Proceedings & Collections - NSHS - Vol. IV

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HON. FRANK WELCH.

March 4th, 1877--September 4th, 1878.

As in the darkness of the night the electric flash reveals the form and foliage of the tree that perishes by its stroke, so do the memorial addresses of Congress reveal the manly virtues and lovable character possessed by the Hon. Frank Welch. From these, the first voluminous historian of Nebraska drew a biographical sketch; and from them this brief summary must be extracted. For all his innate modesty allowed him to report in the Congressional Directory was "Frank Welch, of Norfolk, was elected to the 45th Congress as a Republican."
Senator Paddock said of him, on memorial occasion:

Mr. President--I shall not delay the Senate by an extended memorabilia of our lamented colleague, Representative Welch. He was born on Bunker Hill, Charlestown, Massachusetts, February 10, 1835; was graduated at the Boston High School, and afterward specially educated and trained as a civil engineer. Soon after embarking in his profession the duties thereof called him into the West, and finally, while yet a very young man, in the year 1857, he established his home at Decatur, Nebraska. Mr. Welch was a gentleman in the highest and broadest sense of the term--kind, gentle, generous, manly. As might naturally have been expected of a young man possessing such qualities of mind and heart, he rapidly advanced to the front in society, and in affairs in his county and section. He was very soon chosen to represent his district in the council or senate of the first legislature chosen under state organization, of which body he was made the presiding officer. He held other positions of honor and trust under both the Federal

EDITORIAL NOTE.--Frank Welch was born on the Bunker Hill site, Massachusetts, February 10, 1835, and had his education in the schools of Boston. until his graduation from the High School of that place. His father had died when he was very small, leaving him to the training of his mother. He chose the work of civil engineering, and was engaged in railroad engineering in 1857, on a road terminating at the Missouri. On a printed list of the personnel of the territorial legislature of 1855, the name of Frank Welch appears, "age, 24; nativity, N. Y.; residence, Nebraska Center; occupation, telegraph operator." This does not tally with the information about him suggested by the various memorialists in "Memorial Addresses on the Life and Character of Frank Welch." Washington, 1879. His address is given as Decatur, in 1857; later, as West Point. In 1863 he was married to Miss Elizabeth Butts, of Hudson, New York. He was register of the U. S. land office at West Point from 1871 to 1876, when he was elected to the lower house of Congress. He died September 4, 1878.

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and State Governments, and in 1876 was elected a member of the Forty-fifth Congress. He represented the largest Congressional district in the Union, both as respects territorial extent and population. He was alone in the other House from Nebraska--a state embracing an area of seventy-five thousand square miles, with a population of nearly four hundred thousand--a comparatively new state, having innumerable and varied interests in process of development, dependent largely upon Federal legislation and Federal executive administration for encouragement and protection.
There was put upon him the labor of three men, and by day and by night unceasingly he struggled through the protracted and exciting session of last year to do it all. Mr. Welch was a man of great energy, industry, and pertinacity of purpose. He would do all required of him although he should know the effort would cost him his life; he did all, and as many another before him in like circumstances had done, he went prematurely to his grave. When the session closed, Mr. Welch returned to his constituency very much worn and broken in health. He needed rest, but he took it not. At once he entered upon an active and an exceedingly laborious political canvass. His physical machinery could not endure the additional strain put upon it, and then the end came, soon and swift but pangless. In the evening of the 4th day of September, 1878, in a public meeting, in the midst of a numerous audience composed largely of his political friends and admirers whom he was about to address, he was suddenly stricken and fell in death.

But it was not left to Nebraska alone to garland his tomb, Iowa, by the Hon. Mr. Sapp, furnished her contribution:

Mr. Speaker, I knew him long and well. For him time and earth have passed away; he has departed in the meridian of his manhood; in the midst of the glowing hopes of a successful life, like a vigorous tree cut down in the wealth of its summer bloom ere the bright green of a single leaf had been seared by the blight of Autumn.

