History of Baltimore, Maryland, from its founding as a town to the current year, 1729-1898, including its early settlement and development; a description of its historic and interesting localities; political, military, civil, and religious statistcs; biographies of representative citizens, etc., etc, Part 67

Author: Shepherd, Henry Elliott, 1844-1929, ed. 4n
Publication date: 1898
Publisher: [Uniontown? Pa.] S.B. Nelson
Number of Pages: 1344

USA > Maryland > Baltimore County > Baltimore City > History of Baltimore, Maryland, from its founding as a town to the current year, 1729-1898, including its early settlement and development; a description of its historic and interesting localities; political, military, civil, and religious statistcs; biographies of representative citizens, etc., etc > Part 67

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Gov. Philip Francis Thomas, Rich- ard B. Carmichael, Isaac D. Jones, George R. Dennis, Oliver Miller, Edward Ham- mond, Henry Williams, James C. Clark, afterwards President of the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal Company, and later of the Ohio & Mobile Railroad; Charles B. Calvert, Chas. C. Magruder, Henry S. Magraw, Alexander D. Evans, Upton Burhman,

The following letters from Gov. Oden Bowie and Judge Richard B. Carmichael having been inadvertently omitted are here inserted.

The success of the Democratic Conserva- tive party in Baltimore was the subject of profound satisfaction throughout the State. Our friends in the counties were aware of the difficulties we had to encounter; of the conduct of the removed commissioners; the action of Judge Bond; the encouragement which the radicals had received from the visits of General Grant and General Canby; the want of sympathy and support from a number of Democrats in our city, men who could forget nothing and could learn noth- ing, and who, either indisposed or afraid to take any part in the movement, did not wish others to do so, and they almost despaired of our success. These friends were corre- spondingly elated when the news was flashed over the wires that, after a hard fight, we had carried the entire delegations from the three legislative districts of Balti- more City in the General Assembly; thus ensuring the passage of all the reform measures advocated by the Democratic party, including that of a call for a Con- stitutional convention; the constitutional two-thirds votes of each House necessary for the passage of that all-important meas- ure having been obtained by our victory in the city. From Col. Oden Bowie, the able and intrepid chairman of the Democratic State Central Committee during the three years of strife and struggle through which we had passed, and whose services were de- servedly rewarded by his nomination and election as Governor in 1867, Mr. Knott re- ceived the following letter of congratula- tion:

COLLINGTON, PR. GEO. CO., MD., 8th Nov., 1866.

MY DEAR KNOTT,

Laus Deo :

You have covered yourself all over with glory Most heartily do I congratulate you.

It seems to me the occasion is worthy of, and calls for, an address from our committee. I am too much engaged just now, however, in railroad matters to go up to consult you all about the matter, and as at this distance from the real battle- field (Baltimore City) I might make a mistake in the kind of address our allies would think best, I write to ask you to prepare such a one as on con- sultation you think best, and publish it as coming from ourselves. In haste.

Yours very truly,

ODEN BOWIE.

Several other letters of a similar import and character were received from the coun- try members of the Democratic State Cen- tral Committee. In accordance with the suggestion of Colonel Bowie, a brief address of congratulation to the Democratic voters of the State was issued.

Judge Carmichael, of Queen Anne's "clarum et venerabile nomen," was one of the leading spirits in this movement for the re- demption of the State from its beginning to its close. He was present at the initial meet- ing in Annapolis in February, 1864; was one of the delegates-at-large to the National Democratic Convention at Chicago in that year; was chairman of the joint committee of the Senate and the House to report a bill for the call of a convention, and he crowned his labors by presiding over the delibera- tions of the body which framed the Con- stitution of 1867. He was the Ulysses of our movement, sagacious in council and fearless in the field. He had in early life been a member of Congress, and was famil- iar with the traditions and the great men of the Jacksonian period. He had imbibed the spirit of those great men and imparted some of it to the younger men who were associated with him. On the resignation

of Governor Swann of the office of United States Senator, as subsequently narrated. the Democratic Conservative members of the Legislature turned instinctively and al- most unanimously to Judge Carmichael as their choice for the Senate; but he declined the nomination, as he subsequently declined to have his name presented for the nomina- tion of Governor at the first election under the new constitution which he contributed so much to ordain and establish. He was content to serve his State with a disinter- ested patriotism, and to aid by his wisdom and courage the emancipation of her people. That work accomplished he returned to private life, from which no temptation of office could withdraw him. Mr. Knott has always accounted it a peculiarly happy cir- cumstance of his life that he was honored with the confidence and friendship of this really great and good man. On his first nomination as State's Attorney for Balti- more City, Judge Carmichael sent him the following congratulatory note:

BELLE VIEW, MID., 6th Oct., 1867.

