USA > Georgia > The history of the State of Georgia from 1850 to 1881, embracing the three important epochs: the decade before the war of 1861-5; the war; the period of Reconstruction, v. 2 > Part 22
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Judge Warner had been all his life grazing at the Governorship. This was his last chance, necessarily, in the course of advancing years.
558
GORDON'S RESIGNATION AND BROWN'S APPOINTMENT.
He soon became convinced that Gov. Colquitt was the strongest man in the field, and with that grim frankness that belonged to him, he so told one of the other candidates. He left his canvass to take care of . itself. The trouble with Col. Hardeman was that his friends were Gov. Colquitt's friends, mainly. No man in the State had been a more zealous and disinterested party-worker. His strong abilities and ready eloquence could be counted on at any time in any party stress. Il. had a cheery, stimulating way with the people, and was a valuable and willing worker in any cause of a public character. He was always a generous antagonist, just, courteous, fair and honorable, scorning any underhanded advantage, and dealing none but legitimate blows. Such men as this candid and lofty gentleman make politics honorable, and elevate public agitations. The truth is that " Tom Hardeman," as he is familiarly called, is the type of truth, directness and fidelity, and has been a true representative of our best Georgia manhood. And he never made a poor or uninteresting speech in his life. Gov. Colquitt, Gen. Gartrell and Col. Hardeman all made campaign addresses.
In May, 1880, occurred an event that enlivened the campaign, some- thing like the effect that the explosion of a powder magazine would have in a fortification. There has never been an incident in our politi- cal history that created a more sudden and uncontrollable fury of the political elements. It shook the State from center to circumference. Things were comparatively quiet. The swift storm that ensued was blinding and ferocious. It was for a while like a raging cyclone-it blew men's wits off their feet, so to speak. Gov. Colquitt thought he had been pretty heavily abused before this. He received a gust of thundering public vituperation that nearly took his breath away. The event that had such an overwhelming effect was, that Gen. John B. Gor- don resigned his place as United States Senator from Georgia, to which he had been so recently elected, and Gov. Colquitt appointed in the vacancy ex-Gov. Joseph E. Brown.
The relations between Gov. Colquitt and ex-Gov. Brown had been very friendly. Between Gen. Gordon and Gov. Brown there existed, perhaps, a less cordial intercourse than among ordinary acquaintances, due to an assault of the latter on Gen. Gordon about his course as a Senator in the Presidential matter. There was, therefore, a cordial good feeling between Colquitt and Brown, and an absence of the same between Brown and Gordon, and yet a charge of "bargain " was instantly formulated by the opposition, based upon the very opposite of these relations, involving acts of kindness and benefit done by
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BARGAIN CHARGED AGAINST COLQUITT, GORDON AND BROWN. 559
Brown for Gordon to win Brown's support for Colquitt. The State rang with the calumny of an understanding between the three, which made Gordon give up his seat that Brown might be appointed in his place, Gordon to get railroad favors from Brown, including the Presi- dency of the State road, and Brown to help Colquitt politically. The circumstantiality with which this incredible fiction was urged was something wonderful. With a fierce passion but a severe logic, appar- ently, sensible men and honest journals argued this monstrous aspersion upon three of the purest, ablest, best tried and most trusted public men of the State. Intelligent and conscientious men believed it, though there never was a piece of popular injustice that had less basis of fact. Against life-time honor and integrity, against thrice tested character, against illustrious public service, against reason and proba- bility, the swift, hot, unreasoning charge of the darkest personal dis- honor and official criminality was blazoned against these gentlemen.
The incident illustrates how rancorous can be political hostility. The lives of these men was a standing disproof of such reproach. Gen. Gordon had made an illustrious fame as a soldier and Confederate Gen- eral. For seven years he had illustrated Georgia most magnificently as a United States Senator. His career in the national councils had been conspicuously able and influential. His first speech in the United States Senate was upon the great financial question of the day. It made a profound impression upon the whole country. Senator Morton pronounced it the ablest effort made on the subject. The Agricultural Convention which assembled in Georgia soon after its delivery unani- mously adopted a vote of thanks to Senator Gordon for it. The New York Times, a Republican paper, while criticising the speaker and differing with him, used this language: "Gen. Gordon is the ablest man from the South in either House of Congress." This was very high praise from an opposition paper.
