March 25, 1837. On his father's side, his ancestry was Swiss, and on his mother's, German. In 1839 the family removed from Perry to Hancock County, where Jacob spent his youth in working on a farm and attending country school during the winter months. At the age of seventeen he was apprenticed to his brother-in-law in Findlay to learn the carpenter's trade. In 1855 he began teaching school, and in 1859 graduated from an academy in Republic, Seneca County. July 1, 1861, he was admitted to the bar and in 1862 opened an office in Findlay. In 1892, after thirty years' practice, he was elected to the Supreme Bench. Judge Burket was one of the Republican Presidential electors in electors in 1880, voting for James A. Garfield. In December, 1881, he was elected Grand Master of the Odd Fellows of Ohio, serving for one year.

Josiah B. Allen, Clerk of the Supreme Court, was born near Cadiz, Harrison County, Ohio, July 14, 1844. He was educated in the common schools, and in Ohio University, at Athens. He left college in his senior year to enter the Union Army. During his military service he was severely wounded, losing an arm. After returning

from the war he became a merchant at Athens. He was elected Recorder of Athens County in 1867, holding the office for four terms, or until 1880. He was Sergeant-atArms of the Ohio House of Representatives from 1884 to 1886, and clerk in the office of the Adjutant General of the State from 1887 to 1890. In 1892 he was elected Clerk of the Supreme Court of the State and reelected in 1895.

Edwin L. Lybarger, Member of the Board of Public Works, was born at Blachleyville, Wayne County, Ohio, September 29, 1844. He attended the common schools. and Millwood Academy, Knox County, Ohio. He has engaged in the mercantile business and in farming, and is at present a farmer. He located at Spring Mountain after the close of the war, in which he served as Captain of an infantry regiment, and still resides there. In the Sixty-second General Assembly he served as a Republican member of the House from the Democratic County of Coshocton. Captain Lybarger was elected Member of the Board of Public Works in 1892 and again in 1895. In 1896 he was chosen Department Commander of the Grand Army of the Republic for the State, serving one year.

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OT a great deal of interest attended the opening of the Fifty-second Congress on Monday, December 5th, owing to the great Democratic victory of the previous November and the near approach of a Democratic Administration. President Harrison's annual message was not only a summary of the acts of the Administration for the previous year, but also a contrast between the situation of the country in 1860 and in 1892. He took pride in the fact that "a comparison of the existing conditions with those of the most favored period in the history of the country" would show that "so high a degree of prosperity and so general a diffusion of the comforts of life were never before 1892 enjoyed by our people." He dwelt upon the work of those in authority under him and pointed out what had been accomplished with great particularity. He closed with this striking paragraph:

This exhibit of the work of the Executive Departments is submitted to Congress and to the public in the hope that there will be found in it a due sense of responsibility and an earnest purpose to maintain the National honor and to promote the happiness and prosperity of all our people. And this brief exhibit of the growth and prosperity of the country will give us a level from which to note the increase or decadence that new legislative policies may bring to us. There is no reason why the National influence, power and prosperity should not observe the same rates of increase that have characterized the past thirty years. We carry the great impulse and increase of these

years into the future. There is no reason why in many lines of production we should not surpass all other nations, as we have already done in some. There are no near frontiers to our possible development. Retrogression would be a crime.

He little imagined what a great contrast and what awful retrogression there would be in the country in consequence of new legislative and administrative policies before the term of his successor was half completed. The high level of prosperity and conditions under Republican rule was scarcely maintained for a single week after President Cleveland was inaugurated.

On February 8, 1892, both Houses of Congress met in joint session, with Vice President Morton in the chair, to count the electoral vote. Tellers were appointed, and the certificates from the several States were read without objection from any source, and Grover Cleveland and Adlai E. Stevenson were duly declared elected as President and Vice President of the United States.

On February 9th, Mr. Catchings, of Mississippi, called up a resolution from the Committee on Rules, the purpose of which was to bring to an immediate decision the repeal of what was known as the Sherman Silver Purchasing Act. The motion failed by the vote of 143 to 154. On January 17th a bill to repeal the purchasing clause of this act was introduced in the Senate,

but a motion to take it up for consideration failed, receiving only 23 affirmative votes to 42 in the negative, 22 Senators not voting. The attention of Congress was OCcupied for a considerable period by the Anti-Option Bill, a measure defining "options" and "futures," imposing special taxes on dealers therein and requiring them to be licensed. It originated in the House and was passed by that body at the first session. It was amended and passed the Senate, but the House refused to concur in the amendments and it therefore failed.

