Publisher's Synopsis
Excerpt from The Balance Sheet of the Two Parties: A Speech Delivered by John Hay, Cleveland, Ohio, July 31, 1880
In connection with these eloquent figures let us read a paragraph from the Democratic platform of this year. The right to a free ballot is a right pre servative of all rights, and must and shall be n'iaintained in every part of the United States. Is this a tardy repentance? There is no other symptom of it. Ls it a piece of pure clfrontcry, the very wanton ness of impudence, or is it a coarse joke, uttered with l wink and a grin, in the face of the World? Certainly no such false pretense has ever been put forth by an American party. Its falsehood is written in letters of blood in every election return which has come in recent years from the States where. The Democrats have seized control of affairs.
Yet they have the assurance to call us the sec tional party. There is an old maxim of law that no man shall take advantage of his own wrong. But here we see these people committing upon the Repub licans the most savage wrong conceivable and then blaming them for the result of it. It is as iftyou should put out a man's eyes and then curse him forhis blindness. We are the sectional party! Judge Barnes, of Georgia, a. Member of the Democratic National Comn'tittee. Boasted the other day in New York, that Georgia was so solid that they would have to hire a few llenmcrats to vote for Garfield, so as to have something to count their majority from. With a brazen and unblushing cheek he made that boast, never reflecting that where there is no dif ference of opinion there is no freedom, where there is no political movement there is stagnation and death. What Would happen to a Northern h'epnbli can who talked like that in (ieorgia? The other day t Texas Republican madea little speech at a gathering of his friends. The next day prominent citizens waited upon him. And told him if he repeated the oll'ense, he Would forget to wake up some morning. Yet. Northern llcmocrats at tack us because We have no party in the South.
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