge its sacred obligations to the soldier of the Union and to the Avidows and orphans of those who fell in its defence. " The resumption of specie payments, which the Re publican party so courageously and successfully accom plished, has removed from the field of controversy many SINCE THE CONVENTION. 511 juestions that long and seriously disturbed the credit of the Government and the business of the country. Our paper currency is now as national as the flag, and re sumption has not only made it everywhere equal to coin, but has brought into use our store of gold and sil ver. The circulating medium is more abundant than ever before, and we need only to maintain the equality of all our dollars to insure to labor and capital a measure of value, from the use of which no one can suffer loss. The great prosperity which the country is now enjoy ing should not be endangered by any violent changes or doubtful financial experiments. In reference to our customs laws a policy should be pursued which will bring revenues to the Treasury, and will enable the labor and capital employed in our great industries to compete fairly in our own markets with the labor and capital of foreign producers. We legislate for the people of the United States, not for the whole world, and it is our glory that the American laborer is more intelligent and better paid than his foreign competitor. Our country cannot be independent unless its people, with their abundant natural resources, possess the requisite skill at any time to clothe, arm, and equip themselves for war, and in time of peace to produce all the necessary im plements of labor. It was the manifest intention of the founders of the government to provide for the common defence, not by standing armies alone, but by raising among the people a greater army of artiwaus whose in telligence and skill should powerfully contribute to the safety and glory of the nation. " Fortunately for the interests of commerce there is 51 2 JAMES A. GARFIELD. no longer any formidable opposition to appropriations for the improvement of our harbors and great navigable rivers, provided that the expenditures for that purpose are strictly limited to works of national importance. The Mississippi River, with its great tributaries, is of such vital importance to so many millions of people that the safety of its navigation requires exceptional consideration. In order to secure to the nation the control of all its waters, President Jefferson negotiated the purchase of a. vast ter ritory extending from the Gulf of Mexico to the Pacific Ocean. The wisdom of Congress should be invoked to devise some plan by which that great river shall cease to be a terror to those who dwell upon its banks, and by which its shipping may safely carry the industrial pro ducts of twenty-five millions of people. The interests of agriculture, which is the basis of all our material prosper ity, and in which seven-twelfths of our population are en gaged, as well as the interests of manufactures and com merce, demand that the facilities for cheap transportation shall be increased by the use of all our great water courses. The material interests of this country, the tra ditions of its settlement and the sentiment of our people have led the Government to offer the widest hospitality to emigrants who seek our shores for new and happier homes, willing to share the burdens as well as the bene fits of our society, and intending that their posterity shall become an un distinguishable part of our population. " The recent movement of the Chinese to our Pacific Coast partakes but little of the qualities of such an emi gration, either in its purposes or its res alt. It is too much like an importation to be welcomed without restric- SINCE THE CONVENTION. 513 tion ; too much like an invasion to be looked upon with out solicitude. We cannot consent to allow any- form of servile labor to be introduced among us under the guise of immigration. Recognizing the gravity of this subject, the present administration, supported by Congress, has sent to China a commission of distinguished citizens for the purpose of securing such a modification of the exist ing treaty as will prevent the evils likely to arise from the present situation. It is confidently believed that these diplomatic negotiations will be successful without, the loss of commercial intercourse between the two great: powers, which promises a great increase of reciprocal: trade and the enlargement of our markets. Should these efforts fail, it will be the duty of Congress to mitigate' the evils already felt, and prevent their increase by such, restrictions as, without violence or injustice, will place upon a sure foundation the peace of our communities and; the freedom and dignity of labor. " The appointment of citizens to the various executive- and judicial offices of the Government is, perhaps, the most difficult of all duties which the constitution has im posed upon the executive. The convention wisely de mands that Congress shall co-operate with the executive departments in placing the civil service on a better basis. - Experience has proved that, with our frequent changes of administration, no system of reform can be made effective and permanent without the aid of legislation. Appoint ments to the military and naval service are so regulated by law and custom as to leave but little ground of com plaint. It may not be wise to make similar regulations. bv law for civil service, but without invading the author: J 33 514 JAMES A. GARFIELD. ity or necessary discretion of the executive, Congress should devise a method that will determine the tenure of office, and greatly reduce the uncertainty which makes that service so uncertain and unsatisfactory. Without depriving any officer of his rights, as a citizen, the Gov ernment should require him to discharge all his official duties with intelligence, efficiency, and faithfulness. " To select wisely from our vast population those who are best fitted for the many offices to be filled requires an acquaintance far beyond the range of any one man. The executive should therefore seek and receive the informa tion and assistance of those whose knowledge ofthe com munities in which the duties are to be performed best qualifies them to aid in making the wisest choice. The -doctrines announced by the Chicago Convention are not the temporary devices of a party to attract votes and carry an election. They are deliberate convictions result ing from a careful study of the spirit of our institutions, the events of our history, and the best impulses of our people. In my judgment, these principles should control the legislation and administration of the Government. In ;any event they will guide my conduct until experience points out a better way. If elected, it will be my purpose to enforce strict obedience to the constitution and the laws, and to promote as best I may the interest and honor >of the whole country, relying for support upon the wisdom of Congress, the intelligence and patriotism of the people, ;and the favor of God. " With great respect, I am, very truly yours, •« To Hon. George F. Hoar, " J« A" G™"*-" ' Chairman of the Committee." SINCE THE CONVENTION. 515 We have now traced the career of General Garfield from his birth to his formal acceptance of the nomination of his party for the Presidency. It is a grand career, and builds up a noble and powerful example to the young men of his country. Here we must leave him. That he will be triumphantly seated in the Presidential chair none who have read this narrative can doubt; and that his administration will be pure and grand is a certainty. In person General Garfield is six feet high, broad- shouldered, and strongly built. He has an unusually large head, that seems to be three-fourths forehead, light brown hair and beard, large light blue eyes, a prominent nose and full cheeks. He dresses plainly, is fond of broad-brimmed slouch hats and stout boots, eats heartily, cares nothing for luxurious living, is thoroughly temper ate in all respects save in that of brain-work, and is devoted to his wife and children, and very fond of his country home. Among men he is genial, approachable, companionable, and a remarkably entertaining talker. Genera] Garfield is the possessor of two homes, and his family migrates twice a year. On the corner of Thir teenth and I streets stands his Washington home. It is a very modest and unpretentious mansion of brick, plain and square built, after the manner of its distin guished owner and occupant. Above it, to the north, towers the palatial Franklin school building. On the west is that lovely stretch of rolling turf and shade and shrubbery known as Franklin Square. The residences in the immediate vicinity denote a respectable but by no means fashionable neighborhood. The house is square, with a wing on the east, comprising dining-room and 516 JAMES A. GARFIELD. library. The parlor side-windows look out on the pleas ing prospect of the park, while the front commands a corner view of I and Thirteenth streets. Above all other places of interest in this house, how ever, is the library. Here is the working-ground of a man of energy and ideas ; here the student and scholar lives and has being in the exclusion of the man ; hero the statesman and politician takes nourishment and flourishes. The room is about twenty-five by fourteen feet, three windows opening south on I street, one to the east. The pattern carpet leaves about three feet of stained floor about the margin. In the centre and under the heavy chandelier is a double walnut office-desk, with an addition of pigeon-holes and boxes and drawers on the end. There is an air of legal brusqueness everywhere, of orderly disorder, as if the owner cared less for general symmetry than for immediate convenience. Haifa dozen bookcases occupy the available space against the walls, and two or three thousand books freight their shelves. No two of these cases are alike, of the same height, width or make. It is as if the accumulation had from time to time overflown the limit of book-room and another case had been hastily procured in which. to store the surplus, and then, when that was full, another was added, and so on. Books, books, books ! It is the one striking feature of Mr. Garfield's home. They confront one in the hall upon entering, in the parlor and sitting-room and in the dining-room — yes, and even in the bath-room, where documents and speeches are corded up like firewood. I would not be at all surprised if a fair library could be discovered in the kitchen. Among all these books there SINCE THE CONVENTION. 