Grover Cleveland was inaugurated President of the United States for the second time on March 4, 1893. In his address he urged the necessity of maintaining a sound. and stable currency and pledged the use of all the power of the Executive branch of the Government to uphold the National credit and avert financial disaster. He further declared that it would be his aim to reform the tariff and emphatically condemned the granting of bounties and subsidies. The second proposition, of course, counteracted all the good effects of the first. His Cabinet selections were: Secretary of State, Walter Quintin Gresham, of Illinois; Secretary of the Treasury, John Griffin Carlisle, of Kentucky; Secretary of War, Daniel Scott Lamont, of New York; Attorney General, Richard Olney, of Massachusetts; Postmaster General, Wilson Shannon Bissell, of New York; Secretary of the Navy, Hilary A. Herbert, of Alabama; Secretary of the Interior, Hoke Smith, of Georgia; Secretary of Agriculture, Julius Sterling Morton, of Nebraska. Some of these were regarded as very able men, and their selection was approved by the entire country. But even the Democratic party never be

came reconciled to the appointment of the others.

Associate Justice Lucius Q. C. Lamar, of the Supreme Court of the United States, died on January 23d, and President Harrison surprised the country by appointing Howell E. Jackson, a Tennessee Democrat, to the

vacancy. There was some talk of the Senate refusing to confirm the nomination, but finally the selection was endorsed with several Republicans refusing to go on record. Samuel Blatchford, another Associate Justice, died on September 19th, and William B. Hornblower, of New York, was nominated by President Cleveland. Though a Democrat, there was so much opposition to Hornblower by the Democrats in the Senate that his appointment was rejected. Subsequently Wheeler H. Peckham, also of New York, was named by the President, but this nomination was rejected by the Senate, a majority of the Democratic members opposing him. Then the name of Edward D. White, of Louisiana, was sent in and the nomination confirmed. The Republicans generally held aloof and let the Democrats settle. their troubles among themselves.

On June 30th, President Cleveland issued a call for a special session of the Fifty-third The Congress to convene on August 7th. reasons for this, as set forth by the President in his proclamation, were the following:

The distrust and apprehension concerning the financial situation which pervade all business circles have already caused great loss and damage to our people and threaten to cripple our merchants, stop the wheels of manufacture, bring distress and priva

tion to our farmers and withhold from our working

men the wages of labor.

The present perilous condition is largely the result of a financial policy which the Executive branch of the Government finds embodied in unwise laws which must be executed until repealed by Congress.

The Senate was composed of thirty-seven Republicans, forty-four Democrats and four Populists, with three vacancies. After the Legislatures of Montana, Washington and Wyoming had adjourned without electing United States Senators for the terms beginning March 4, 1893, the Governors of these States appointed their successors. On August 23d, the Senate decided that when a State Legislature has the opportunity to elect a United States Senator and fails to do so, an appointment by the Governor of the State is void. In the House there were 137 Republicans, 218 Democratic and II Populist members. Charles F. Crisp, of Georgia, was elected Speaker, over Thomas B. Reed, of Maine.

The President sent a message to Congress on August 8th, relating solely to the silver question, and asking for a repeal of the silver purchasing act. On the 11th, Representative Wilson, of West Virginia, offered a bill for its repeal. The bill was debated until August 28th, when it was brought to a vote. Mr. Bland, of Missouri, offered a provision to authorize the free coinage of silver at the ratio of 16 to 1, which was rejected-Yeas: 13 Republicans, 102 Democrats and 10 Populists, total 125; Nays: 110 Republicans and 116 Democrats, total 216. Votes were then cast on other amendments for coinage at different ratios -from 17 to 1 to 20 to 1-and all were rejected, receiving fewer affirmative votes than were cast for the first proposition. motion to add the purchasing clause of the Bland-Allison Act to Wilson's proposed law was rejected, 15 Republicans, 110 Democrats and 11 Populists voting in the affirmative, and 110 Republicans and 103 Democrats voting in the negative. The bill then passed the House-Yeas: Republicans 101,

A

Democrats 138; Nays: Republicans 24, Democrats 85; not voting 5. Senator Voorhees, of Indiana, reported the bill with an amendment from the Senate Finance Committee, on August 29th. The question was debated until October 27th, when an attempt to attach a free-silver rider was defeated by the vote-Yeas: Republicans 6, Democrats 18, Populists 4; Nays: Republicans 20, Democrats 19. Some minor amendments were voted upon, and on October 30th the bill passed the Senate by the vote of 43 to 32, ten Senators not voting. The affirmative votes were cast by 23 Republicans and 20 Democrats, and the negative votes by nine Republicans, four Populists and 19 Democrats. Both Senators Sherman and Brice, of Ohio, voted for it. The House concurred in the Senate amendment, on November 1st, by the vote of 194 to 94 -70 Republicans and 124 Democrats in the affirmative, and 18 Republicans, 67 Democrats and 9 Populists in the negative. The President approved the bill on the same day.