Senator Gordon's next effort, which attracted most attention, was the defense of the South in the debate with Morton and Edmunds. The approval of our people was universal, while even the Northern press passed upon it the highest encomiums. It was the first time anything like an elaborate vindication of the South had been made by a Southern man. Every effort was made by Morton, Edmunds, Conkling and others, to provoke Gen. Gordon into imprudent utterances; but the friends of the eloquent Senator and of the South all over the country thought that the whole of our case was managed with tact, skill and ability by him in that memorable debate.
560
GENERAL GORDON'S SENATORIAL CAREER.
Perhaps the next most striking fact in Gen. Gordon's senatorin! career was his bill and speech intended to secure reform in the civil service of the country, and especially in the Revenue Department, the central idea of which was the separation of the revenue from party politics. Some conception of the impression made upon the whole country may be obtained from the commentary of the press. The Republican and Independent papers of the North were forced to com- mend the views of our distinguished young statesman. The Spring- field Republican declared of this measure of Gordon that it was " the first notable demonstration in the direction of civil service reform from high Democratic authority," and warmly endorsed it. The Chicago Times said editorially, " There never has been brought to the attention of Congress a proposition of civil service reform so practical and thorough as that which Mr. Gordon had indicated. It is, in truth, the only suggestion of a practical remedy for the all-pervading official corruption that has ever been brought to the attention of Congress." The Boston Advertiser, New York Herald, New York Tribune, New . York Post and Chicago Tribune, all of which were among the leading papers of the United States, strongly endorsed and commended the effort. The New York World pronounced the speech "impassioned, able, eloquent, logical and impartial." There is little doubt that Sena- tor Gordon would have succeeded in engrafting some such policy upon the administration of our revenue, had he have remained in public life, for the country was with him upon it.
These are some of the great occasions, when Gen. Gordon arose to the full stature of a Senator, handling vast themes of public policy, originally, eloquently, and with unquestionable statesmanship. He was able to impress himself upon the critical thought of a great nation. Not only in these large matters, but in every possible phase of private and public service, he bore himself with the duty and dignity befitting his high trust. He wielded a powerful influence among his colleagues and in the Departments, and he won from the masses of the broad country the fame due to an acknowledged public leader, whose exalted individuality gave an added renown to the great commonwealth he so well represented.
And this was the official who, at the beginning of a second term of six years of his most dazzling distinction, laid it down to attend to his private affairs, sadly neglected. And this was the official whose almost unprecedented renunciation of an august responsibility was charged to be the subject of a corrupt personal bargain. In the light of subse-
561
THE FACTS OF SENATOR GORDON'S RESIGNATION.
quent developments, the monstrosity of such a charge is so overwhelm- ingly demonstrated as to excite amazement that it ever had an exist- ence. Public meetings in Columbus and Pike county denounced Gov. Colquitt, Gen. Gordon and ex-Gov. Brown. The cry of "Trade !" rang over the State. The severity of denunciation of these distin- guished and honored Georgians was something phenomenal. " Base and treacherous conduct," " a stench in the nostrils of honest men," "Senatorial deformity," " slimy pits of dishonor and degradation," "eternal infamy," and a thousand similar phrases, were showered upon them. The issue was made clear, sharp and savage, and it was met with a gameful readiness that betokened what resulted, that the people had to settle the stirring question.
The facts were very few and simple. Senator Gordon had long wanted to get out of public life, to build up his private fortunes. He was offered a valuable chance in Oregon. He tendered his resignation. Gov. Colquitt tried to get him to withhold until the session of Congress ended, which would be in a few weeks. He had to utilize his busi- ness opportunity, and declined to postpone his resignation. Gov. Colquitt, upon his own inspiration, sent for Gov. Brown and tendered him the place unconditionally. And this was all of the bargain-no collusion, no conditions-no trading. The presidency of the State Road was not resigned by Gov. Brown and given to Gen. Gordon. Gov. Brown knew nothing of Gen. Gordon's resignation until the appointment was tendered him. Gen. Gordon knew nothing of Gov. Brown's appointment until it was made. Gov. Brown was already a supporter of Gov. Colquitt for Governor, and therefore there was no inducement to win his championship. Mr. Newcomb, the president of the Louisville and Nashville railroad, after Gordon's determination to accept the Oregon offer and to resign, offered Gordon a business propo- sition that allowed him to stay in Georgia; which he accepted, getting released from his other contract. With this Gov. Brown had nothing to do. And since then, Gen. Gordon has succeeded in organizing and starting the construction of a great line of railway from Atlanta to the Mississippi, through the coal fields of Alabama, utilizing the defunct Georgia Western railroad, and connecting with the Richmond and Atlanta Railway scheme, independent of the State road, or the Louis- ville and Nashville road.
