that in the effort to determine whether or not our nomination was the free and unbiased choice of the Republican party we must not be candidates, is simply to try the question at issue. We have no desire to discuss the question in any of its numerous bearings. We have placed ourselves unreservedly in the hands of the Republicans of Pennsylvania. We have pledged ourselves to act concurrently with your committee, and are bound by its action. We therefore respectfully suggest that we have no power or authority to act independently of the committee, or make any declaration at variance with the propositions submitted in accordance with its action. There ought to be and can be no such thing as personal antagonism in this contest. We socially and emphatically disclaim even the remotest approach to a feeling of this kind toward any person. We fraternize with and are ready to support any citizen who loves the cause of pure Republicanism, and with this declaration we submit the whole subject to your deliberate judgment and wise consideration. JAMES A. BEAVER. JOHN M. GREER. At the meeting of the Independent State Committee, July 27th, the propositions of the Regular Committee were unanimously rejected, and a committee appointed to draft a reply, which was done in the following terms: Thomas V. Cooper, Esq., Chairman Republican State Committee. Dear Sir: I am instructed to advise you that the Independent Republican State Committee have considered the four suggestions contained in the minutes of the proceedings of your committee, forwarded to me by you on the 12th instant. I am directed to say that this committee find that none of the four are methods fitted to obtain a harmonious and honorable unity of the Republican voters of Pennsylvania. All of them are inadequate to that end, for the reason that they afford no guarantee that, being accepted, the principles upon which the Independent Republicans have taken their stand would be treated with respect or put into action. All of them contain the probability that an attempt to unite the Republicans of the State by their means would either result in reviving and strengthening the political dictatorship which we condemn or would permanently distract the Republican body, and insure the future and continued triumph of our common opponent, the Democratic party. Of the four suggestions, the first, second and fourth are so inadequate as to need no separate discussion: the third, which alone may demand attention, has the fatal defect of not including the withdrawal of that "slated" ticket which was made up many months ago, and long in advance of the Harrisburg Convention, to represent and to maintain the very evils of control and abuses of method to which we stand opposed. This proposition, like the others, supposing it to have been sincerely put forward, clearly shows that you misconceive the cause of the Independent Republican movement, as well as its aims and purposes. You assume that we desire to measure the respective numbers of those who support the Harrisburg ticket and those who find their principles expressed by the Philadelphia Convention. This is a complete and fatal misapprehension. We are organized to promote certain reforms, and not to abandon them in pursuit of votes. Our object is the overthrow of the "boss system" and of the "spoils system." In behalf of this we are willing and anxious to join hands with you whenever it is assured that the union will be honestly and earnestly for that purpose. But we cannot make alliances or agree to compromises that in their face threaten the very object of the movement in which we the support of many or few, of a majority have engaged. Whether your ticket has or a minority of the Republican voters, does not affect in the smallest degree the duty of every citizen to record himself against the abuses which it represents. Had the gentlemen who compose it been willing to withdraw themselves from the field, as they were invited to join in doing, for the common good, by the Independent Republican candidates, this act would have encouraged the hope that a new convention, freely chosen by the people, and unembarrassed by claims of existing candidates, might have brought forth the needed guarantee of party emancipation and public reform. This service, however, they have declined to render their party; they not only claim and receive your repeated assurances of support, but they permit themselves to be put forward to secure the use of the Independent Republican votes at the same time that they represent the "bossism," the "spoils" methods, and the "machine management which we are determined no longer to tolerate. The manner in which their candidacy was decreed, the means employed to give it convention formality, the obligations which they incur by it, the political methods with which it identifies them, and the political and personal plans for which their official influence would be required, all ioin to make it the most im perative public duty not to give them sup- | House at Washington are giving active port at this election under any