WIGGINTON, of California:

We of the Committee of Public Lands all knew him with the most unhesitating confidence in and respect for his character and abilities as a man, and with a most cordial regard inspired by his genial and gracious temper as an associate. In the brief course of his parliamentary career, if he did not belong to the conspicuous few who compel our admiration for the brilliant intrepidity and force, alert-

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ness and power of intellect which achieve the leadership of the tumultuous debate, he had yet taken his assured place among those who are marked for sturdy independence and self-reliance of thought, conscientious inquiry for truth, and a high standard of determination and action,--qualities scarcely less valuable, though less resplendent, in him who serves the people in this hall.

MR. TIPTON, of Illinois:

I desire to place upon record to go down to history my judgment that he was one of the good men of this land; that every purpose, every object of his life was for the good of the people; that he had no motive, no purpose which in his judgment would injure any man on the face of this earth, but on the contrary his life was devoted to the good of all.

MR. CONGER, of Michigan:

Genial, warm-hearted, gentle, kindly, inoffensive, pleasant, and agreeable in all the relations of life, those who knew him were won to him by that loving, kindly, generous nature of his. He loved his fellow-men, and his fellow-men loved him; and many hearts were grieved, almost startled, when the news first reached them that our quiet friend had passed from the living and was numbered with those who had gone from these halls for ever.

MR. WRIGHT, of Pennsylvania:

We form our associates too often with our own party men, unless accident brings us in close contact with those of the opposite party, as accident in the line of my official duty here brought me in contact with Mr. Welch. I only wish I could be brought more often in contact with men differing from me in political affinities, if they could be of the kind of men that this man who has left us proved himself to be. I bade adieu in this chamber to a friend who in life was very near to me. I hope that in the future these halls may be filled with men who possess the heart, who have the ability, who have the judgment that he had who has gone forever. Peace to his ashes.

The words of Senator Saunders, of Nebraska, may close these unusually hearty tributes:

Our late associate has gone hence, sir, but his memory will survive, embalmed in the hearts of those who knew him and appreciate his manly qualities. He died, as he lived,

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deserving and possessing the warm-hearted esteem of many and the ill-will, I trust, of none. In private life in the state in which he lived he was respected, confided in and beloved to a very remarkable degree; and I have never witnessed a community apparently more deeply impressed by the death of one of its members than in the exhibition of sorrow over the death of our deceased associate.
The integrity of his character, the soundness of his judgment, and the kindness of his heart were well attested by the confidence and affection bestowed upon him in his life and the intense sorrow with which his untimely death was deplored.
Let us commend the heart-stricken widow, the fatherless children, and the bereaved relatives and friends to the tender mercies and teachings of Him who doeth all things well, and who alone can heal the bruised heart and calm the whirlwind of grief in the afflicted soul.

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HON. T. J. MAJORS.

December 2nd, 1878--March 3rd, 1879.

   Thomas J. Majors was born in Jefferson County, Iowa, June 25th, 1841; received an academic education; removed to Nebraska in 1860; engaged in mercantile pursuits; entered the Union army in 1861; was made 1st Lieutenant of Company C, First Nebraska Infantry, afterward Cavalry, and served until 1866; mustered out with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel.
   He was a member of the Territorial Council; served in the first State Senate and was re-elected; was appointed United States Assessor of Internal Revenue in 1869; was elected a contingent member of Congress in 1876 and 1878; was elected a representative to the 45th Congress in place of Frank Welch, deceased; and again elected a contingent member to the 46th Congress.
   The election of a contingent member proceeded upon the assumption that the population of Nebraska had increased so much subsequently to the census of 1870, and previous to that of 1880, as to entitle her to another member of the House of Representatives; but as the discretion was with the House, no additional one was granted till, under the apportionment of 1880, the State was found entitled to three instead of one. Hence, Mr. Majors was never known as a contingent member, but as the successor of Hon. Frank Welch, in the third session of the 45th Congress, which commenced December 2nd, 1878, and adjourned March 3rd, 1879. As this was a short session of ninety days only, there was no opportunity for the young and new member to signalize his term, either by oratorical displays or legislative achievements.
   Subsequently Mr. Majors was twice elected Lieutenant Governor; but in 1894, when Republican candidate for Governor, he was vigorously attacked by a leading and powerful paper of his party, the Omaha Bee, and defeated, while his party elected the legislature and all state officers.