A. LEO KNOTT, ESQ.,

My Dear Sir :

I have only a word to convey my congratula- tions on the occasion of your nomination and to express my pleasure at it.

Perhaps you will permit me "entre nous" to remind yon that the duties of the place will re- quire all the emphasis which drew down upon you, last winter, the fierce retort of " the honor- able member " from Dorchester.

I am, very truly yours,

RICHD. B. CARMICHAEL.

The allusion in this letter to "the fierce retort of the honorable member from Dor- chester," refers to a personal incident which occurred between the Hon. Francis P. Phelps. of Dorchester, and Mr. Knott in the House of Delegates in the discussion which took place in that body on the bill for a State appropriation to aid in the con- truction of an ice boat for Baltimore City, which measure was strongly antagonized by "The honorable member" from Dor- chester. The difficulty was settled, how- ever, by the intervention of common friends.

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HISTORY OF BALTIMORE, MARYLAND.

members of the House of Delegates. In this body Mr. Knott took a prominent part. He was a member of the joint committee of ten of the Senate and of the House, which was appointed on the second day of the session to frame and report a bill for the call of a convention of the people of the State to form a new Constitution. This committee. was composed of the following gentlemen: Messrs. William Kimmel, Oden Bowie, George Vickers, G. Fred Maddox and Levin J. Broadwater on the part of the Senate, and Messrs. Richard B. Carmichael, A. Leo Knott, Francis P. Phelps, Wm. Tell Bixler and George W. Morgan on the part of the House. Messrs. Kimmel, Bixler and Knott were the members from Baltimore City. It was proposed in this committee, and the original draft of the bill brought in by its author, Judge Carmichael, the chair- man of the committee, provided, that in the convention to be assembled under the call, the representation of the city of Baltimore and of several counties should be on the basis fixed in the Constitution of 1851. Under the Constitution of 1851 Baltimore City was represented in the General Assem- bly of the State by one Senator and ten members in the House of Delegates. The Constitution of 1864 divided Baltimore City into three Legislative Districts, and gave to each district one Senator and six dele- gates in the Lower House. It was sought in the committee to vindicate this proposed basis of representation on the grounds that the Constitution of 1864 had never been adopted by the people, that in no moral sense could it be regarded as the expression of their supreme will; that it was forced upon them by Federal interference and Federal bayonets; and that its provisions,

wherein it differed and departed from those contained in the Constitution of 1851-the last authentic expression of the popular will -should therefore be disregarded and ig- nored.

To this proposition in regard to repre- sentation in the convention Mr. Knott strenuously objected, contending that while the proposed basis of representation would but slightly affect the rights and interests of the counties, it would affect most seri- ously and materially the rights and interests of Baltimore City by reducing its repre- sentation in the convention by nearly half, from twenty-one to eleven. That it might well be feared that the basis thus proposed, if adopted in the bill, might be accepted by the convention assembled under it as a rule 01 precedent to regulate its own action in fixing the basis of representation of the city and the counties in the Constitution which would be the work of its hands, and thus the representation of the city of Bal- timore might be permanently reduced and the equality of its people with the rest of the people of the State denied. He declared that while it was true that the Constitution of 1864 had been forced upon the people of the State by military rule and the disfran- chisement of a large number of its voters, yet it could not be denied that the basis of representation established in that instru- ment was just and equitable. Mr. Knott further reminded his Democratic colleagues in the committee that for many years be- fore the Civil War broke out, the in- equality of the basis of representation be- tween the city and the counties in the Gen- eral Assembly had been regarded as a great and serious grievance; that the Democratic party of the State had frequently, but in

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HISTORY OF BALTIMORE, MARYLAND.