Thus one by one of the specifications in the fierce charge of " Bar- gain" have been disproved by that unfailing healer of injustice, Time, and its inevitable co-worker, Truth. The storm, like all storms, did
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562
.. GORDON'S ELOQUENT SPEECH.
good. The right was vindicated after much travail. It was a dead' struggle, but a marvelous victory. The final result was beneficial to tì. State and to the country. Gen. Gordon came home, and in a master !: and eloquent speech in Atlanta, thus stated the motives governing Gov. Colquitt in this appointment:
"Let us place ourselves in Gov. Colquitt's place, and laying aside all passion, see wlist our cool judgment would dictate. [Laughter and applause.] Let me premise what ] am about to say by the remark that while, as a matter of sentiment, most of us woul have preferred some other Georgian, yet there are thousands in and out of the Stat who are beginning to agree with that greatest of living generals, Joseph E. Johnston. that Joseph E. Brown was the very best selection that could have been made under all the circumstances surrounding our present and the momentous issues involved in our politi cal contests for the future. There are great men and true men now in high places of responsibility, who believe that the time had come in the South when the integrity : our society, the security of our property, and the supremacy of our political principk. require that we should so liberalize our policy as to extend the olive branch to all men now in accord with our principles, although they had differed from us in !! transition stage succeeding the war as to the public policy. They saw in Gov. Brown the most distinguished representative of that class of citizens in the entire South. They saw in him a man of intellect, of long experience, of distinguished services in the ante bellum history of the State. A man of large property, deeply interested in the materia! progress of the country and in stable government-a life-long Democrat, who, although denounced by us for voting for Grant and reconstruction in 1868, was joined by us in voting for Greeley and reconstruction in 1872. [Applause.] This is, I say, what other men, able and true, saw in this appointment." What did Gov. Colquitt see to guide him to a conclusion which his enemies now seek to use to his detriment. If he will permit i .. I will publish his letter informing me of Gov. Brown's appointment, and of the result- he expected to be produced upon himself, the party, and the country. He saw the two strongest Democratie districts in the State lost to the Democratic party. He saw in a third, the same fate seriously threatened. He saw in a fourth, Hammond, able and elo- quent, elected after a most laborious struggle. He saw the party upon whose supremary seems to depend all that is valuable to us as a people, apparently on the verge of disso- lution. He saw the friends and life-long followers of Gov. Brown among the hardy yeomanry of the mountains, dissatisfied and ready to break with the organization ; and he felt that he might thus recall them to their allegiance, recapture these Demu- cratic strongholds, harmonize former differences, assuage bitterness, and assure the future of Democratic supremacy. I wish to repeat here that everybody knows that I am not the champion of Gov. Brown, but it is due our manhood that we either cease hostility to Gov. Brown, or cease to ask his time and talents and money for the benefit of our party. It is due to truth to state that Gov. Brown has been unfaltering in his devotion to the Democratic party for ten or twelve years; that he was the sug porter of Milton Smith, of Alfred Colquitt and of myself in my last race for the Senate, even against his life-long friend-that upright jurist, and great statesman, Herschell V. Johnson. It would be unworthy in me were I to fail, in this public manner, to testify to the earnest, unswerving, potential aid given in the last campaigns to myself and !. the standard-bearers of the party in these hotly contested mountain districts. [ Applanse.] In thus speaking at some length upon the purposes of Gov. Colquitt in making thi
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THE SUGGESTIVENESS OF GOVERNOR BROWN'S APPOINTMENT. 563
appointment, I have done him nothing but simple justice. If I know myself I speak in the cause of truth, of harmony, of Democratic unity. [ Applause.] One thing is cer- tain, that while others high in position were apologizing for, or defending Grant, while he drove the cold iron into the breast of Louisiana, Gov. Brown was denouncing this act of tyranny." [Applause and cries of that's so.]