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HON. E. K. VALENTINE.

March 4th, 1879--March 3rd, 1885.

   E. K. Valentine was born in Keosauqua, Iowa, June 1st, 1843, and like a majority of valued citizens who have attained eminence, was educated in the common schools.
   The first call of Mr. Lincoln for troops in 1861 found the enthusiastic youth at the "printer's case," who received a damper upon his ardor when informed by a mustering officer that lack of age and physical debility precluded his acceptance as an infantry volunteer. Having met the same impediment in a cavalry regiment, by perseverance he was finally mustered into the service in 1862, under a 90 days' call, and subsequently served in the secret service at Chicago and St. Louis; ending a military career as adjutant and brevet major for three years in the 7th Iowa Cavalry, upon the Western plains.
   Coming to Nebraska, in 1866, he was subsequently appointed Register of a United States Land Office at Omaha, and having been admitted to the bar, was elected judge of the 6th District in 1875, which office, he discharged until elected to the 46th Congress, where he was continued by subsequent elections through that of the 47th and 48th Congress.
   In order to take possession of the judicial office he had to sue out a writ of quo warranto upon his opponent who had received the certificate of election. The district was so large, and the only means of travel by private conveyance and over primitive roads, with extemporized hotels, and temples of justice, that the "Variegated District" would have been a graphic designation.
   During his first four years in Congress he was the sole Representative of the State in the House, while its voting population had increased from 8,922 in 1867, to 80,414 in 1882, showing a vast increase of legislative and departmental duties.
   From the census of 1880 the apportionment gave him two additional colleagues in 1882. At the commencement of his second

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Congress he became chairman of the Committee on Agriculture and during the 48th Congress was promoted to the Judiciary Committee.
In the contest in the House over the passage of the first bill to establish the Department of Agriculture, his labors were arduous in committee and conspicuous in the House. On account of certain provisions touching the railroad transportation of agricultural supplies or products a bitter fight was waged in behalf of a substitute for the original bill passed by a majority of 175, seven only voting in the negative. In the matter of a bill to straighten the northern boundary of the State his efforts were intelligently and persistently applied. He did not leave a single item of interest unguarded, before a department, in which a private citizen was concerned. Nor did he attempt to condone state representative delinquencies by irrelevant speeches; but where interests were to be defended and attacks parried, he was a soldier to the front with a banner unfurled.
During the administration of President Harrison the Senate of the United States made him Sergeant-at-arms, which office he discharged to the great satisfaction of the body, and in the true spirit of impartiality and fidelity.

MUD SILLS.

   During the reign of slavery in the United States, when that detestable system almost entirely dominated church and state, some owners of human stock couched their contempt for free white laborers of the North in that most offensive term "Mud Sills." And even in 1860, at the commencement of the Civil War, many Southern gentlemen anticipated the disagreeable necessity of unhorsing five "Mud Sills" at once, in single combat.
   Mr. Valentine having served through the war, and the member from Kentucky having had a like experience, and apparently having passed into history, it did not seem proper that the conception of "Mud Sills" should be perpetuated as "a survival of the fittest."
   It was not astonishing, therefore, that a young, vigorous, native American, of pioneer history and industrial associations, should resent an epithet born of an era of master and slave.