517 is not a trashy volume. They are law and history, biography, poetry, politics, philosophy, government, and standard works of all sorts, the accumulation of years of study and the patient research of the scholar. And these are but a portion of Mr. Garfield's collection, a con siderable one being at his country home in Ohio. Five or six years ago the little cottage at Hiram was sold, and for a time the only residence the Garfields had in his district was a summer house he built on Little Mountain, a bold elevation in Lake County, which com mands a view of thirty miles of rich farming country stretched along the shore of Lake Erie. Three years ago he bought a farm in Mentor, in the same county, lying on both sides of the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern Railroad. Here his family spend all the time when he is free from his duties at Washington. The farm contains about one hundred and twenty acres of excellent land, in a high state of cultivation, and the Congressman finds a recreation, of which he never tires, in directing the field-work and making improvements in the buildings, fences, and orchards. Cleveland is only twenty-five miles away ; there is a post office and a rail way station within half a mile, and the pretty country town of Painesville is but five miles distant. One of the pleasures of summer life on the Garfield farm is a drive of two miles through the woods to the lake shore and a bath in the breakers. On this farm General Garfield has built him a new house, which attracts considerable attention and much curiosity from passers by on the Lake Shore Railroad. It cannot be called grand in any sense of the word, but 518 JAMES A. GARFIELD. it will be a pleasant and very convenient country house, superior to the majority along this section of the Ridge road. It is generally of the Gothic style of architecture, but mingled with other styles, so as to form what con tractors term a " mixture." A roomy porch extends along the front and part of the side toward Cleveland. Lattice work has been arranged in front for training vines. The house is sixty feet front by fifty deep and two stories and a half high. The apartments are all roomy for a country house, and the wide hallway attracts attention the first thing on entering. General Garfield has marked that section of the plan where the pantry is located, " Plenty of shelves and drawers," and in the rear part of the second floor of the diagram is written " Snuggery for the general." The last mentioned room is rather small, measuring only 13J feet by 14 feet. It is to be fitted up with book-shelves, but Garfield will still continue to use as his library the detached building erected a year or two since in the yard northeast of the house. Two of the best apartments in the eastern and front part of the edifice are being especially fitted up for occupancy by Mrs. Garfield, the mother of the gen eral. The front room has a large old-fashioned fireplace, and the pains taken to make everything comfortable nere plainly show the tender feelings of the son for the aged mother. Dr. Robinson noticed the admiration of the writer for this room, and said : " The general thinks everything of his mother. You know he chopped a hundred cords of wood once for $25, and took the money home to her." SINCE THE CONVENTION. 519 There are few of the timbers of the old house (over which the new has been constructed) now visible, and probably there will be none in sight when the carpets are put down. The cost of the structure will be, when fin ished, between $3,500 and $4,000. This is remarkably slight, when the expense of bringing such workmen as were wanted so far away from the city is considered. The work has been hurried forward with rapidity, par ticularly within the last few weeks, as it was intended to get it as nearly finished as possible before the general's return from Washington previous to going to the Chicago Convention. Mrs. Garfield was really the architect of the house. A man in Cleveland drew a slight sketch, and Mrs. Garfield filled it out, the general marking in various directions with bold strokes of the pen. When the ideas of the wife had been put on paper the general wrote the following underneath, as a gentle hint to the builders : ' " These plans must stand as above, unless otherwise ordered hereafter. If any part of them is impracticable, inform me soon and suggest change. " J. A. Garfield." " Washington, March 6, 1880." The . general has never been proud or " stuck up," the neighbors say, although they thought he might be come so when he first moved among them. His wife they characterize as a " perfect lady," who, however, is not afraid of work. General Garfield has five children living, and has lost two, who died in infancy. The two elder boys, Harry 620 JAMES A. GARFIELD. and James, are now at school in New Hampshire. Mary, or Molly, as everybody calls her, is a handsome, rosy- cheeked girl of about twelve. The two younger boys are named Irwin and Abram. The general's mother is still living, and has long been a member of his family. She is j»n intelligent, energetic old lady, with a clear head and a strong will, who keeps well posted in the news ofthe day, and is very proud of her son's career, though more liberal of criticism than of praise. General Garfield's district lies in the extreme north eastern corner of Ohio, and now embraces the counties of Ashtabula, Trumbull, Geauga, Lake, and Mahoning. His old home county of Portage was detached from it a year ago. With the exception of the coal and iron regions in the extreme southern part, the district is purely a rural one and is inhabited by a population of pure New Eng land ancestry. It is claimed that there is less illiteracy in proportion to the population than in any other district in the United States. CHAPTER XII. ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. The Presidential Election — Garfield Elected — Life at Mentor after the Elec tion — Departure for Washington — The Inauguration — Brilliant Scenes — The new Cabinet — Divisions in the Republican Party — Nomination of Judge Kobertson — Resignation of the New York Senators — Tbe Presi dent endorsed by the Senate and People — Promise of a noble Adminis tration — The Star Route Scandal — Illness of Mrs. Garfield — The proposed New England Tour — The President Shot — Scenes at the Depot — Removal to the White House — Heroic Courage of the President — A Brave Fight — Arrival of Mrs. Garfield — Anxiety of the People — Statements of Eye witnesses — Daily Progress of the President's Case — Hope at last — The Assassin — His Crime an3 its Motive — No Conspiracy — Details of the Arrest — Guiteau's Father and Brother denounce him. The Presidential Election of 1880 was held on the 2d of November, and the popular vote was as follows : For James A. Garfield (Republican) 4,437,345 For W. S. Hancock (Democrat) 4,435,015 For J. B. Weaver (Greenback) 305,931 General Garfield thus obtained a majority of 2,330 of the vote of the people. The electoral vote was as follows: for James A. Garfield, 214; for W. S. Han cock, 155; thus giving to General Garfield a majority ef 59 votes in the Electoral College. These figures indicate unerringly that General Garfield was the choice of the majority of his countrymen. General 521 522 JAMES A. GARFIELD. Hancock accepted his defeat manfully, and was among the first to heartily congratulate his successful com petitor. On the first Wednesday of December, 1880, the Electoral Colleges of the various States met and cast their votes, as provided by the Constitution. All the returns having been forwarded to the Vice-President of the United States, at Washington, the two Houses of Congress met in the Hall of the United States House of Representatives on the second Wednesday in February, 1881, for the purpose of counting the elec toral vote. The certificates of the Electoral Colleges of the various States having been opened and read, the Vice-President announced that James A. Garfield had been duly elected President, and Chester A. Arthur Vice-President of the United States, for the term of four years from the 4th of March, 1881. The successful candidates were subsequently officially noti fied of their election. After the November election, General Garfield re mained quietly at his home at Mentor, receiving thousands of visitors from all shades of the Republican party. Once he made a visit to New York for the purpose of consulting with the leaders of his party. Great curiosity was manifested in all parts of the country to learn the names of the statesmen he had selected as members of his Cabinet ; but the President elect maintained a dignified silence, reserving the announcement of the names of his constitutional ad visers until after his entrance upon the duties of his office. ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 523 At length, on the 1st of March, General Garfield left Mentor for Washington to be inaugurated Presi dent of the United States. The whole route was a triumphal progress. At all the principal points he was received by enthusiastic crowds, and at several delivered brief but eloquent addresses. Washington was reached on the 2d of March, and the President elect met with a reception rarely given to persons even of his position. On Friday, March 4th, the inauguration ceremonies took place upon a scale of unusual magnificence. Thou sands of strangers crowded the city. Military and civic organizations had been arriving for days pre viously, and on the morning of the 4th of March, it was believed that at least 50,000 strangers were in the city. Friday dawned bleak and stormy. Big flakes of snow went scattering through the chilling air. All the roofs and trees shed trickling streams of ice water. But between ten and eleven o'clock, although the high wind continued, the sun began to show it self through the clouds. All Washington was astir at an early hour, and men, women, and children hurried through the snow and slush from every direction, every one intent on reaching Pennsylvania avenue to witness the inaugural procession, or to the Capitol. About ten o'clock the escort of Federal troops was formed in front of the White House, and at half-past ten the procession started down Pennsylvania avenue for the Capitol. The in-coming and out-going Presi dents rode in a four-horse barouche, with the gor- 524 JAMES A. GARFIELD. geously uniformed First Cleveland troop mounted inv mediately in front. The procession presented the most imposing spec tacle witnessed in Washington since the grand review of troops seventeen years ago, when the victorious armies of the Republic returned North at the close ef the war. At the head were two platoons of mounted police, and the grand marshal, General W. T. Sherman, and aids. The procession was divided into five divisions, which numbered fully 15,000 nren. The first division, under command of Major-General R. B. Ayres, United States Army, consisted of twelve companies of regular artillery, four companies of ma rines, a battalion of Cleveland troops, cavalry; Presi dent and party in carriages ; Philadelphia troops, cavalry; Knights Templars, four platoons; Grand Army of the Republic, eight platoons ; Boys in Blue, eight platoons ; Naval Cadets ; two horse batteries of regulars; battalion Washington light infantry, four companies ; Colonel Moore, Company A, fifth battalion ; Second California brigade ; Hampton Cadets, Virginia; Langston Guards, Norfolk, Va. ; Union Blues, Thomas- ville, Ga. ; Rome Star Guards, Ga.; National Rifles (Washington), Captain Burnside; Signal Corps, United States Army; and the Ninth Regiment, of New York. The second division, commanded by Major-General John F. Hartranft, was composed of five brigades of Pennsylvania militia. The third division, commanded by Major-General Thomas C. Fletcher, consisted of the Grand Army of the Republic, Boys in Blue, and militia from New ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 525 York, District of Columbia, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware, Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin, Indiana, Illinois, Minnesota, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, New Hampshire, Connecticut, Massachusetts, and veterans from the Dis trict of Columbia and Pittsburg. The Governor of Connecticut and staff were in this division. The fourth division, under the command of Major- General Charles H. Field, was composed of militia from Maryland, Virginia, West Virginia, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Florida. The fifth division, under the command of Colonel Robert Boyd, was composed exclusively of civic societies. Along the route of the procession, from stands erected at intervals, thousands upon thousands of people gazed upon the passing pageant. The streets through which it moved were lined with people. Pennsylvania Avenue presented a grand sight. Every window had its occupants, and every house was bright with the joyous costumes of fair women and beautiful children, who waved handkerchiefs, the national colors, and white hands, as the man, who is to preside over the destinies of the nation for the next four years, passed by. All available space was occupied. Even the roofs of many houses, which had been covered with benches, chairs, etc., were thronged with people. The long eastern portico of the Treasury building was filled with ladies and gentlemen, and a stand erected at the south end of the building was occupied by at least 3,000 clerks of the department. In the two squares between Thirteenth and Fourteenth 526 JAMES A. GARFIELD. streets were two stands occupied by the employes of the Bureau of Printing and Engraving, and of the Interior Departments, the former numbering about 600, and the latter over 2,500. There were arches at the intersection of the cross streets with Pennsylvania Avenue, and on Fifteenth street, between the Treasury Department and the Corcoran building, was a great triumphal arch, which presented a beautiful appearance. It was Gothic in design, and one end was surmounted by a tower with four minarets, from which floated red and blue pennants. On the other end was a flag-staff, .with a blue-and-white banner waving therefrom, and four lines of small flags, extending from the topmost point ofthe pole to the arch below. The entire structure was painted to imitate brown stone, and the columns and ornaments Nova Scotia stone. Thirty-eight windows in the arch and towers were painted in imi tation of stained glass. In the centre of each was a red, white and blue shield, on which was the name of a State. Eight similar windows were marked with the names of the eight Territories. Across the top of the arch were two rows of cavalry and infantry guidons. • The Senate reassembled at ten o'clock. The floor was covered with chairs before, between and behind the rows of desks. At half-past ten Mrs. Hayes, Mrs. Garfield, and young Mrs. Garfield, accompanied by junior members of the Hayes and Garfield families, entered the south gallery. Mrs. Hayes and Mrs. Gar field carried bouquets. At the same time the doors ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 527 of all the galleries theretofore closed were opened, and the galleries were quickly filled with the families of Congressmen, heads of departments, diplomats, and officers of the army and navy. All the ladies wore handsome toilets. The scene was a brilliant one. -A few minutes before eleven, General Hancock, accompanied by General Mitchell, entered with Senator Blaine. As he walked across the Senate the galleries burst into loud applause. Senator Conkling was the first to greet him. They shook hands warmly. Senator Thurman grasped his hand next. The whole Senate followed suit. After he had shaken hands with all, he was conducted to a seat on "the left amid renewed applause. Then came successively Chief-Justice Carter and the rest of the Supreme Court of the District; Judges Hunt, Bancroft, Davis and others of the Court of Claims ; Secretary of State Evarts ; Governor Bigelow of Connecticut; ex- Attorney-General Williams, Gen eral Phil Sheridan, and others. At twenty minutes to eleven the Senate received the House resolution asking for the appointment of a Senator on the com mittee to wait, with members appointed on the part of the House, on the President and tell him that Congress had finished its business and was ready to adjourn. At eleven -o'clock the President and President-elect, each accompanied by a member of the Committee of Arrangements, arrived and proceeded to the President's room. Vice-President-elect Arthur, accompanied by a member of the Committee of Arrangements, proceeded 528 JAMES A. GARFIELD. to the Vice-President's room. The Diplomatic Corps assembled in the marble room and entered the Senate Chamber in a body at fifteen minutes past eleven. All were in full court dress. The Japanese and Chinese legations attracted much attention. The corps was headed by its dean, Sir Edward Thornton, and Secretary Evarts. At half- past eleven Chief- Justice Waite and the Justices of the Supreme Court, accompanied by ex-Justices Strong and Swayne, and preceded by their clerk, appeared in the Senate and took the seats provided for them. The Presidential procession, headed by President Hayes and President-elect Garfield, finally entered, under escort of Senators Pendleton, Anthony, Bayard, and others, of the Committee of Arrangements, and two minutes later was followed by Vice- President elect Arthur, in charge of a committee composed of the above-named Senators, all present in the cham ber rising upon each occasion. Mr. Wheeler intro duced the Vice-President-elect, who addressed to the Senate a few well-chosen words, and then turned to Mr. Wheeler and raised his right hand. The out going Vice-President administered the oath of office to his successor, and immediately afterwards bade fare^ well to the Senate in a brief address. The new Senate was then organized; after which the Senate, House, and guests proceeded to the east front of the capitol. The scene presented at the platform was impressive in the extreme. The crush of spectators filled the large platform, which was about one hundred yards wide, and extending out on each side past the two ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 529 wings of the building. The crowd was so closely wedged together that the scene from above presented a solid mass. Directly in front of the platform were spectators who had stood patiently there in the cold and wet for four hours. Behind were massed the military. The. cold northeast wind had softened, and the sombre sky had given way to the bright sunlight. The change was auspicious. In the first row of a temporary platform sat four Ohio men — Chief-Justice Waite, in his gorgeous gown of silk; James A. Garfield, full-bearded, big-eyed and with folded arms ; Rutherford B. Hayes, looking wearied; and old Senator Pendleton. Behind them sat Mrs. Hayes, her jet-black hair silvered here and there with white. She wore a round, white, fluffy sort of turban, with flowing feathers, and a seal-skin sacque or ulster, and a black silk dress. Next her sat Aunt Eliza, as Mr. Garfield calls his mother, a very aged lady with snow-white hair. She seems feeble, and her skin is furrowed and full of wrinkles. She wore a black silk bonnet and a "black silk robe of some kind. She looked warm and comfortable, and her eyes rested fondly on her son, and her cheeks flushed perceptibly when later on his manly utterances were cheered to the echo. The wife of the President-elect sat next his mother, and beyond her stood their children, Vice- President Arthur, Speaker Randall, General Swaim, and others. Back ©f them were Secretary Evarts — large hat and slender figure — the round Derby hat and tall person of Roscoe Conkling, the Supreme Court Judges, the Senators and Representatives. 