For Gov. Brown, the unsolicited tender of this peculiar trust was an event of unspeakable import and most dramatic connection. It recalled the grim memories of that painful experience of twelve years back, in 1868, when the people of his State stood solidly against him, and he was defeated for this very office, under such pitiless public execration as few men ever experience and fewer outlive. It looked then as if he was forever buried, politically. He went down in the mad savagery of that time, a recipient of as noble a resentment, though unjust, as any people ever exercised. He had lived to see the subsidence of passion, and the abatement of obloquy. He had steadily cured the misconceptions of his course, coming with a wonderful elasticity above the cruel repression and odium that struck him down. And the redemption had at last, after many a weary delay, arrived, but was not, even with this appoint- ment, complete. This was the act of the Governor. It failed of the requisite finish unless rounded off by the popular endorsement. There was much speculation as to whether Senator Brown would seek an elec- tion at the hands of the legislature, his appointment only running to the session of that body in the winter of 1880.
There is, perhaps, no earthly inducement that could have withheld Joseph E. Brown from that test of the public pulse. The opposition made the appointment an issue, and the leading issue of the guberna- torial campaign. But if this had not been done, he would have fashioned it so. Every prompting of his pride and memory, every impulse of his nature, every tingling nerve of his combative temperament drove him irresistibly to a naked trial of this single question by the majestic in- quest of the popular suffrage. His friends led off in suggesting that the approval of the Brown appointment be directly canvassed and voted upon.
It was a very strong triumvirate of influences, capabilities and man- agement, this union of Colquitt, Gordon and Brown. Each one of them was powerful, and had shown himself pretty nearly invincible, each achieving victories single-handed that recorded marvels of majorities. Each one could point to personal triumphs that were out of the range and scope of ordinary political success. The alliance of the three in a battle where their coalition was intensified by a reciprocal interest and
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564
BROWN, GORDON AND COLQUITT.
a common defamation of their conduct, was the junction of the most ponderous agencies of our Georgia leadership. And as well equipped managers as they each were, each found valuable aid in the others. Gov. Colquitt's enemies have decried his abilities and decision. No one could look at his firm set mouth, and not read there an uncommon reserve of will. It comes to him by inheritance. His life, critically dissected, has shown it strikingly. And as for management, his father, Walter T. Colquitt, was the very incarnation of the sagacious and invincible manager, and transmitted it to his diplomatic son. Under that gentle grace and hearty simplicity Gov. Colquitt carries as practical a sense, as rare a tact, as broad a scope of plan, as nice a discernment of agents, as resolute a persistence, as astute a retention of his own secrets, and as true a fidelity to his friends, as any man in the State. And to these subtle qualities he adds an effective magnetism in impress- ing and swaying masses of men, and an exceptional prudence of ex- pression that leaves him no indiscretions to correct.
Ex-Gov. Brown has been an unequaled conductor of political cam- paigns, and brought to this strong junction of force his superlative and disciplined capacities. Gen. Gordon has been a lordly campaigner, going direct to the popular heart with his chivalrous esprit, bold, direct, lofty and gallant. There has always been something in this gentleman to make men love, admire and trust him, an unfailing glow of generous sentiment, a manly self-respect, and a vigorous, healthy intellectuality. His ideas are all liberal and large, his impulses knightly, his nature attractive, and his bearing princely. Never a foeman, unless under attack, he is always an open-handed, magnanimous opponent. And every fiber of his soul is loyal to friendship and the popular good. It was a strong trio, and when the struggle came, an irresistible coalition.
It was no slight benefit in the campaign that the anticipation of Senator Brown's service in the few weeks' session of the United States Senate was realized, and was an example of instantaneous and poten- tial influence. In a body where large-brained and distinguished men go through a long probation and apprenticeship of quiet and initiation, Gov. Brown took immediate rank as an acknowledged leader. The tuition of years in this august parliament he mastered immediately. He gained the ear of the body at once, and his voice was heeded. He was sworn in on the 26th of May, 1880, and Congress adjourned on the 16th of June, giving him three weeks' service only. In that short time he secured a $10,000 appropriation for the harbor of Brunswick against the report of the appropriation committee, and came near increasing
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JOSEPH E. BROWN'S SHORT TERM IN THE U. S. SENATE.