The adjourned session of the Seventieth General Assembly of Ohio began on January 3d and closed its labors on April 22d. It passed 374 acts, a great majority of which were local, but a number of them very important measures with no bearing on political subjects.

The Republicans made the first nominations of the year. The State Convention was the fortieth since the formation of the party, and was held in the Grand Opera House in the city of Columbus on June 7th and 8th. It was called to order by F. S. Pursell, of Hocking County, Chairman of the State Central Committee; Rev. David R. Moore, of the city of Logan, invoked the blessings of God upon the Convention

Mr. Pursell, in his opening address, was at times inclined to indulge in humor, and altogether his remarks were appreciated by his hearers. Owing to limited space only his opening paragraphs are quoted:

Again we stand on the threshold of a political campaign with the scars of battle upon us; we again present ourselves for the consideration of the people of our Commonwealth. With an abiding faith in our cause and an honest, earnest hope for a restoration of reason among the suffragists of our land, we to-day proclaim to the thoughtless people that our flag is still there, that there is vitality still in the "Grand Old Party;" that the Republicans of this land still emulate the example, or rather voice the sentiment of Barnaby Rudge's raven, and "never say die." Though the monumental liars of the land have deceived and betrayed us though the World's Fair and the Tammany tiger have snatched from us what was left after the vulture feast of the cranky and imbecile followers of the hairy Peffers and the Simpless Soxen, yet, my sad and sorry fellow-citizens, we still live, we still live. And now, in the presence of this splendid assemblage, the pride and flower of Buckeye Republicanism, we once more kiss the old flag of our party and offer up anew our pledge of loyalty and devotion to a cause that can not die. Can the memory of Abraham Lincoln pass away? Can the deeds of the martyred Garfield be torn from our hearts? Can the splendid statesmanship of Benjamin Harrison be obscured? Can we ever obliterate the magnificent achievements of that magnetic man at whose tomb this Nation so recently bent the knee and bowed the head in sorrow? Can we forget our Foster in the Cabinet, or our gallant Foraker in the fight? Can we close our eyes to the career of our grand old John Sherman in the Senate or cease to remember that splendid man who sits in the Gubernatorial chair to-day, whose fame is as wide as civilization, and whose honesty is of that sterling character that prompted him to sacrifice the savings of his useful life upon the altar of his spotless integrity? Oh, no, my fellow citizens, we will not forget, we can not forget.

In concluding his address Mr. Pursell introduced General Charles H. Grosvenor, of Athens County, as Temporary Chairman. The temporary organization was made com

Secretary: Frank M. Martin, of Noble. Assistant Secretaries: William H. Clifford and Harry C. Mason, of Cuyahoga; W. E. Potter, of Auglaize; Edward Dunlap and Henry Rendthrop, of Hamilton; J. Harry Rabbitts, of Clarke; John D. Gallagher, of Clermont; R. B. Howard, of Henry; W. R. Johnson, of Jefferson; and Charles A. Cottrell, of Lucas.

Upon assuming the chair, General Grosvenor was heartily cheered and his remarks were frequently applauded. The following are quotations from his magnificent address:

It still remains a badge of honor to be a Republican and stand with the representative men of the Republican party. It is a party of principle, actuated by principle and working for principle, and so it is that it remains unintoxicated by victory and never stampeded by defeat. It gathers the fruit of its victories and administers upon them in the light of the great ideas of

the party. It construes its tenets and prepares for future action with reference to the unvarying terms and conditions of its organic laws. It never breaks up its battle formations to pursue the flying enemy, or to scalp the dead and wounded upon its victorious battlefields. It never burns its wagon-trains nor abandons its disabled friends nor retreats ingloriously from a field of discomfiture. It never cries out at the end of a victorious campaign in the language which we heard in November, 1892: "In we go, out you go, and now we'll be in clover." In the hour of victory it recognizes the momentous responsibility of administering the Government it saved from overthrow and destruction. In the hour of defeat it studies the causes that led to it, squares its action by the platform of the party, but never readjusts itself upon new lines of battle to catch the spasmodic breezes of popular favor which seem to blow hither and thither. Yet the Republican party is a progressive party and keeps up with the developments of politics. It meets new issues and adjusts itself to new phases and new conditions, but never by the abandonment either of party organization or party principles; and above all things, it will not throw out seductive suggestions to ephemeral ideas that amid the wreck of party politics, constantly arise and float for a few months upon the surface of things, destined to sink and be forgotten forever. Above all it obeys