34 530 JAMES A. GARFIELD. General Garfield read his inaugural slowly and effectively, and was frequently applauded. When he had concluded, he turned to Chief-Justice Waite and said, " I am now prepared to take the oath." The Chief-Justice was attended by Mr. McKinney, Clerk of the Supreme Court, carrying a Bible (Sab bath-school edition). Rising, he tendered the book to the President-elect, and administered the customary oath. General Garfield kissed the page, bowed to the Chief-Justice, and then reverently kissed his mother and his wife, after which he received the congratula tions of his friends. The ceremony being over, the President and Mr. Hayes were escorted to the barouches, and the grand pro cession down the avenue to the White House began to move. Upon his arrival there, President Garfield took a seat upon the grand stand, in company with Mr. Hayes, and the procession passed in review before him. Two hours later, the President and his family entered the White House. Immediately after his inauguration President Gar field sent to the Senate, which had been convoked in extra session by President Hayes, the names of the members of his Cabinet. They were promptly con firmed. They were as follows : Secretary of State, James G. Blaine, of Maine. Secretary of the Treasury, William Windom, of Minnesota. Secretary of War, Robert T. Lincoln, of Illinois. Secretary of the Navy, W. H. Hunt, of Louisiana. Secretary of the Interior, S. J. Kirkwood, of Iowa. Attorney-General, Wayne MacVeagh, of Pennsylvania. Po6tmaster-General, Thomas L. James, of New York. ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 531 Very soon after entering upon his duties, President Garfield found that the executive chair was by no means a bed of roses. The Republican party soon di vided into ¦ two sections, one supporting the President, and the other, known as the " Stalwarts," opposing him. A bitter partisan contest set in, and prolonged the executive session of the Senate to a very late day. The quarrel was fiercest over the appointment of a new Collector for the port of New York, and culmi nated in the resignation of Senators Conkling and Piatt, of that State. The resignation was based upon the ground that the President had nominated the Collector for the port of New York without consulting or yielding to the wishes of the Senators from that State, the said Senators in effect claiming the right to dictate what appointments should or should not be made in that State. The President, however, having with him the support of the great mass of the nation, without regard to party, pursued with unshaken firm ness the course he had determined upon. After the resignation of Senators Conkling and Piatt, the nomi nation of Mr. Robertson was confirmed by the Senate, the highest legislative body in the Union thus uniting with the majority of the citizens of the country in approving the course of the President. As the time wore on, President Garfield gained steadily in the esteem of the people. His purpose to give to the country a fair and just administration of the Government became every day more apparent, and his high and noble qualities became each day more conspicuous. People began to feel for the first time in 532 JAMES A. GARFIELD. many years that the Executive Chair was occupied by a man capable of conceiving a pure and noble standard of duty, and possessed of the firmness and strength of will necessary to carrying it out. The country was prosperous, and there was every reason to expect a continuance of the general happiness. Soon after the opening of President Garfield's admin istration, the Postmaster-General discovered that cer tain contracts for carrying the mails on what are known as "the Star Routes" were fraudulent, and the persons interested in them were robbing the government of immense sums of money. The President, Postmaster- General, and Attorney-General, sustained by the other members of the Cabinet, resolved to bring the crim inals to justice. The latter, being men of wealth and position, bitterly resented the course of the government, and violently denounced it. Nevertheless the President firmly pursued what he deemed his duty, and the crim inals were only prevented from being brought to speedy trial and conviction by the close of the term of the court. During the late spring and early summer the Pres ident suffered a severe affliction in the serious illness of his wife from malarial fever, which came near result ing fatally. The White House is situated in the most unhealthy section of Washington City, and its inmates are every summer forced to retreat to a purer atmos phere. As soon as Mrs. Garfield was able to be moved, she was taken to Long Branch, where she speedily re covered. On the morning of the 2d of July, the President, ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 533 with a considerable party, including several members of the Cabinet and ladies, started on a visit to New England. During the trip the President intended to be present at the commencement exercises of his alma mater, Williams College, in Massachusetts. The party arrived at the Baltimore and Potomac depot in Wash ington in advance of the President, who reached the depot shortly after with Mr. Blaine, the Secretary of State, who came simply to see him off and say good bye. In passing through the waiting-room at the sta tion the President was fired at twice, and fell terribly wounded. The correspondent of the Philadelphia Times thus describes the tragedy : About twenty minutes after nine o'clock this morn ing the people on Pennsylvania avenue were startled by the sight of a team of powerful horses driven at full speed toward the White House. The first impres sion was that it was a runaway, but as the team swept by, the fact that it was a War Department covered wagon and the driver, of grim and soldierly bearing, sat urging his horses to a still higher speed, was a puz zle to everybody. The avenue was thronged with ve hicles, and the soldier driver thundering along on the dead run waved them aside, while the people on the walks closed rapidly in behind with muttered comment and looks of astonishment. The impression prevailed that the driver was drunk, but those who saw the man's grim look knew that he was on some great pur pose. "You are wrong," said my companion to one of 534 JAMES A. GARFIELD. these cursing commentators. " Something great has happened or is going to happen." The words were scarcely out of his mouth before the President's empty carriage, with the driver on the box, came bowling along at the same break-neck pace, the driver urging his animals with the whip. The bewil dered crowd, who had just rushed into the street to strain their eyes and shake their fists after the rapidly- vanishing wagon, now scattered pell-mell right and left to give way to this second apparition. While the pop ulace gathered at the curb and vehicles stood stationary on the safe side, still another carriage, containing an attache of the White House, whirled by at a rapid pace, preceded by a mounted policeman at full gallop. Then everybody knew something had happened, and that this something was to the President of the United States or some one of the Presidential party. It was generally known that they were to leave the city by the morning train, and but a few minutes before the exec utive carriage and others containing the members of the party had passed down the avenue. Little time elapsed in which to indulge in specula tion. It could not have been more than five minutes when the intelligence spread that President Garfield had been assassinated. No one could trace the source of this rumor. It came in subdued whispers. It seemed to come from everywhere and spread with the morn ing breeze. Proprietors and clerks rushed from their stores and offices, and men, women and children quickly gathered on the walks and thronged the corners in ex cited groups. Then the President's carriage came tear- ASSASSINATION" OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 535 ing down the asphaltum again toward the depot. In it sat Colonel Corbin of the War Department and Sur geon-General Barnes. This confirmed the stories on the street. Then Dr. Bliss' carriage went by, and by this time everybody knew the President of the United States, for the second time in the history of the country, had been assassinated. This was within ten minutes of the occurrence. The excitement was intense. There were no loud voices, but everybody ran hither and thither without method. Men forgot hat and coat, and ran into streets and wandered about, apparently anxious only to be near somebody else, but shocked and bewildered with the startling rumors beyond concerted action. About this time a disorderly character was run in at the Tenth district station house, and evidently under the impression that this might be the assassin of the President, a half-frantic mob rushed in from all sides, then fell rapidly away again, disappointed. As soon as the public had fairly recovered its senses, there was a general move for the scene of the tragedy, the Balti more and Potomac depot. The shooting occurred at 9.20, in the Baltimore and Potomac depot. The assassin was Charles Guiteau. The story is full of exciting interest. Mr. Garfield arose this morning at about half-past seven, and took his breakfast at eight with his oldest son. At about nine Mr. Blaine called, and a few minutes after the President's carriage was announced. The President and Secretary Blaine took seats in the carriage, and were driven down the avenue. It was 536 JAMES A.