the appropriation to the Savannah river from 865,000 to $100,000. IIe passed a bill to allow the Savannah, Florida, and Western railroad to build a bridge over the St. Mary's river, which is now being used. He discovered and defeated a provision in the census bill that would have lost Georgia a representative in the United States Congress. This pro- vision provided that enumerators should report a list of all males over twenty-one years disqualified from voting, and such number be deducted from the inhabitants of the State in making up its basis of representa- tion. On account of the voters in Georgia disqualified for non-pay- ment of taxes, this would have lost Georgia twenty or thirty thousand votes in estimating our representation in Congress.
Senator Brown made three speeches in his strong, practical way, that attracted general attention, that placed him among the recognized leaders of the Senate, and carried to Georgia a substantial basis for popular sanction of his appointment. In urging increased appropria- tions for our State harbors, he put so clearly our claims to greater lib- erality that Senators Thurman, Bayard, Davis, Blaine and Vance com- plimented him. Senator Blaine raised quite a laugh by saying " he never heard so fine a speech from so young a Senator." It was in the speech, however, delivered on the 12th of June, 1880, upon the Mexican Pension bill, that Gov. Brown made a profound impression upon the country, and instantly stamped himself as a master of debate, an origi- nal thinker and a positive actor in the national councils, able to cope with any of the practiced powers of that august body, and to place his people in sharp advantage upon the delicate questions of the war. An amendment was offered to strike Southern soldiers who had participated in the last war from the benefits of a pension for service in the Indian and Mexican wars. Gov. Brown strenuously opposed this exclusion of Southern soldiers. Senators Ingalls, Conkling, Kirkwood and Blaine kept a running fire upon him, injecting adroitly into the discussion the disunion and war issues.
Gov. Brown's speech was a master-piece of diplomacy and argument. He took occasion from the interruptions to go into the whole subject of Southern sentiment upon war questions, and without an imprudent word, he completely turned the tables upon his sharp questioners, and struck the "Bloody Shirt " policy, as it was felicitously called, of keep- ing up war prejudices, the deadliest blow it has received. His temper was perfect, his readiness unfailing, and his retorts irresistible. Ile made every stroke cut. His acceptance of reconstruction was used hap- pily. The galleries were crowded, and the ablest men of the other side,
566
SENATOR BROWN'S SPEECH AGAINST THE BLOODY SHIRT.
the recognized experts of debate and the keenest wits of the Republi- can party were using every effort to trip the new Senator. They came at him from every quarter and struck him vigorously. Parrying every lunge, cool, poised and prompt, he met every attack successfully, and followed his adversary to an undeniable discomfiture. He evaded nothing. Senator Ingalls asked him if he didn't think now he was right in defending secession. Gov. Brown shot back the affirmative instan- taneously, but added that secession was not a living issue, and had been settled forever by the war.
He drew with the nicest discrimination the difference between the questions decided by the revolution and our living rights. He thus admirably concluded:
" When we returned to the Union, we did so in good faith. The question of the right of secession is settled forever, and with its settlement our faith is pledged to stand by and defend the Constitution and the Union. In the field you found the Southern armies to be brave men, and brave men are never treacherous. Should our relations with foreign powers at any time involve this Government in war, the people of the North will have no reason to complain of the promptness, earnestness and gallantry with which the people of the Southern States will rally around the old flag, and bear it triumphantly wherever duty' calls. If that emergency were now upon us, the comrades in arms of Sherman and Johnston, who once confronted each other with such distin- guished heroism, would rally together in the cause of the Union, and vieing with each other, would perform such prodigies of valor as the world has seldom witnessed. This being the present condition of the country, the present feeling of the great masses of people on each side, let us do justice to each other, restore cordial and fraternal rela- tions, and folding up the bloody shirt, let us bury it forever beyond the reach of resur- rection; and let us unite in the enactment of such laws as will show to the world that we are once more, not in name only, but in reality, a united people, ready to do equal and exact justice to all. And let us move forward gradually and gloriously in united efforts to restore to every section of the Union substantial, growing, material prosperity ; and we will then bring to the whole country peace, happiness and fraternal relations. This seems to me to be a consummation devoutly to be wished by the patriotic people of all parts of the Union.
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