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   MR. VALENTINE: I do not believe that at this late day that rallying cry, or epithet, or whatever you desire to call it, of "Mud Sill," will be of any avail to the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Blackburn).
   He took occasion to term the Second Assistant Postmaster General a "mud sill" clerk. That kind of talk might have been of some avail twenty years ago on that side of the House; but I do not believe that, since the "late unpleasantness," the majority of my friends on that side of the House believe that any man at the North is a "mud sill"; and I should think the gentleman from Kentucky had received lessons enough upon that question himself not to have been found upon this floor, in this debate, terming an officer of the United States Government a "mud sill."
   I do not believe that his colleagues will agree with him, but will agree with me that this language was uncalled for and unnecessary. I have thought it proper that some one should make at least some reference to it, so that the epithet should not go by unchallenged. THE WEST.

During a discussion in 1880, in the House, Mr. Valentine found a legitimate opportunity to publish the great acquisition to the population of the State during the preceding year, which he put at over one hundred thousand. He said of a committee:

In the bill they undertake to say, we will set you back where you were sixteen months ago. Now sixteen months in the great West is a long time to our people. We grow rapidly in sixteen months, and our wants are greatly increased. Sixteen months in the West, in reference to its growth and wants, are as sixteen years in some of the Eastern States. INDIGNATION.

In the matter of a contested election case, the gentleman from Nebraska, in the parlance of the West, "turned himself loose" at the conclusion of a very cogent speech:

If the Democracy of this House oust the sitting member, a Republican, and seat the contestant, a Democrat, upon the case made and submitted, it will be a most damnable but fitting crown of infamy to place upon the brow of a once honorable but now dishonored and rejected party; and thus close the chapter of its history for 1880, which is one of fraud, forgery and frustrated ambition.
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On railroads and agriculture:

Mr. Reagan calls Agriculture and Commerce, as does the gentleman from West Virginia, twin sisters. The gentleman from Texas says he likes bold men, chivalrous men, men who have the courage to grapple with the lion,--monopoly; and yet he stands on this floor and asks you gentlemen to place internal commerce as a division alongside agriculture. Why, when, where, and how, at any time, have the agriculturists of this country come before this Congress or any other and by a lobby, or raising large sums of money, asked legislation in their behalf? And yet these gentlemen, who stand here and cry "Down with the railroads," say, "Take the railroad interest of this country and place it alongside of agriculture, as a division under a department of industries." Why, Mr. Speaker, how long do you suppose the agricultural lamb would exist placed alongside of the railroad lion?
If they are set side by side in one department of the Government, is there a man here who does not honestly believe that inside of two years the commerce lion would eat up, wool and all, the agricultural lamb?

In vindication of a division of statistics he said:

Heretofore the agriculturists of this land have had no help from these statistical reports. When I say no help, I may not be supposed to mean just what I say. We have had, it is true, a report coming from the Agricultural Department two or three years after the information was gathered. But we have had no help from the government to give the farmers a knowledge of the present status of their crops. Grain speculators, grain gamblers, have held the agriculturists in their grip for years. They spend thousands upon thousands of dollars to send agents through the entire agricultural regions of the country. If they desire to work upon wheat, they send their agents into the wheat regions; if upon cotton, they send their agents into the cotton regions; and they know by the time the crop is gathered, if not before, what the crop is. We want the farmers to have the benefit, if there be any, of a short crop in Europe or in any other portion of the world. We mean them to publish a market report that is authoritatively furnished by the Government of the United States, and not made up by boards of trade in the cities of Cincinnati, Chicago, New York--made by men whose only object it is to deceive the farmer and make him believe his crop is only worth fifty cents on the bushel when it is in reality worth a dollar.

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LAND SHARKS.

Of an act to protect settlers on public lands he said:

Now under the present system, while relinquishment papers are in Washington undergoing this long and tedious process of cancellation, some party near the land employs an attorney in the City of Washington, who visits the General Land Office daily, who enters his name as an attorney in the case.
He receives notice, when the entry is cancelled, and immediately telegraphs to his man, who watches the land office at its opening day by day; and in my own personal experience, while register of a land office, I have known one man to be there thirty consecutive days when the office was opened. This person, being the first legal applicant, makes entry and defeats the title of the man who has paid for the improvement on the land. Thus these attorneys or land sharks, in this city, have made hundreds and thousands of dollars out of the poor homestead settlers of the West.