circum- work to the passage of a tariff bill, the re stances. peal of the revenue taxes, and the passage of a two-cent letter postage bill-measures anxiously hastened by the Republicans in order to anticipate friendly and defeat unfriendly attempts on the part of the Democratic House, which comes in with the first session of the 48th Congress. In closing this note, this committee must express its regret, that, having considered it desirable to make overtures to the Independent Republicans, you should have so far misapprehended the facts of the situation. It is our desire to unite the Republican party on the sure ground of In Pennsylvania, as we close this review principle, in the confidence that we are of the struggle of 1882, the Regular and thus serving it with the highest fidelity, and Independent Republican State Committees preserving for the future service of the at least the heads thereof-are devising Commonwealth that vitality of Republicanism which has made the party useful in the past, and which alone confers upon it now the right of continued existence. The only method which promises this result in the approaching election is that proposed by the Independent Republican candidates in their letter of July 13th, 1882, which was positively rejected by your committee. On behalf of the Independent Republican State Committee of Pennsylvania, I. D. MCKEE, Chairman. With this communication ended all efforts at conciliation. * * * * * * * * a plan to jointly call a Republican State Convention to nominate the State ticket to be voted for in November, 1883. The groundswell was so great that it had no sooner passed, than Republicans of all shades of opinion, felt the need of harmonious action, and the leaders everywhere set themselves to the work of repair. ana, and may take more definite and generalshape in the great campaign of 1884. The Democratic party was evidently surprised at its great victory in 1882, and has not yet formally resolved what it will do with it. The Congress beginning with December, 1883, will doubtless give some indication of the drift of Democratic events. The Republicans in the South differed from those of the North in the fact that their complaints were all directed against a natural political enemy-the Bourbonsand wherever there was opportunity they favored and entered into movements with Independent and Readjuster Democrats, with the sole object of revolutionizing political affairs in the South. Their sucThe election followed, and the Demo- cess in these combinations was only great cratic ticket, headed by Robert E. Pattison in Virginia, but it proved to be promising of Philadelphia, received an average in North Carolina, Mississippi, and Louisiplurality of 40,000, and the Independent Republican ticket received an average vote of about 43,000-showing that while Independence organized did not do as well in a gubernatorial as it had in a previous off-year, it yet had force enough to defeat the Republican_State ticket headed by Gen. James A. Beaver. All of the three several State tickets were composed of able men, and the force of both of the Republican tickets on the hustings excited great interest and excitement; yet the Republican vote, owing to the division, was not out by nearly one hundred thousand, and fifty thousand more Republicans than Democrats remained at home, many of them purposely. In New York, where dissatisfaction had no rallying point, about two hundred thousand Republicans remained at home, some because of anger at the defeat of Gov. Cornell in the State nominating convention-some in protest against the National Administrations, which was accused of the desire for direct endorsement where it presented the name of Hon Chas. J. Folger, its Secretary of the Treasury, as the home gubernatorial candidate,―others because of some of the many reasons set forth in the bill of complaints which enumerates the causes of the dissatisfaction within the party. At this writing the work of Republican repair is going on. Both the Senate and The most notable law passed in the closing session of the 47th Congress, was the Civil Service Reform Bill, introduced by Senator Geo. H. Pendleton of Ohio, but prepared under the direction of the Senate Judiciary Committee. The Republicans, feeling that there was some public demand for the passage of a measure of the kind, eagerly rushed to its support, at a time when it was apparent that the spoils of office might slip from their hands. From opposite motives the Democrats, who had previously encouraged, now ran away from it, but it passed both Houses with almost a solid Republican vote, a few Democrats in each House voting with them. President Arthur signed the bill, but at this writing the Commission which it creates has not been appointed, and of course none of the rules and constructions under the act have been formulated. Its basic principles are fixed tenure in minor places, competitive examinations, and non-partisan selections. PART III. POLITICAL PLATFORMS. COMPARISONS AND DESCRIPTION OF ALL LEADING ISSUES. WITH TABLES FOR READY REFERENCE. |