Part 8

On the third of August, with the mercury registering ninety-nine degrees, thirty-five hundred visitors arrived from Montgomery and Clinton counties, Indiana. Their parade, carrying miniature log-cabins and other emblems, was one of the most enthusiastic demonstrations of the campaign. Fifty voters of 1840 headed the column led by Major D. K. Price, aged 92. The Montgomery County delegation was marshalled by John H. Burford, W. W. Thornton, T. H. B. McCain, John S. Brown, E. P. McClarkey, John Johnson, J. R. Bonnell, D. W. Roundtree, T. H. Ristine, H. M. Billingsley, Dumont Kennedy, and Clerk Hulett of Crawfordsville. Their spokesman was Hon. Peter S. Kennedy.

Among the Clinton County leaders were Albert H. Coble, Edward R. Burns, A. T. Dennis, Wm. H. Staley, R. P. Shanklin, S. A. Coulton, J. W. Harrison, J. T. Hockman, Nicholas Rice, Ambrose Colby, Oliver Hedgecock, and Dr. Gard of Frankfort. Judge J. C. Suit was their orator.

In reply to their addresses General Harrison said:

_My Fellow-citizens_--These daily and increasing delegations coming to witness their interest in the great issues which are presented for their consideration and determination, and bearing as they do to me their kind personal greetings, quite overmatch my ability to fittingly greet and respond to them.

You are here from every walk in life. Some of you have achieved success in the mechanical arts, some in professional pursuits, and more of you come from that first great pursuit of man--the tilling of the soil--and you come to express the thought that you have common interests; that these diverse pursuits are bound together harmoniously in a common governmental policy and administration. Your interests have had a harmonious and an amazing growth under that protective system to which your representatives have referred, and you wisely demand a continuation of that policy for their further advancement and development. [Applause.] You are in large part members of the Republican party. You have in the past contributed your personal influence, as well as your ballots, to the great victories which it has won. Among the great achievements of our party I think we may worthily mention the passage of that beneficent act of legislation known as the "homestead law." It was impossible to the old parties. It was possible only to a party composed of the sturdy yeomanry of the free States. [Applause.] It has populated our Territories and newer States with the elect of our citizenship. It opened a way to an ownership of the soil to a vast number of our citizens, and there is no surer bond in the direction of good citizenship than that our people should have property in the soil upon which they live. It is one of the best elements of our strength as a State that our farm-lands are so largely possessed in small tracts, and are tilled by the men who own them. It is one of the best evidences of the prosperity of our cities that so large a proportion of the men who work are covered by their own roof trees. If we would perpetuate this condition, we must maintain the American scale of wages. [Applause.] The policy of the subdivision of the soil is one that tends to strengthen our national life. God grant that it may be long before we have in this country a tenantry that is hopelessly such from one generation to another. [Applause.] That condition of things which makes Ireland a land of tenants, and which holds in vast estates the lands of England, must never find footing here. [Applause.] Small farms invite the church and the school-house into the neighborhood. Therefore, it was in the beginning the Republican party declared for free homes of a quarter-section each. That policy should be perpetuated as long as our public domain lasts, and all our legislation should tend in the direction which I have indicated. I cannot discuss all the important questions to which you have called my attention. I have before alluded to some of them. My Montgomery and Clinton county friends, I thank you for the cordial and hopeful words you have addressed to me. My highest ambition is to be found worthy of your respect and confidence. [Applause.]

To these veterans of 1840 who kindly transfer to this the interest they felt in that campaign, to these first voters who come to join us with the high impulses of youth, I desire to extend my sincere thanks. [Applause.]

INDIANAPOLIS, AUGUST 4.

The most remarkable night demonstration of the campaign occurred August 4, the occasion being the visit of the Harrison and Morton Railroad Club of Terre Haute, a thousand strong. They were met by twelve hundred members of the Indianapolis Railroad Club, and, escorted by several thousand citizens, marched to the Harrison residence.

At the head of the column rolled the model of a monster locomotive, emitting fire and smoke and bearing the significant number 544, Hundreds of stores and residences along the line of march were illuminated.

At the head of the visiting club marched its officers: President, D. T. Downs; Secretary, Chas. E. Carter; Treasurer, Benj. McKeen; and Vice-Presidents, R. B. Woolsey, J. L. Pringle, J. N. Evanhart, E. G. South, L. M. Murphy, H. M. Kearns, George Leckert, and W. H. Miller.