* GARFIELD. about the first time that the President's new horses and carriage had been out. They were driven by Smith, the colored man who has for twelve years been the White House coachman. There was no footman on the box, but the equipage was very showy, and attracted general admiration. At about a quarter past nine the carriage arrived at the Baltimore and Potomac station. It had been arranged that the President and several members of his official household should leave on the limited express at half-past nine. The Presi dent's party was to go first to Long Branch, and thence through New England. When the President and Mr. Blaine arrived at the station, they were told that they had ten minutes be fore the train would go, and so the two friends sat in the carriage and conversed together for about five minutes. Wffrned by an attending policeman that little time was left, they got out of the carriage and entered the ladies' room of the station, and arm-in arm walked into the main room through which -they had to pass to get to the train. Mr. Garfield expressed his regret that Mr. Blaine was not going with him, and the later replied that they would soon meet in Augusta. There was not a large crowd at the station. Per haps half a hundred had gone to the station from instinct of curiosity, for it was known the President and certain members of the Cabinet would leave on the limited express. A few newspaper reporters were on hand, and a score or more of personal friends, who, like Mr. Blaine, had come to bid the President and ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 537 his party good-bye. Secretary Windom, Postmaster- General James and Secretary Hunt had arrived before the President. They were accompanied by their wives and other members of their families. Colonel Rock well, who acts as a sort of personal aide to the Presi dent, was also in advance of his chief, accompanied by his son, Don Rockwell, and by the President's son Harry. The President and Mr. Blaine had traversed half of the main hall of the station, when Guiteau walked out deliberately with a cocked revolver. He gave no warning, and said not a word, but presenting his pistol fired at the President's heart. Whether on account of defective aim, or because the President was in motion, is not known, but the shot, instead of going into the President's heart, went into the upper part of his arm, making a harmless wound. The assassin, with the same devilish deliberation, next tried to shoot the President in the stomach, but the first shot caused the President to turn slightly, and the second fire, only arr instant after the first, struck him in the side or back, near the back-bone. At this the President fell heavily. Mr. Blaine, almost paralyzed by the sudden event, hesitated a moment between succoring his friend and securing the assassin. He called loudly for help, and the assassin was secured. The horrible occurrence caused the crowd to fall back at first in terror, but the waiting-woman of the station at once went to the stricken man's assistance. Few realized what had occurred. Two shots had been heard, but no unusual noise had preceded or 538 JAMES A, GARFIELD. followed the event. But the sad news spread rap idly. The President lay helpless on the floor, the blood flowing from both his wounds most copiously. Some minutes elapsed before those present regained their senses. Nobody seemed to know what to do. Mr. Windom, Mr. James, and Mr. Hunt came in and viewed the prostrate figure. Mr. Windom shed tears and could not control his emotion. Mr. James was more prac tical. He and Mr. Blaine soon secured a mattress, and not long afterwards the wounded President was taken up-stairs and placed upon a bed. The scene. at the bedside was most affecting. The President lay upon his back, his wounds bleeding pro fusely. His coat, vest and trousers had been cut away, and the half-dozen surgeons, who by this time had arrived, pronounced the injury of the most serious character. The sudden shock had affected the Presi dent's stomach, and he vomited quite freely. He did not, however, lose consciousness. About his bed were gathered his Cabinet, and some of his best friends. He said nothing, but he recognized every one with his eye. At one time he put his arm around Blaine, and said : " You know how I love you, Blaine." The President's grief-stricken son, Harry, stood by the side of the bed, holding his father's hand, and crying as though his heart would break, and calling aloud: "My poor father! my poor father!" There were few present who did not weep. Before long the surgeons decided that the President could be removed to his home. An army ambulance ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 539 was at hand, and four stalwart figures bore the bleed ing President from the station and placed him in the covered vehicle. Two or three trusted friends attended him in the ambulance, and five thousand sympathiz ing friends — men, women, children of all ages, black and white — followed the ambulance on the run until it reached the White House. The wagon was driven to the south entrance, and as the President was lifted out he recognized Mr. Crook, his financial clerk, and Mr. Pruden, his private secretary, in an upper window, and, smiling, saluted them with his uninjured arm. He was taken to his wife's chamber, overlooking the Potomac, and disrobed. He complained of fatigue and was allowed to rest. Two attempts were made to find the ball — one at the station and one at the White House — but without result. George W. Adams, one of the proprietors of the Evening Star, of Washington, was at the depot when the shooting occurred. He says that the President had just alighted from his carriage to take the cars for the North. Secretary Hunt and Mrs. Hunt, Secretary Windom and Mrs. Windom, Postmaster-General James and the rest of the party had taken their seats in the car ; Colonel Jamieson, of the Post-Office Department, who was to have charge of the transportation of the party, was standing at the gate leading to the cars. He heard a shot, quickly followed by another. There was a rush to the ladies' room, from whence the sounds came. President Garfield was found lying on the floor, having fallen to the left. Secretary Blaine came out of the room, following a man and calling : " Rock- 540 JAMES A. GARFIELD. well ! where is Rockwell ? " The man was seized by officers Kearney and Parks, the depot policemen. The President was taken up-stairs. Dr. Bliss arrived soon afterwards. It was soon discovered that both shots had taken effect. One struck him in the right arm, below the shoulder; the other went in at the right side of the back, between the hip and kidney. It then passed forward and went down into the groin. It was probed for, but could not be found. The shooting occurred when the President and Secretary Blaine were walking arm-in-arm through the ladies' room. Secretary Blaine was not going with the party, but came down to bid the President good-bye. He said: "The President and I were walking arm-in-arm towards the train ; I heard two shots, and saw a man run ; I started after him, but saw that he was grabbed. As he got out of the room I came to the President, and found him lying on the floor. The floor was covered with the President's blood. A number of people who were around shortly afterwards had some of that blood on their persons. I think I know the man ; I think his name is Guiteau. When arrested he said : ' I did it, and want to be arrested; I am a Stalwart, and Arthur is President now ; I have a letter here that I want -you to give to General Sherman ; it will explain every thing ; take me to the police station.' " When Guiteau had fired his second shot and made for the B-street entrance of the depot, where hack 195 waited, he found his plan of escape wouldn't work. Depot Policeman Parks sprang between him and the exit, and the assassin then turned the other way. ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 541 Here he was confronted by Officer Kearney, and both officers seized him at once. As they dragged him through the crowd he flourished a sealed letter in one hand and shouted in a highly dramatic manner: " Arthur is President of the United States now. I am a Stalwart. This letter will tell you everything. I want you to take it to General Sherman." He was deprived of his pistol on arrest. It is an ugly-looking weapon, of what is known as the five-bar relled British bull-dog pattern, of 44 calibre, with a white bone handle; and had three loads undischarged. He did not throw it away, but flourished it in his hand when he ran, everybody about the waiting-room dodg ing from in front of it without regard to appearances. When the wounded President reached the Executive Mansion he was taken to his chamber and made as comfortable as possible. Immense crowds surrounded the grounds, but- were not allowed inside. The fol lowing physicians were called in: Doctors Bliss, Ford, Huntingdon, Woodward, U. S. A., Townsend, Lincoln, Reyburn, Norris, Purvis, Patterson, Surgeon- General Barnes and Surgeon- General Wales. The President was conscious and did not complain of suffering. He dictated the following telegram to his wife : Mrs. Garfield, Elberon, Long Branch : The President wishes me to say to you from him that he has been seriously hurt. How seriously he cannot yet say. He is himself and hopes you will come to him soon. He Bends his love to you. A. F. BOCKWELL. Meanwhile there was the greatest anxiety as to the President's condition throughout the city. Immediately after the shooting his pulse went down to 53, and his 542 JAMES A. GARFIELD. face, as he was moved to the White House, was of an ashen hue. His pulse recovered to 63 and the color returned somewhat to his face when taken to his room. Several attempts were made to probe for the balls dur ing the early part of the afternoon, but they were un successful. As the afternoon wore on the President's symptoms grew worse, and it was telegraphed all over the world that there was but very slight ground for hope. The President conversed freely with those about him, and was very anxious for the arrival of his wife. She left Long Branch shortly before one o'clock on a special train placed at her disposal by the Pennsylvania Rail road. The distance is about 200 miles, and she reached Washington in less than six hours. From' Gray's Ferry to Bay View, a distance of 96 miles, the train traveled in 100 minutes. What a journey that was to one sor rowing, grief-stricken woman ! She was accompanied by a special agent of the railroad and members of her own family. From Long Branch to Philadelphia the distance was made with but a single stop. She was shown no despatches at Philadelphia. Members of the party, with trembling hands, received a despatch saying the President's condition was encouraging, yet what hope could be given her where all was uncertainty even to the President's physicians? Mrs. Garfield arrived at about half-past six. The President was conversing with Secretary Hunt and others around his bedside, and his quickened ear caught the sound of the carriage wheels below. " That is she," he said, turning his face with a glad smile toward his watchers, ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. '543 tind so it was. Attorney-General MacVeagh assisted Mrs. Garfield to alight and conducted her up-stairs to her husband. She was weeping. Her, eyes were red and swollen, but she bore herself with much fortitude. " She's a plucky little woman," said the President, when he was questioned as to the propriety of her being shown to his bedside, and so she proved herself. She took off her things as she went up, and going to the bedside spoke cheerfully and hopefully of his recovery. Dr. Bliss had said : " You have one chance of recovery." "I embrace that chance," replied the President. A large crowd assembled outside the grounds early in the day, and throngs of excited and anxious people paraded up and down all the afternoon, catching greed ily at every rumor that came from within the gates. The crowd was greatly augmented at night, and the anxiety increased with each report of his condition. Up in the White House offices assembled a large body of special correspondents, some about the doors of the private secretary, in whispering groups near the great windows, and writing out their notes at various official desks. Reports of the situation came out every min ute or two, and were greatly conflicting. The most hopeful took their cue from Dr. Bliss, who appeared to be the most sanguine of those in attendance. He thought the President improving. A number of prom inent Washington ladies and the ladies of various high official households sat in the ante-rooms below stairs waiting to hear various bulletins as they came from the wounded President's chamber. Of all these people watching and waiting, not one was as cheerful and self- 5l4 JAMES A. GARFIELD. possessed,, as the wounded President. He bore his suf fering without a murmur, had a word and a smile for every man who entered and a joke for the ladies. Mrs. Garfield sat at his bedside, " as lively as a cricket," as Mr. Blaine put it. In the library was a remarkable group. Around the colored-globed lamp on the round table sat Mr. Blaine, dictating despatches. On the op posite side was the Postmaster-General, who, with Rob ert Lincoln, enjoyed their cigar while waiting for returns from the sick-room. Secretary Windom could be seen through the open folding-doors, pacing slowly and medi tatively up and down the corridor. Attorney-General MacVeagh, the smallest figure in the group, stood look ing on with hands folded behind his back. There was Mrs. Hunt on a sofa on one side, talking in whispers to Mrs. James, while on the opposite side, over against the wall, sat the Secretary of the Navy alone with his cigar. Young Harry Garfield stood looking into the lamp with out a word. It was a group for an artist ; and all the while all eyes sought the open door of the wounded President's chamber. All remained until a late hour, and retired with a more hopeful feeling. At seven o'clock Secretary Blaine telegraphed to Vice- President Arthur, in New York, that the President had recognized his wife and had conversed with her, but most of his physicians thought he was sinking rapidly. At 7.40 there was a change. The President's voice was strong, and he talked freely with those around him. This was regarded as a change for the better, and the bulletin when posted caused intense satisfaction, for the sympathies of the people were wholly with the wounded ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 545 President. At 8.30, however, came the news that " the President is again sinking, and there is little if any hope;" and the hopes of the people fell. There was another gleam of hope a few minutes later. It was announced that the President was sleep ing pleasantly and was more comfortable. Pulse, 128 ;, temperature, 99.1, slightly above normal; respiration,, 22 and more regular. At 9.20 the President, it was given out, had rallied a little within the past three-quarters of an hour, and his symptoms were a little more favorable. He contin ued brave and cheerful. About the time he began toi rally, he said to Dr. Bliss : " Doctor, what are the indications ? " Dr. Bliss replied : " There is a chance of recovery." " Well, then," replied the President cheerfully, " we will take that chance." At 10.20 the President's symptoms continued to- grow more favorable, and to afford more ground for hope. His temperature was then normal; his pulse' had fallen four beats since the last official bulletin, and' the absence of blood in the discharges from the bladder- showed that that organ was not injured, as had been feared. Mrs. Garfield, although still weak from her recent illness, and shocked by the suddenness of the grief which has come to her, has behaved since her arrival with a courage and self-control equal to those of her husband. Not only has she not given way to the terror and grief which she necessarily feels, but she has been constantly by the President's side, encour- 35 546 JAMES A. GARFIELD. aging him with her presence and sympathy, and giving efficient aid, so far as it has been in her power, to the attending physicians. Shortly after ten o'clock Secre tary Blaine cabled the foreign Ministers that at that hour the President's condition had improved. In the judgment of all the attending physicians the change was marked and hopeful. So passed the first night after the shooting. Writing the next evening, the same correspondent ;says : " This waiting crowd before the White House gates is representative of all the people one meets on the :streets. Men ask each other for the news. Strangers, who have never seen each other before, stop and talk about the crime and its probable consequences. There is not so much noise as in other cities. There is not :SO much blustering about making onslaughts and fur nishing twenty thousand men to sack Washington ; ibut there is a deeper feeling, a feeling more akin to ¦horror, than the Federal capital has experienced since ithe assassination of Mr. Lincoln. The President him self is full of splendid courage. His nerve is remark able, and has done much to sustain him. His grasp is ;as strong as ever. His eyes are bright, and he talks to those about him cheerfully. Sometimes he con trives to joke with the doctors, but he realizes very •clearly the straits that he is in. He said to Secretary iBlaine to-day : ' I know well enough there is now some hope, but I want you to tell me frankly when there is no hope-. I can stand it. Tell me frankly, for I may not be able to trust my own judgment.' Last evening ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 547 he had given up hope, but he was cheerful, neverthe less, even when he told his boy that he probably should not live. There is no thought of giving up so long as the end can be fought off, and the physicians have a remarkably strong hope in the grit and deter mination of their patient. They have telegraphed to Drs. Frank H. Hamilton, of New York, and D. Hayes Agnew, of Philadelphia, to join them in their consul tations." At this hour, ten o'clock p. M., there are many vis itors at the White House — members of the Cabinet, Vice-President Arthur, General Sherman, several Sen ators, high officials of the government, and intimate friends ©f the President and family. They are sitting in the room of Private Secretary Brown, and in the Cabinet room. Most of the rooms of the President's suite are not open. There, is every effort to have quiet throughout the Executive Mansion. Although there is not nearly so much bustle and excitement as last night, yet there is a good deal of going and coming. Whether there is reason for it or not, there is an in creasing feeling of apprehension. Members of the Cabinet are less cheerful than they were during the day. Secretary Blaine looks much broken. He. is grief-stricken, and weighed down with dread of the worst. Vice-President Arthur was visibly agitated when he