The Great Conspiracy, Complete

by John Alexander Logan

Failing in this effort, the very failure became a grievance. On the principle of a fleeing thief diverting pursuit by shouting "Stop thief," the cry of "fraud" was raised by the Democratic leaders, North and South, against the Republican Party, and was iterated and reiterated so long and loudly, that soon they actually began, themselves, to believe, that President Hayes had been "counted in," by improper methods! At all events, under cover of the hue and cry thus raised, the Southern leaders hurried up their work of Southern solidification, by multiplied outrages on the "Mississippi plan," so that, by 1880, they were ready to dictate, and did dictate, the Democratic Presidential nominations.

[Senator Wallace, of Pennsylvania, telegraphed from Cincinnati his congratulations to General Hancock, and added: "General Buell tells me that Murat Halsted says Hancock's nomination by the Confederate Brigadiers sets the old Rebel yell to the music of the Union." In the Convention which nominated Hancock, Wade Hampton made a speech, saying; "On behalf of the 'Solid South,' that South which once was arrayed against the great soldier of Pennsylvania, I stand here to pledge you its solid vote. [cheers] * * * There is no name which is held in higher respect among the people of the South, than that of the man you have given to us as our standard-bearer." And afterward, in a speech at Staunton, Virginia, the same Southern leader, in referring to the action of the Democratic Convention at Cincinnati, said: "There was but one feeling among the Southern delegates. That feeling was expressed when we said to our Northern Democratic brethren 'Give us an available man.' They gave us that man.">[

While these old Rebel leaders of the South had insisted upon, and had succeeded in, nominating a man whose record as a Union soldier would make him popular in the North and West, and while their knowledge of his availability for Southern purposes would help them in their work of absolutely solidifying the South, they took very good care also to press forward their pet Free-Trade issue—that principle so dear to the hearts of the Rebel Cotton-lords that, as has already been hinted, they incorporated it into their Constitution of Confederation in these words:

"SEC. 8.—Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises for revenue necessary to pay the debts, provide for the common defense, and carry on the Government of the Confederate States; but no bounty shall be granted from the Treasury, nor shall any duty or tax on importation from Foreign Nations be laid to promote or foster any branch of industry."

It may also be remarked that, under the inspiration of those Southern leaders who afterward rebelled, it had been laid down as Democratic doctrine, in the National Democratic platform of 1856—and "reaffirmed" as such, in 1860—that "The time has come for the People of the United States to declare themselves in favor of * * * progressive Free-Trade. * * * That justice and sound policy forbid the Federal Government to foster one branch of industry to the detriment of another." But, by 1864, the Republican Protective-Tariff of 1860, had so abundantly demonstrated, to all our people engaged in industrial occupations, the beneficence of the great principle of home industrial Protection, that Tariff-agitation actually ceased, and the National Democratic platform of that year had nothing to say in behalf of Free-Trade!

After the close of the War, however, at the very first National Democratic Convention, in 1868, at which there were delegations from the lately rebellious States, the question was at once brought to the front, and, under the inspiration of the old Rebel leaders aforesaid, the Democratic platform again raised the banner of Free-Trade by declaring for a Tariff for revenue. But the mass of the People, at that time still freshly remembered the terrible commercial disasters and industrial depressions which had befallen the Land, through the practical operation of that baleful Democratic Free-Trade doctrine, before the Rebellion broke out, and sharply contrasted the misery and poverty and despair of those dark days of ruin and desolation, with the comfort and prosperity and hopefulness which had since come to them through the Republican Protective-Tariff Accordingly, the Republican Presidential candidate, representing the great principle of Protection to American Industries, was elected over the Democratic Free-Trade candidate, by 214 to 71 electoral votes-or nearly three to one!

Taught, by this lesson, that the People were not yet sufficiently prepared for a successful appeal in behalf of anything like Free-Trade, the next National Democratic Convention, (that of 1872), under the same Southern inspiration, more cautiously declared, in its platform, that "Recognizing that there are in our midst, honest but irreconcilable differences of opinion, with regard to the respective systems of Protection and Free-Trade, we remit the discussion of the subject to the People in their Congressional districts, and to the decision of the Congress thereon, wholly free from Executive interference or dictation." The People, however, rebuked the moral cowardice thus exhibited by the Democracy—in avoiding a direct issue on the doctrine which Democracy itself had galvanized at least into simulated life,—by giving 286 electoral votes to the Republican candidate, to 63 for the Democratic,—or in the proportion of nearly five to one.

Warned, by this overwhelming defeat, not to flinch from, or avoid, or try to convert the great National question of Tariff, into a merely local one, the National Democratic platform of 1876, at the instigation of the old Rebel leaders of the now fast solidifying South, came out flat-footedly again with the "demand that all Custom-house taxation shall be only for revenue." This time, the electoral vote stood almost evenly divided, viz.: for the Republican candidate, 185; for the Democratic candidate, 184;—a result so extremely close, as to lead to the attempted perpetration of great frauds against the successful candidate; the necessary settlement of the questions growing out of them, by an Electoral commission—created by Congress at the instance of the Democratic Party; great irritation, among the defeated Democracy, over the just findings of that august Tribunal; and to the birth of the alleged Democratic "grievance," aforesaid.

The closeness of this vote—their almost triumph, in 1876,—encouraged the Solid South to press upon the National Democratic Convention of 1880, the expediency of adopting a Free-Trade "plank" similar to that with which, in 1876, they had so nearly succeeded. Hence the Democratic platform of 1880, also declared decidedly for "A Tariff for revenue only."

The old Rebel leaders, at last in full control of the entire Democratic Party, had now got things pretty much as they wanted them. They had created that close corporation within the Union—that imperium in imperio that oligarchically—governed league of States (within the Republic of the United States) which they termed the "Solid South," and which would vote as a unit, on all questions, as they directed; they had dictated the nomination, by the Democratic Party, of a Presidential candidate who would not dare to act counter to their wishes; and their pet doctrine of Free-Trade was held up, to the whole Democratic front, under the attractive disguise of a Tariff for revenue only.