President Downs delivered an address and presented an engrossed copy of the club roster. General Harrison spoke from a stand in front of his residence, and said:

_Mr. Downs, Gentlemen of the Terre Haute Railroad Club, and Fellow-citizens_--I am amazed and gratified at the character of this demonstration to-night. I do not find words to express the emotions which swell in my heart as I look into your faces and listen to the kindly greetings which you have given me through your representative. He has not spoken in too high praise of the railroad men of the United States. The character of the duties they are called to discharge require great intelligence, in many departments the best skill in the highest mechanic arts, and in all, even in the lowest grade of labor in connection with railroad management, there is required, for the safety of the public who entrust themselves to your care, fidelity and watchfulness, not only in the day, but in the darkness. The man who attends the switch, the trackman who observes the condition of the track--all these have put into their charge and keeping the lives of men and women and the safety of our commerce. Therefore it is that the exigencies of the service in which you are engaged have operated to select and call into the service of our great railroad corporations a picked body of men. I gratefully acknowledge to-night the service you render to the country of which I am a citizen. The great importance of the enterprises with which you are connected have already suggested to our legislators that they owe duties to you as well as to the travelling and mercantile public. The Congress of the United States has, under that provision of the Constitution which commits to its care all foreign and interstate commerce, undertaken to regulate the great interstate railroads in the interest of equal and fair competition and in the equal interest of all members of our communities. I do not doubt that certain and necessary provisions for the safety of the men who operate these roads will yet be made compulsory by public and general law. [Applause.] The dangers connected with your calling are very great, and the public interest, as well as your own, requires that they should be reduced to the minimum. I do not doubt that we shall yet require that uniformity in the construction of railroad cars that will diminish the danger of those who must pass between them in order to make up trains. [Applause.] I do not doubt, either, that as these corporations are not private corporations, but are recognized by the law to which I have referred and by the uniform decisions of our courts as having public relations, we shall yet see legislation in the direction of providing some suitable tribunal of arbitration for the settlement of differences between railroad men and the companies that engage their services. [Great applause.] I believe that in these directions, and others that I have not time to suggest, reforms will work themselves out, with exact justice to the companies and with justice to the men they employ. Because, my friends, I do not doubt--and I hope you will never allow yourselves to doubt--that the great mass of our people, of all vocations and callings, love justice and right and hate oppression. [Applause.] The laboring men of this land may safely trust every just reform in which they are interested to public discussion and to the logic of reason; they may surely hope, upon these lines, which are open to you by the ballot-box, to accomplish under our American institutions all those right things you have conceived as necessary to your highest success and well-being. Do not allow yourselves to doubt, for one moment, the friendly sentiment of the great masses of our people. Make your appeal wisely, and calmly, and boldly, for every reform you desire, to that sentiment of justice which pervades our American public. [Applause.]

You come to-night from one of our most beautiful Indiana cities. It was built on the Wabash in the expectation that that stream would furnish the channel of its communication with the outside world. But the Wabash is a small tributary to-day to the commerce of Terre Haute. The railroads that span it are the great vehicles of your commerce. They have largely superseded the water communication that was deemed so important in the first settlement, and, perhaps, was so decisive in the location of your city. Terre Haute is conspicuous for its industries. The smoke of your factories goes up night and day. The farms about your city have become gardens, and the cordial and harmonious relations between the railroad shop and the factory and the farms that lie about have a conspicuous illustration with you. You have found that that policy which built up these shops, which maintains them, which secures the largest output yearly from the factories, which gives employment to the largest number of men, is the best thing not only for the railroads that do the transportation, but for the workingmen, who find steady employment at good wages, and for the farmers, who supply their needs. [Applause.] You will not willingly be led to believe that any policy that would check the progress and the prosperity of these enterprises is good for you or for the community in which you live. [Applause and cries of "No, never!"] It will be hard to convince such an intelligent body of workingmen that a policy which would transfer from this country to any other the work that might be done here is good for them. [Applause.] It can easily be demonstrated that if our revenue laws were so adjusted that the imports from Great Britain should be doubled it would be good for the workingmen of England, but I think it would be hard to demonstrate that it would be good for the workingmen of America. [Applause.] There is a wise selfishness; it begins at home, and he who has the care of his own family first, of the community in which he lives, of the nation of which he is a citizen, is wise in his generation.

Now, my friends, I have been daily talking. I used to be thought by my friends to be a reticent man. [Laughter.] I fear I am making an impression that I am garrulous. [Cries of "No! No!"] And yet, when friends such as you take the trouble you have to-night to visit me, I feel that I owe it to you to say something.