entered the White House to-night. He was in formed by Secretary Blaine that Mrs. Garfield was desir ous of seeing him. He was received by her with marked consideration. His expressions of heartfelt sorrow were affecting and impressive in the extreme. At a late 548 JAMES A. GARFIELD. ' hour to-night there are large crowds upon the streets. About a thousand people are in front of the White House grounds. There are many more people out than at this hour last night. There is much less cheerfulness, and an increasing fear of fatal results. This is caused chiefly from the fact that the President does not improve rapidly, but is remaining in much the same condition as some time ago. The 4th of July dawned gloomily at the White House. It was a night of suspense and agony there which preceded the dawning of the nation's anniver sary. It seemed as though the shadow of death had settled there, and that death itself might come before morning. As the sun went down on the peaceful Sunday evening, there was hope that the President's Tavorable symptoms might become certain symptoms for recovery; but suddenly — almost as suddenly as the shot which pierced him — there was a change, and it was an unfavorable one. The pulse was accelerated by a fever which would have burned his life away if not reduced. Those ominous prickly sensations in the feet and legs, characterized by the President himself as " tiger clawing," showed that the nerves were pro testing at some great injury done to one of the largest of them, or to their centre, the spinal cord. It was a grave, critical time. The silent physicians, as they bent over the bedside testing the pulse, the respira tion, and the temperature of the blood, knew that just now medical skill was of no avail. Restoration from relapse was to be the work of nature alone. The President, his mental faculties undisturbed by ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 549 the great shock, by the terrible track of a bullet and its irritating presence in his vital Organs, with a calm ness that was heroic, expressed his own opinion of his coming fate. That was the first time he had confessed death since he had remarked at the depot that the wound was fatal. Nature did what was hoped it would do, though for three hours or more nature struggled terribly with death. At length death was vanquished; but for how long? Would there be another struggle, when nature, taxed beyond the power of resistance, would succumb? The physicians, as they silently moved from the sick-chamber to the adjoining dark ened room where sat the Cabinet, strangely mute, ex pressed this idea to them. It was needless for the Cabinet to inquire. They glanced up with imploring look, and their glance asked the question more eagerly than words could ever do. Not more painful than the pale face of the President was the sorrow-stricken look of these men who but a day or two ago were gathered with the President around the Cabinet table. Secretary Blaine had aged in a night and a day from a man in his prime to a tottering, feeble old man. The quick step, the active, springy movement which used to characterize the Secretary of State, was gone, and when he came from the chamber it seemed as though he must have support or he would fall. He waited only for the arrival of General Arthur, who had been sent for, intending after having seen the Vice-President, to retire. Exhausted nature was warn ing him, and so his physician told him, that the strain must be relaxed, or the consequences might be severe 550 JAMES A. GARFIELD. to him. There was the Postmaster-General, who had not even removed his clothing, sitting by one of the windows, silent as one in the presence of death. There was the venerable Secretary of the Interior, pacing slowly back and forth, now in the light of the moon, as it streamed in the open window, and now in the darkness of the shadows. There was the Attorney- General, seemingly the most calm and self-possessed of all, conversing in whispers with the Secretary of the Treasury at infrequent intervals. The Secretary of War, now passing through a second experience of this kind, stepped in for a moment, asking a single ques tion, and then retiring with silent tread. Thus were the Cabinet in that outer room, waiting for any announcement. They hoped, but they feared. It was as still as death. The breeze that came up from the Potomac rustled the window draperies, but that was all the noise there was. At intervals of a few minutes some one appears from the sick-chamber. Sometimes a simple shake of the head would indicate no change — at least, no change for the better. Some times the question would be asked : " How is he now, doctor?" and the reply would be: "No change," or, "About the same." This meant that his pulse was running still at 120 or thereabouts. Vice-President Arthur came a little before ten. The first person to meet him as he entered the room where the Cabinet was, was the Secretary of State. The Vice-President took the proffered hand in both of his, and said : "How is the President?" ASSASSINATION OF PEESIDENT GARFIELD. 551 " No better, I fear," replied the Secretary, " and I am very glad you have come." The Vice-President conversed for a few moments. He then requested to see Mrs. Garfield, and when he took her hand the Vice-President was weeping. He clasped both her hands in his, and, almost overcome with emotion, expressed in beautiful sentiments his sympathy for her. There were no dry eyes in the room at this meeting. "It was," said the Postmaster-General, "one of the most touching and affecting sights." The intervieAV was brief, Mrs. Garfield inquiring after the health of the Vice-President, and expressing her own firm con viction that in the providence of God her husband would be spared. After that General Arthur con versed with the Cabinet for a while, and then withdrew. Only the briefest conversation passed respecting any official act. Secretary Blaine said that it was the opinion of the Cabinet that in case of the death of the President, at whatever hour, General Arthur ought to take the oath. General Arthur replied : " I shall be ready to fulfil the obligations imposed upon me by the Constitution if they should unhap pily arise, and await the advice and notification of the Cabinet." The hours of evening waned, and there was no im provement in the condition of the President; every symptom was watched, every movement observed. Constant records of the pulse were taken. At one o'clock the physicians discovered symptoms of tympa nitis, or bloating of the abdomen — a symptom dreaded 552 JAMES A. GARFIEL-D. I but expected — a symptom which is the advanced sign of coming peritonitis, and peritonitis precedes either mortification or erysipelas, which are advance agents of death. The only hope was that the symptoms might disappear. Slight as this hope was it was made the most of by Secretary Hunt, who expressed the opinion that if the President kept alive until ten o'clock to-day he would recover. But Colonel Inger soll, with tears,, streaming down his cheeks, took the hand of Secretary Blaine, saying : " My dear Blaine, his death is only a matter of time." " God help the country ! " quick as a flash said the Secretary, in his familiar, nervous and impressive man ner, looking at Ingersoll. "Oh, no; you must not think it is so bad as that." The Secretary of State then went away, being al most driven from the house by the physicians, who warned him that he must take needed rest. Mrs. Blaine remained at the bedside of the President much of the time. She sat with her hand in his, and the President would catch short naps. The President at times seemed desirous of talking, but lie was not permitted to do so. Mrs. Blaine her self cautioned him against speaking. She told him that rest was necessary, and Dr. Bliss reminded him that he must not waste his strength even by convers ing. At two o'clock the physicians said that whatever happened the President would not die before morning. Then the wearied members of the Cabinet went to their homes to sleep the sleep of exhaustion. They left word ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 553 to be called, however, in case of the immediate prospect of death. The White House was now deserted, except by those who were to remain through the night. Dr. Agnew arrived from Philadelphia in an early train, and reached the Executive Mansion about five this morning. He spent the time from that hour until the arrival of Dr. Hamilton, of New York, who reached here at seven, in familiarizing himself with the prog ress of the case as shown by the official bulletins. Upon the arrival of Dr. Hamilton, at abou£ seven o'clock, an examination and consultation by all the attending phys icians was at once commenced. It was immediately after this consultation that the first bulletin of the morning was issued. It was as follows : Washington, July 4 — 8.15 A. m. The condition of the President is not materially dif ferent from that reported in the last bulletin (12.10 A. M.) He has dozed at intervals during the night, and at times has continued to complain of the pain in his feet. The tympanitis reported has not sensibly increased. Pulse, 108 ; temperature, 99.4 ; respiration, 19. D. W. Bliss, J. K. Barnes, J. J. Woodward, Robert Reyburn, F. H. Hamilton, N. Y. D. H. Agnew, Phila. We held a consultation with the physicians in charge of the President's case at seven A. m., and approve in every particular of the management and of the course of treatment which has been pursued. Frank H. Hamilton, of New York, D. Hates Agnew, of Philadelphia. 554 JAMES A. GARFIELD. Official bulletins were issued several times each day during the President's prostration. The 5th of July, though it showed some improve ment in the President, was still a day of deep anxiety throughout the country. Throughout the White House during the day there was a solemn and oppressive quiet. The reports of the physicians, while they excited no new alarm, yet were not such as to remove the dread ful overshadowing anxiety and uncertainty. It was a day of watching a,pd waiting. The busiest persons were the telegraph messengers, who have been kept running night and day delivering and receiving messages. The number of private telegrams received and forwarded to-day is almost beyond precedent in Washington. The anxiety throughout the country appears to be increas ing. Persons who have arrived here from various cit ies and sections express their surprise that everything is so comparatively quiet in Washington. Others are further surprised that there is so little disposition here to hold the Stalwarts indirectly responsible for Gui- teau's terrible crime. They can scarcely believe that nearly all the officers and clerks are at their desks to day, and that the government business, with the excep tion of that requiring the attention of Cabinet officers, is going on as usual. Several members of the Cabinet went to their offices this morning to attend to important matters which could not be delayed, but they did not remain long. Overcome by anxiety and fatigue, they found themselves in great need of rest. Secretary Win dom was compelled to go home and seek rest. When the departments closed at four o'clock the streets be- ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 555 came full of people, who gathered about the latest bul letins and eagerly read the announcement that the con dition of the President throughout the day had not been unfavorable. The last official bulletin of last night had been unfavorable. The news of a change in the Pres ident's condition had not been issued officially, so that the people here did not know of it. When, therefore, they read this morning's announcement it was a glad surprise. Very few were at the gates to-day, for it was not a holiday, but when the sun went down — the hot test sun that Washington has seen this summer — the old crowd gathered together again and strained their anxious eyes toward the White House. Inside the house it has been a quiet day. The Cab inet officers, certain that there was no immediate dan ger, went to their offices and houses. The ladies re mained and rendered what services were required. The President resumed his cheerfulness and his pleasant talk, until he was told by General Swain that he must cease talking, or he- would shut the door to every que, when the President sighed, and said he supposed he must obey. "I am very anxious to live, indeed," said the President, "and if necessary, I would let them cut my limb off inch by inch. Still, if I have to die, I'm ready to go." Every once in a while Private Secretary Brown enters the room, and the President is always glad to have him at his bedside. Besides Mr. Brown and the nurses, Mrs. Garfield is the only person allowed in the sick room, except occasionally any of the Cabinet ladies. The President always welcomes his wife with a smile, and she speaks to him encouragingly. Said a Cabinet 556 JAMES A. GARFIELD. officer : " She is like a rod of iron, and she is as all good wives would be on such an occasion." So far, seven o'clock, it has been the brightest day Washington has had since the shooting. There is more and more doubt of the conspiracy theory. None of the Cabinet officers approve it, and the President himself does not believe in it. When Mrs. Garfield read to him a suggestion in a newspaper to the effect that there was a conspiracy, he said : " No, no ; there has been no conspiracy. This is the deed of an individual." The events of the 6th of July are thus summed up by the correspondent of the New York Times : " The weary vigil at the Executive Mansion was con tinued last^ night; but those engaged in watching the brave patient were inspired by hope, and this made their mournful task lighter than it has been heretofore. Drs. Bliss and Woodward took turns in watching at the bedside of the wounded President, and Mrs. Blaine remained with him until about midnight, ministering to his wants as only a tender and sympathetic woman can. As no unfavorable change had appeared at twelve o'clock, Mrs. Blaine left the White House to seek the rest which she so much needed. She left full of hope, and confident that the President's life would be saved. Mrs. Dr. Edson, of this city, a most estimable lady and competent nurse, relieved Mrs. Blaine, and re mained in the sick-room until this morning. The night was very warm, the thermometer at one o'clock this morning registering 84°. A very slight breeze was blowing, but it came from the north, and did not ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 557 penetrate to the President's room. He was constantly fanned by those in attendance on him, however, and if he suffered any inconvenience from the heat, he made no complaints, and certainly no evil effects fol lowed. At 10.30, as the President had displayed signs of restlessness, one-quarter of a grain of morphine was administered hypodermically, and after that he slept very well for a man in his condition, and rested com fortably throughout the night. His naps lasted from ten to twenty minutes, broken by waking seasons of about the same duration until daylight. During his waking hours he was cheerful and inclined to talk, but his attendants insisted on his obeying the order of the physicians, and talking was not encouraged. Upon waking from one of his naps, he turned to Mr. Crump, a steward of the White House, who has been a constant attendant upon him since his illness, and said, smiling : ' It's too bad we couldn't hold a Cabinet meeting to day.' Yesterday was the regular day for the meeting of the Cabinet, and the fact that it had been missed seemed to weigh upon the mind of the President. The thought was a momentary one, however, and he soon turned over and dozed off again. " Mrs. Garfield passed the night in bed. She is anxious to be with her husband all the time, but her own health is very precarious, and the doctors insist that she shall take her regular rest at night. She is the only one of the President's family who has been allowed to enter the sick-room since Sunday. The doctors refuse to allow anybody to see the_ President except those who are required to attend upon him. 558 JAMES A. GARFIELD. To this rule, Mrs. Garfield is the only exception. She arose soon after sunrise to-day, and has been in and out of the President's room all day. She remains only a few minutes at each visit, and does not talk to her husband, except to ask the stereotyped question : ' How do you feel now, dear?' to which the President. responds. Perfect quiet is the great medicine for Gen eral Garfield, and both he and Mrs. Garfield recognize the authority of the surgeons, and obey their orders. The President is a good patient, and very little trouble is given by him. He seems to recognize that many of the chances of his recovery depend upon his own obedience to orders, and although he is strongly in clined to talk at all times, when he is awake, and especially when Mrs. Garfield is with him, he stops himself like an obedient schoolboy the moment the warning finger of Dr. Bliss is raised. He is bearing himself with great fortitude, and Mrs. Garfield has exhibited a coolness and courage in this crisis for which her oldest and most intimate friends had scarcely given her credit. " During the niglit the President partook of small quantities of chicken soup at intervals, and it remained in his stomach without difficulty. His pulse and his temperature continued gradually to lower, and every symptom was of a nature to gratify the surgeons and add to the hope which they had felt since the first favorable change took place on Monday night. At about eight o'clock this morning people began to gather in front of the gate to the grounds of the Executive Mansion in anticipation of the bulletin which was ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD. 559 promised for 8.30. The crowd, however, was not nearly so large as it has been for the last four days, and the faces of the men showed that they were full of hope. The bulletin, when it came, was calculated to add to the hopes of the people. The President, it said, had passed a most comfortable night, and slept well ; his pulse had been reduced from 108 at nine o'clock last night to 98, a fall during the night of 10. This was encouraging, but the temperature of the President was still more so. It registered 98r5° — within three-tenths of a degree of being normal. His respiration was recorded at 23. Upon the receipt of this inspir ing intelligence the crowd dispersed with beaming faces. The news was spread throughout the city, and men worked better at their various vocations for the knowledge of the President's steady improvement. The Cabinet officers began to arrive at the White House, and all were overjoyed at the glad tidings. Postmaster-General James was one of the first to arrive. He grasped the hand of Private Secretary Brown, and with the one exclamation, 'Thank God!' passed into the Cabinet room. Secretaries Blaine, Hunt, Lincoln, Windom, Kirkwood, and Attorney-General McVeagh, with the ladies of the Cabinet, were early at the Executive Mansion, and all went away to their several departments with faces wreathed in hopeful smiles. Among the other visitors were President Hinsdale, of Hiram College, General Sherman, Adjutant-General Drum, Judge Field, Judge Harlan, and G. W. Phillips, an old friend of the President. None were allowed to get nearer to the sick-chamber than the Cabinet-room, 560 JAMES A. GARFIELD. but all received such solid foundations for hope, that they left the White House with feelings of gratitude and joy. " During the day the President has rested uncom monly well, and his symptoms have continued to b