vain, protested against it, and sought its re- dress, and that it would ill become that party now, when in complete and undisputed con- trol of the means of remedying that griev- ance, to refuse to do so, solely because the Republican party had availed itself of an op- portunity, however obtained, to anticipate what would be or ought to be the action of the Democratic party in that behalf. He warned the committee that if the proposed basis should be adopted, it would seriously endanger the success of the call when sub- mitted to the people even should the bill pass both Houses of the General As- sembly of which, in the present political composition of that body, and should the proposed basis of representation be adopted, there was grave doubt, the dele- gation from Baltimore City in the House being equally divided between Democrats and Conservatives. And finally, that if the majority of the committee should persist in embodying such basis in its report, he would feel it his duty to submit a minority report giving to the city of Baltimore and the coun- ties the representation to which they were entitled under the Constitution of 1864. These views, after considerable discussion, prevailed. The basis of representation con- tained in the Constitution of 1864 with slight modifications was accepted; the citizens of Baltimore were secure in their rights to a fair and equal representation with the rest of the people of the State; the bill was unan- imously reported to the House and subse- quently passed.

He was a member of the joint committee of the Senate and House on Federal Rela- tions, to which committee was referred the question of the ratification by the State of

the XIV Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, which had just been sub- mitted by Congress to the States. This committee, of which Hon. Isaac D. Jones was chairman, framed and reported a reso- lution refusing the assent of Maryland to the proposed ratification, which resolution was adopted by the General Assembly by a strict party vote. He was a member of the Judi- ciary Committee, and chairman of the Com- mittee on Elections and of the Committee on Internal Improvements. As chairman of this committee, Mr. Knott reported a bill making amendments to the charter of the Baltimore and Potomac Railroad, which passed the House notwithstanding the powerful influence of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company, which was ar- rayed against them. These amendments enabled the Baltimore and Potomac road to construct a new line of railway com- munication between Baltimore and Wash- ington.

As chairman of the Baltimore City dele- gation Mr. Knott reported, advocated and secured the passage of a bill for the appropriation of $75,000 annually by the State for two years to aid the city of Baltimore in the construction and running of an ice boat to keep open a channel through the ice in the harbor of Balti- more. This measure met with opposition from an unexpected quarter. The mem- bers from the Eastern Shore counties were at first almost to a man against it. They wanted as a condition for their votes for the bill that the boat should also be employed in the harbors of all the towns of the Eastern Shore situated on tide-water. This would have left very little if any time for the opera-

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HISTORY OF BALTIMORE, MARYLAND.

tions of the boat in Baltimore harbor. A committee composed of Messrs. Robert R. Kirkland, Israel M. Parr and William Crichton, prominent merchants of Balti- more, and representing the Board of Trade, were assiduous in their attendance during the action of the Legislature on this bill, and materially contributed to its success by their intelligent arguments and explana- tions.

During Mr. Knott's term in the House he secured for the first time in the history of the State a recognition of the value of the noble public work done by the charitable institutions in Baltimore City connected with the Roman Catholic Church. The committee appointed to visit and report upon the condition and wants of the public institutions of Baltimore receiving aid from the State, were invited to visit the House of the Good Shepherd and the foundling hos- pital known as St. Vincent's Infant Asylum. This committee was so impressed by the good work and admirable management of these two institutions that it unanimously recommended a State appropriation of $3,000 to each of them for two years. These appropriations received the almost unanimous sanction of the House, but they failed in the Senate. A conference committee between the two houses sub- sequently agreed to and reported an ap- propriation of $1,500 to each of them. In this recognition by the State of deserving public charities, Mr. Knott was aided by the members of the city delegation, by Hon. Oliver Miller, speaker of the House, who appointed some members of the committee on his recommendation, by Hon. James C. Clerk, chairman of Committee on Appro-

priations, and Hon. Charles H. Nicolai, of Baltimore county.

The Legislature had now been in session for more than two months and yet the bill for the call of a convention to frame a new Constitution, although it had been intro- duced at a very early period of the session, was not yet passed. It had been called up twice, but the call had been suspended on the discovery of the fact, that, on each occa- sion, owing to the absence of some of the members of the House, and also to some jealousies which had sprung up between the Democratic and Conservative members of that body, the requisite two-thirds vote could not be secured for the bill. These deplorable jealousies had their origin in a primary election which had recently been held in Baltimore to nominate a Democratic Conservative candidate for mayor at a spe- cial municipal election provided to be held in April by an act which had been passed early in the session. This act, however, it was afterwards discovered failed to comply with certain requirements of the general election law, and the election under it was abandoned, and the act itself was repealed. A new bill providing for the same purpose had been introduced and was still pending in the Senate, where it had encountered a decisive check by the ruling of the Presi- dent, Lieutenant Governor Cox, on a point of parliamentary law. The rivalries and ill feeling enkindled by this political contest in Baltimore were unfortunately transferred to Annapolis and entered as a very disturbing element into the question of the failure or success of the measures of reform still pend- ing. They were finally adjusted, but not without considerable difficulty.

568

HISTORY OF BALTIMORE, MARYLAND.

VII.

EFFORTS OF THE REPUBLICANS TO PRE- VENT BY INTRIGUE AND INTIMIDATION THE CALL FOR A CONVENTION, THE ELECTION OF GOVERNOR SWANN TO THE UNITED STATES SENATE, HIS RESIGNATION OF THAT HONOR, ITS CAUSES AND CONSEQUENCES.

Even after the Legislature had convened the policy of terrorism, intimidation and in- trigue which had been inaugurated by the radical Republicans before the election and which had nearly succeeded at that time, was continued in order to deter that body if possible from proceeding in its work of emancipation and reform, and especially from passing a convention bill, the most im- portant, comprehensive and indispensable of all its proposed measures, without which in- deed the others were but temporary expedi- ents of uncertain results.

In the early part of the session, Governor Swann in recognition of the valuable and patriotic services he had rendered to the cause of constitutional reform had been elected Senator of the United States for the term of six years from the 4th of March, 1867, as successor to Hon. John A. J. Cres- well. This gentleman, who subsequently entered General Grant's cabinet as Postmas- ter General, had, on the death of Hon. Henry Winter Davis, in December, 1865, succeeded that brilliant orator as the recog- nized leader of the radical wing of the Re- publican party in this State. Though the representative of a Southern State, Mr. Creswell had zealously supported by his voice and his vote the most extreme and radical courses of the Republican majority in the Senate towards the Southern State. It was a matter of profound gratification,

therefore, to the people of the State that his place in that body was to be filled by a gen- tleman of conservative views and principles. Governor Swann had intimated his accept- ance of the honor conferred upon him and had fixed on Tuesday, the 26th of February, as the day of his retirement from the Guber- natorial office, and of the installation of his constitutional successor, Lieut. Gov. C. C. Cox. Both Houses had made arrange- ments for the ceremonies usual at the per- formance of that function, and on Thursday, the 21st of February, had adjourned over to Monday, the 25th.

Late in the evening of February 22d, Mr. Washington Bonifant, the United States Marshal for Maryland, called at Barnum's Hotel, Baltimore, bearing a message from Hon. Montgomery Blair, of Washington, to Hon. (afterwards Judge) Edward Ham- mond, a delegate from Howard county in the General Assembly, and to Mr. Knott. Mr. Hammond was not at the hotel, having gone the previous evening, immediately on the adjournment of the House, to his home in Howard county. The purport of the message thus sent was, that rumors of a grave and alarming character were rife in Washington as to what would take place at Annapolis upon the resignation of Gover- nor Swann and the inauguration of his suc- cessor. These rumors were that Governor Swann would be refused admission to the Senate on the ground that his election was the result of a bargain with the disloyal ele- ment in the State; that it was a violation of the spirit if not of the letter of the Eastern Shore law-which had been repealed before Governor Swann's election as Senator and restored to the Statute Book afterwards- and that the vacancy thus created in the

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HISTORY OF BALTIMORE, MARYLAND.

Senatorial representation of the State would be filled by the appointment of Senator Creswell by the new Governor. It was fur- ther represented that Governor Swann's successor in the office, Lieutenant Governor Cox, would use all his official influence to defeat the bill for the call of a convention, and failing in that would obstruct and pre- vent its being carried into effect, and to that end aid would be given him from Washing- ton even to the extent of sending troops of the United States into the State, if neces- sary, and that thus the State would be taken out of the hands of the rebels and its gov- ernment once more placed in loyal hands.