Now, thanking you for this roster, which will furnish authentic evidence, if it is challenged, that this visit to-night has been from genuine railroad men [applause], I venture to invite my Terre Haute friends to enter my house. I will ask the citizens of Indianapolis, the escort club of my own home, railroad friends who have done so much to make your coming here to-night pleasant, to kindly refrain themselves, and allow me to greet the visitors. In order that that may be accomplished, I will ask some of my Terre Haute friends to place themselves by the door, that I may meet those who are of their company. The others I have seen, or will see some other day.

INDIANAPOLIS, AUGUST 6.

Monday, August 6, General Harrison received a visit from one hundred members of the Kansas City Blaine Club, accompanied by many ladies, _en route_ to New York to welcome the Maine statesman on his return from Europe. Col. R. H. Hunt led the club, and delivered a stirring address on behalf of the Republicans of Missouri. On concluding he introduced Miss Abbie Burgess, who presented the General a beautiful badge inscribed "The Kansas City Blaine Club Greet Their Next President." Miss Burgess made the presentation in the name of the working-women of America.

General Harrison responded briefly to these addresses, stating that he found he had been talking a great deal of late; "but," he added, "I never begin it; some one else always starts it." He returned his cordial thanks to the visitors for the compliment of their call.

Speaking of the trip which the visitors were making, he commended its purpose in meeting upon his return to America "that matchless defender of Republican principles--James G. Blaine." He felt sure that no circumstance would be omitted in doing him merited honor. He was glad to know that the Republicans of Missouri are so zealous and aggressive. He believed that they had, perhaps, too much acquiesced in the majorities against them, and had not offered such resistance as would prove their own strength. In the coming canvass he thought the economic questions at issue ought to work to the interest of Republicans in Missouri and overcome in part the prevailing Democratic prejudices there. He also expressed the hope that the race question would cease to divide men by prejudices that should long ago have become extinct.

In reply to Miss Burgess' address the General expressed his grateful appreciation of the souvenir, and said that the women of the land could never be forgotten. To those of them who are toilers for their daily bread the first thought goes out in considering the question that involves depreciation of wages, and concluded by declaring if cheaper coats and cheaper garments were to be had by still further reducing the wages of the sewing-women of America, then he was not in favor of cheaper apparel.

INDIANAPOLIS, AUGUST 7.

Indianapolis contained several thousand visitors at this period, in attendance on the State convention; in addition to these, however, on the seventh of August two large delegations arrived. The first came from Tippecanoe County. The city of Lafayette was represented by the Lincoln Club, H. C. Tinney, President; the Garfield Club, Henry Vinton, President; and the Young Men's Republican Club Association. Among other prominent members of the delegation were James M. Reynolds, N. I. Throckmorton, W. H. Caulkins, Charles E. Wilson, Wm. Fraser, John B. Sherwood, Charles Terry, John Opp, Alexander Stidham, Matt Heffner, S. Vater, Maurice Mayerstein, Geo. A. Harrison, W. D. Hilt, P. W. Sheehan, C. H. Henderson, Henry Marshall, J. W. Jefferson, Wm. E. Beach, John B. Gault, and H. M. Carter. Hon. B. Wilson Smith delivered an address on behalf of his townsmen.

General Harrison, in his response, touched upon the origin and principles of the Republican party. He said:

_Mr. Smith and my Tippecanoe County Friends_--I am very grateful for the evidence which you give me this morning by your presence, and by the kind words which your representative has addressed to me, of your respect and good-will. You are members, in great part, of a party that was not machine-made. It had its birth in an impulse that stirred simultaneously the hearts of those who loved liberty. The first convention of our party did not organize it. Those men were great, but they were delegates--representatives of principles which had already asserted their power over the consciences and the hearts of the people. [Applause.] The Republican party did not organize for spoils; it assembled about an altar of sacrifice and in a sanctuary beset with enemies. You have not forgotten our early battle-cry--"Free speech, a free press, free schools and free Territories." We have widened the last word; it is now "a free Nation." The appeals which we have made and shall yet make are addressed to the hearts, the consciences, and to the mind of our people. Therefore, we believe in schools and colleges, and seminaries of learning. Education is the great conservative and assimilating force. A doubter is not necessarily an evil person. The capacity to doubt implies reason--the power of solving doubts; and if the doubt is accompanied with a purpose to find the truth and a supreme affection for the truth when it is found, he will not go widely astray. Therefore, in our political campaigns let men think for themselves, and the truth will assert its sway over the minds of our people. Then everything that affects the record and character of the candidate and the principles of the parties will be brought to a safe tribunal whose judgment will be right. [Great applause and cries of "Good!"]