The bill protecting the original settler was passed, providing for a thirty days' notice to the settler about to be dispossessed, which gave an opportunity to relocate and save his improvement, much to the delight of the member from Nebraska.

PLEURO-PNEUMONIA.

On a bill to prevent the spread of animal diseases the House received a valuable lesson.

MR. VALENTINE: During the Forty-sixth and Forty-seventh Congresses I had the honor to be a member of the Committee on Agriculture, and I was also a member of the sub-committee having in charge the question of pleuro-pneumonia. I had very much desired to speak at length upon this bill but for some reason or other the gentleman in charge of it could not find time for me.
I am therefore compelled to say what I have to say under the five minute rule; and as I know that I cannot in that time say what I would like to say touching the measure I will confine myself particularly to one subject, leaving the discussion of the constitutional question to those who have addressed the committee heretofore. I find in this bill nothing that I cannot subscribe to with reference to the constitution of this country. I shall not stop to argue the question, but merely state that as my conclusion. I believe that the people of this country are in immediate need

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of the passage of this or some bill which will regulate this disease of pleuro-pneumonia. While this bill goes further than that, and provides for the regulation of all contagious and communicable diseases among animals, I shall refer more particularly, in the short time I have, to that of pleuro-pneumonia. About a year ago, or a little more than that, some citizens of Chicago employed one of the most experienced veterinary surgeons of that region and sent him here. He came to see me and asked if I could point out to him the section of this country where pleuro-pneumonia existed. He said he desired to examine some of the cattle affected by it. I told him he could find them here in the District, or he could go across a few miles into Maryland and find there plenty of cattle affected by it.
He went over into the State of Maryland and found he could not get into the stables, or "corrals," as we term them in the West; that the State of Maryland had passed a law touching the matter of pleuro-pneumonia; that the governor, under the provisions of that act, had selected a state veterinary surgeon; that they found that the disease did exist; that they had taken the cattle from the dairymen, slaughtered them and paid them the pittance of $10 each for their cattle. Therefore he was excluded and could not reach what he desired in that way. Then he went down to the store, and got a pair of stoga boots, put on overalls, and went out among farmers as a common cow doctor, taking some prescriptions of charcoal that he said were good for that disease. In that way he got into the good graces of the farmers; and spent more than sixty days investigating the question of pleuro-pneumonia. And he found that among the dairy cattle of Maryland in the region surrounding this city that disease existed largely. He found that when these cattle became so thoroughly diseased that they were no longer fruitful to the owners for giving milk, they were sold in the night to Jews, and taken out and slaughtered and sold to the citizens of Baltimore and this city for beef. I say the members of Congress should not sit idle and prate about the constitution in the consideration of a question like this. They should do something to relieve this community and this country from this terrible plague. I have no doubt that today you are drinking the milk from cattle affected by this disease, and that you are eating beef-steak cut from them.

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HON. A. J. WEAVER.

March 4th, 1883--March 4th, 1887.

Archibald J. Weaver was born in Susquehanna County, Pennsylvania, April 15,1844; lived on a farm until seventeen years of age; then entered Wyoming Seminary, at Kensington, Pennsylvania, remaining there three years as a student and four years as a teacher of mathematics; in 1867 entered the law department of Harvard University, remaining till 1869; was admitted to the bar at Boston in February, 1869, and immediately removed to Nebraska, settling at Falls City in the practice of law; was a member of the Constitutional Convention in 1871; in 1872 was elected District Attorney of the First Judicial District; in 1875 again member of a Constitutional Convention and the same year was elected Judge of the First Judicial District, and re-elected in 1879, holding the office until a Representative to the 48th Congress; and was re-elected to the 49th Congress: On account of the rapid increase of population the census of 1880 entitled Nebraska to two additional members of Congress; and accordingly in 1882 Weaver of Richardson, Laird of Adams, and Valentine of Cuming County, were elected. This gave a valuable combination of talent and experience. Four years of previous congressional experience made Mr. Valentine a valuable worker; training on the bench prepared Judge Weaver for legal investigations; while a vivid fancy and impetuous nature made Laird an impromptu orator and "picturesque character."
A bill being before the House for the protection of cattle from "contagious diseases," and men from New England arguing that state laws could answer the purpose, Mr. Weaver exclaimed:

What has Massachusetts of the cattle industry of this country? Not enough to make a breakfast for the people of the United States. In Massachusetts, if all the steers and stags and bulls were cows, there would be only one cow to a family of seven,--scarcely enough to furnish milk for the babies.

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Take the great State of Nebraska for example,--with one-fourth of the population of Massachusetts,--and her 700,000 head of cattle, where 500 head of cattle don't make a large herd, but where a single herd, under one charge, often embraces thousands of head. How does the argument apply to Kansas with her 1,500,000 head,--Illinois with her 2,500,000 head--to Missouri with her 2,000,000 head, and to any of the great cattle growing states of the West?

The magnitude of the industry, and the danger from Texas fever, admonished him that only the interposition of Congress, under the clause of the constitution for the regulation of "interstate commerce," could meet the emergency.

THE VOICE OF VANDERBILT THE VOICE OF GOD.

Judge Weaver was conspicuous in the debates upon land grants to railroads, and all questions relative to the administration of the public domain. He took a very active part in the passage of a bill to regulate railway charges upon lines passing into and through states, and illuminated his precise judicial style with a flash of irony in the following paragraphs:

Mr. Brown goes so far as to argue that Congress has no power to pass any bill interfering with or regulating transportation of freight from state to state; but does make one strong admission, which forever ought to set the American people at ease, and operate as an estoppel against any railway seeking to gainsay the proposition, namely, that Congress has the power to appoint its agents for gathering statistical information in reference to any branch of industry; so that if we never succeed in passing this or any other bill, we have at least secured a concession of a representative of 6,000 miles of railroad that Congress may go into the statistical business with perfect safety. The gentleman evidently thinks the creature is bigger than the Creator and has reversed the adage, vox populi, vox Dei, and come to the conclusion that the voice of Vanderbilt, Gould and Huntington is the voice of God. COINAGE OF SILVER.

During the first session of the 49th Congress he delivered a very comprehensive speech for the "free coinage of silver."
In the opening sentence he charged "a conspiracy to double the national burden and the industries of the country, by making money dear, and all species of property cheap."

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Continuing he said:

Who has ever seen gold dollars doing the business of this country? Gold is not the money that keeps alive the thousand industries that supply bread for the sustenance, and clothes for the protection of the millions.

After a very thorough statement of our money supply, the value of our property subject to taxation, the increase of our population, commerce, manufactures and agriculture, and a comparison of them all with the great nations of the civilized world, there followed the emphatic declaration:

From the standpoint of national indebtedness, alone, we can readily see how impracticable it is to undertake to erect a single standard of gold; but when we go a step further and consider mechanical, corporate and private indebtedness, and then consider the amount of gold there is in the world, together with the annual product, the proposition appears too absurd to discuss.

He knew of but one firm of New York brokers "who have shown the manhood to expose the fallacies of this great cry against silver," and he added to his speech their very comprehensive circular.

MR. WEAVER: Mr. Speaker, there is no use in urging this question with a view to convincing money kings of this country. Their whole purpose is to steal something by legislation, by act of Congress. Nothing seems to satisfy their ambition but gold. Love of country--patriotism--a desire for the prosperity of the masses never found lodgment in their ignoble souls.
Favoritism must stop. The representatives of the people must correct the existing evils and legislate for the masses, or in absence of this, when there shall be no other hope, the barefooted militia will come down from the hills and take charge of the Capitol. LOGAN MEMORIAL OCCASION.

MR. WEAVER:

John A. Logan dead! no, not dead!

"There is no death!
What seems so is transition:
This life of mortal breath
Is but a suburb of the life elysian,
Whose portal we call death."

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   The noble traits of John A. Logan have been indelibly stamped upon the hearts of the American people. His whole life as warrior and statesman was dedicated to giving full force and significance to the affirmation of the Declaration of Independence--"That all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness." When that mighty effort for the destruction of constitutional liberty had well nigh sapped the foundations of this Republic, when weak and wavering men, to avoid the terrible consequences of war, were willing to make concessions, looking to the separation of this Union, then it was that John A. Logan, rising above all considerations of party policy, inspired by a patriotism and love of country as fervent as that which moved the heart of William Wallace to strike mightily for freedom of his countrymen, then it was, I say, that this great warrior and statesman breathed upon the discontented and wavering element of his own party utterances of such pure and patriotic devotion to his whole united country as will make his memory as lasting and imperishable as the Republic itself.
   The noble traits of his character in his devotion to his country were made more conspicuous because of his lifelong affiliation with a party that was now engaged in a war for the destruction of the Union and the dedication of one part thereof to human slavery.
   Before the bugle blast of war had called any of our country's defenders to the field, but when every movement of the discontented element attested the fearful truth that civil war with all its dire consequences was about to test the national bond, upon this floor, in February, 1861, John A. Logan said: "I have been taught that the preservation of this glorious Union, with its broad flag waving over us as the shield of our protection on land and sea, is paramount to all parties and platforms that ever have existed or ever can exist. I would to-day, if I had the power, sink my own party and every other one with all their platforms into the vortex of ruin, without heaving a sigh or shedding a tear, to save the Union, or even to stay the revolution where it is."
   This was but a patriotic declaration before the clash of arms; but in confirmation of his entire consecration and devotion to the preservation of the Union we have only to let impartial history bear witness. Not content to serve his country in the halls of Congress away from the exposure and danger of shot and shell, this brave man rushed into the thickest of the battle. Where Logan went victory

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perched upon the stars and stripes. He was the inspiration and his soldiers followed him into battle with a spirit of confidence and determination that knows no defeat.
From whatever cause that may be assigned by the faithful chronicler of events, yet no one will ever attempt to gainsay that where John A. Logan went there was victory, there was fighting. He was one whose presence meant a contest, a struggle to the death. Let Belmont and Donelson and Vicksburg and Corinth, and Champion Hill and other battlefields attest to the truth of the allegation.
In that contest for the preservation of the Nation, for right against wrong, for freedom against slavery, for all that was good and pure and noble, against all that was wicked and wrong and oppressive, wherein from the beginning of the contest to the close more than two and one-half million of citizen soldiers placed their lives upon the altar of their country in the contest--we do know that John A. Logan was the greatest volunteer soldier, the greatest commander taken from civil life. He was the recognized leader of that great army of volunteer soldiers, and from the close of the war has been the defender and champion of the cause of the common soldier in the Congress of the United States. The defenders of our common country whose valor has been attested on a hundred battlefields have lost their greatest friend and our country has lost a great warrior and pure statesman. John A. Logan has been in the public service almost continuously for more than thirty years, and during all these years of faithful service his conduct has been so pure that not even a suggestion of corruption was ever associated with his name. His mission in life was not a struggle for the accumulation of gold. He sought not to pacify his conscience with the gilded bubble of wealth; he neglected not the elements of intellectual and moral greatness for the sordid and perishable things of time. His whole life was dedicated to his country,--to human rights, to making more firm and lasting the foundations of this Republic. He has woven his name in history with illustrious and praiseworthy deeds. Oh, that we had more Logans in the public service! More whose every thought and every effort were given to the discharge of public duty; more who sought no opportunity from public position to secure ill-gotten gains to the detriment of the general public; more who come to high public place because the public demand their service and not because the place is made the subject of barter or to serve some special interest.