This information was so startling, it so deeply impeached the personal and political integrity of the party concerned, it seemed so contradictory to the general tenor of his sentiments and conduct since his co-opera- tion with the Democratic Conservative party, that for a moment Mr. Knott, to whom this information was imparted, could at first hardly give it credence. But par- ticulars were given as the conversation pro- ceeded and circumstances detailed, which were well calculated, on reflection, to arouse suspicion and alarm. It was known beyond question that the gentleman implicated by these rumors had been in Washington for a week, absent from his official duties in Ann- apolis as presiding officer of the Senate; and the message of Judge Blair besides con- veyed the distinct and positive assurance that it was a fact known to him (Judge Blair) that during his visit to Washington Lieutenant Governor Cox had held two in- terviews, each of some length, with Secre- tary Stanton at the War Office. The Secre- tary was a most bitter and unrelenting foe of the South. Called to the Cabinet of Mr.

Buchanan a few months before the retire- ment of that gentleman from the office of President, Stanton, had on many occasions manifested both by speech and conduct his sympathies with the South in the extreme course it pursued and had fully sustained his chief in all the views he expressed in regard to the treatment of the seceding States; as a member of Mr. Lincoln's cabinet he had illustrated the truism that there is no hate like the hate of a false friend and a renegade. Odit quem decepit. In this conduct he was but a type of most of the Buchanan-Breckenridge leaders of the North; Gen. Benj. F. Butler, Caleb Cush- ing, General Dix, Daniel S. Dickinson, Gen. Isaac O. Stevens; men who in the National Democratic Convention of 1860, both in Charleston and in Baltimore, and during the Presidential canvass of that year and for some time subsequently, by their voices and votes had encouraged the leaders and the people of the South in the unfounded and unfortunate persuasion and belief that in their secession from that convention, and, consequently, from the Union, they would have the sympathy and support of a majority of the northern Democracy. To this general course of conduct on the part of the supporters of the Breckenridge-Lane ticket in the North after the Civil War began there was one notable and conspicuous exception-the Hon. Jeremiah S. Black, of Pennsylvania. He stood throughout that great struggle and during the dark period of reconstruc- tion a grand and heroic figure, an Abdiel among so many faithless. He had never ad- vised nor encouraged secession, and there- fore he never had occasion to run with inde- cent haste in order to atone for one apostasy

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HISTORY OF BALTIMORE, MARYLAND.

by committing another, and to purchase his pardon and safety by the cruel exploitation of those who were unfortunate enough to have placed confidence and belief in his counsels and assurances. During the war he met the storm of vehement and vindic- tive abuse and denunciation which fiercely beat upon him with an ability and eloquence so masterly, with a courage so calm, fearless and unquailing, that he conquered the re- luctant admiration of his bitterest foes. The hired advocates of arbitrary power felt rebuked by his presence when he entered the forums of the law to defend the imperilled liberties of the citizen or to uphold the prostrate rights of the States. His State has erected no monument to his memory, nor is it meet that it should so long as it numbers the Camerons, the Quays, and the Wanamakers among its great men and leaders. That time indeed may never come to the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, but his name will live in the memories of honest and patriotic men who esteem and cherish the qualities of truth, justice, courage and honor as among the priceless treasures of mankind.

It was called to mind that during the dis- turbances which had taken place in Balti- more at the election in the preceding No- vember, the radical leaders of that revolu- tionary movement had held some sort of correspondence with Secretary Stanton. It was known also that since the election mem- bers of the Republican party, some of them high in its councils, had on several occasions made threats and had given out intimations to the effect that the ascendancy of the Dem- ocratic party in the State would be short- lived, and that loyal men would soon have their own again. These threats and intima-

tions were regarded at the time as puerile and amusing, but with the intelligence thus imparted they ceased to be amusing and be- gan to wear "a weighty and a serious blow." This information, Mr. Blair further re- quested, should be immediately communi- cated to Governor Swann. This was done on that night. The Governor was not dis- posed to give weight or consideration to the rumors. He regarded them as wild and ex- travagant; but he declared, however, that he would communicate with friends in Washington and ascertain, if possible, what foundation existed for them.

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Author: Shepherd, Henry Elliott, 1844-1929, ed. 4n Publication date: 1898 Publisher: [Uniontown? Pa.] S.B. Nelson Number of Pages: 1344

Author: Shepherd, Henry Elliott, 1844-1929, ed. 4n
Publication date: 1898
Publisher: [Uniontown? Pa.] S.B. Nelson
Number of Pages: 1344