I am not unaware of the fact that some of you had another convention preference, but I have always believed that convention preferences should be free in the Republican party [applause], and that no prejudice should follow any Republican on account of that preference. As party men, we will judge a man by his post-convention conduct.

The second delegation comprised fifteen hundred citizens from Vanderburg County. The Tippecanoe Club of Evansville, with sixty veterans, led the column.

Leaders in the delegation were ex-Congressman Heilman, Henry S. Bennett, Chas. H. McCarer, J. E. Iglehart, W. A. Wheeler, C. R. Howe, J. W. Compton, S. B. Sansom, S. A. Bate, John H. Osborn, John W. Davidson, Henry Ludwig, Wm. Koelling, A. S. Glover, J. W. Roelker, R. C. Wilkinson, James D. Parvin, Wm. Warren, Chas. L. Roberts, and Geo. N. Wells.

Dr. W. G. Ralston delivered an address in the name of the delegation.

General Harrison, in reply, said:

_My Good Friends from the Pocket_--I feel very much complimented by your visit to-day. Your coming here from so great a distance involved much inconvenience which those who live nearer have not experienced. You are geographically remote, but it does not follow from that that you are remote from the sources of political influence and political power.

The General then spoke of the extension of the Republican party from the lakes to the Ohio in Indiana and all over the North, saying that geographical lines marked its limits only in the South. He said that the people of Vanderburg County, living as they did on the Ohio River, a river that some men sought to make the division line between two governments, knew what it was to guard their homes and what it was to send out veterans from the sturdy yeomanry to the defence of their country. He referred in the highest terms to General Shackelford and his service in the hour of his country's need. "I greet you to-day," he continued, "as Republicans--men whose judgment and conscience compel their political opinions. It does not fall to my lot now to argue or discuss at length any of the great political questions of the day. I have done that in the past. It is reserved for others in this campaign. I recall with pleasure my frequent visits to you and your cordial reception when I came to speak to you. In this contest others will maintain before you that great policy which, we believe, dignifies every American, both at home and abroad."

Speaking in reference to wages, General Harrison said that he thought we often forget the women who were compelled to work for their daily bread. He sometimes thought those persons who demand cheaper coats would be ashamed of themselves if they could realize that their demand cut the wages of the women who made these coats. In concluding, he greeted and thanked the Tippecanoe Club for coming, and the Young Men's Republican Club also, saying that he had heard of their efficient work in the highest terms of praise.

INDIANAPOLIS, AUGUST 8.

_The Republican State Convention._

The Republican State Convention convened at Tomlinson Hall, city of Indianapolis, August 8, 1888, and concluded its work in one day.

It was the largest attended and most enthusiastic convention ever held in Indiana. Hon. Wm. H. Calkins of Indianapolis was chosen Chairman, and Mark L. De Motte of Valparaiso Secretary. The following ticket was nominated, and in November triumphantly elected:

_Governor_--Alvin P. Hovey, Posey County.

_Lieutenant-Governor_--Ira J. Chase, Hendricks County.

_Secretary of State_--Charles F. Griffin, Lake County.

_Auditor of State_--Bruce Carr, Orange County.

_Treasurer_--J. A. Lemcke, Vanderburg County.

_Attorney-General_--L. T. Michner, Shelby County.

_Superintendent Public Instruction_--H. M. LaFollette, Boone County.

_Reporter Supreme Court_--John L. Griffiths, Marion County.

JUDGES OF SUPREME COURT.

_First District_--Silas T. Coffey, Clay County.

_Second District_--J. G. Berkshire, Jennings County.

_Fourth District_--Walter Olds, Whitely County.

_Electors-at-Large_--James M. Shackelford, Vanderburg County; Thomas H. Nelson, Vigo County.

Judge Gardner, a delegate from Daviess County, introduced a resolution, which was unanimously adopted midst great enthusiasm, inviting General Harrison to visit the convention, and designating Hon. Richard W. Thompson, John W. Linck and E. P. Hammond a committee to convey the invitation.

On the platform, with the presiding officer, to meet the distinguished guest were the Hon. James N. Huston, Hon. John M. Butler, Hon. Will Cumback, William Wallace, Hon. W. P. Fishback, Hon. A. C. Harris, Rev. Dr. Backus, Judge E. B. Martindale, General Thomas Bennett, Judge J. H. Jordan, and the Republican State officials.

The entrance of General Harrison, escorted by the committee, was followed by a tumultuous scene rarely witnessed outside of a national convention, the demonstration lasting nearly ten minutes. Chairman Calkins finally succeeded in introducing--"the next President"--and General Harrison spoke as follows: