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About The Falls City tribune. (Falls City, Neb.) 1904-191? | View Entire Issue (Aug. 13, 1909)
wuManm-tM. Reminiscences of a Wayiarer Some of the Important Events of the Pioneer Days of Richardson County and Southeast Nebraska, as remembered by the writer, who has spent fifty one years here. The Year 1860. Of all the years in Hi*- life of our nation, none wore more fatefully eventful than that year of grace JNfiO. What I ha\e to say of It In these personal recollections will be large ly, tf not entirely, confined to the little of its mighty history that was made in my immediate presence in Richardson county. It does not lie in ray way to recount, If I possessed the ability and was properly equipped for the task, the events precedent in time that laud up to the result of the popular election held that year for president. It is sufficient to say that, not only the life of this govern ment,but all others of like constituent elements possible among men, was de termined thereby. Mad the experi ment (for the American Union was scarcely anything else in its first in ception) failed, the age of superior rule by the people of a government by themselves, in their collective ca pacity, would have been indefinitely postponed at least, though probably not defeated forever, for that is a very long time. Resides, the time to write that history has not come. When it does, the writer will come with it, and the great story will be told comprehensively, and correctly. The most that any historian, writing concurrently with the events he is nnrrnting can do, is to record the fact of their occurrence astheyappea to him; but it is only after the storm has pnsscd and reaction, so to speak, has taken place In the orderly oper ations of things, that effects can be intelligently measured and logically understood. Cause ami effect are very different things, yet both must be considered to understand either. Effects are "Like poison laid to work a long time after,” but until their work is done any story told of them would be Incomplete and therefore of doubt ful value. The French Revolution Is a hundred and twenty years old in its violent and bloody occurrence, but the ultimate effects flowing from and out of it have not yet wholly trans pired. The inimitable English clas sic put the proposition in a nut-shell when lie wrote his aphorism oi "poison laid to work a long tlnu after.” As heretofore recorded in these reminiscences we signalized tht opening of this eventful year l>\ having ail act passed by the legisla ture locating the county seat at Fall! City, and providing for a series of elections by the people to determine the question of its ultimate and per manent location. Something of the history of those elections has already been recited—all that would be of Interest to the people of the current generation, though if I were writing for old-timers only, 1 might amuse them somewhat In the relation of fa miliar things In those days. In which only those actually participating would care io hear of. Maybe I will mention some of them anyhow. Following the last election came the final legal contest to ascertain in a judicial way. which of the two contending towns had received a ma jority of the votes east by the duly qualified voters of the county. The contest extended far into the summer and as stated in a former paper,ended In the triumph of Falls City. There have been some spasmodic efforts at Intervals since to reopen the vexed question, hut time, which is said to "set all things even, finally wore out the desire to keep the county in a constant turmoil over a matter upon which the people had so decisively passed, and it ceased from the pub lic mind entirely. Too much of any thing is not relished by anybody, which lias led me to think sometimes, that too much glorious happiness in another state of which we have heard so much, would ultimately become monotonous, and unless changed in our nature so as to become substan tially somebody else, we would, in the course of such an existence, want to go back to earth, wake up some of the old boys and have another of our monkey and parrot times of the long ago, when we were actively en gaged in the agricultural business of sowing a fantastic cereal called “oats," of the untamed variety. This is mere fancy, but it lias been in my mind, and now and again 1 have thought about it not a little. In I860 Falls City had grown some, but the discovery of gold at Pike s Peak the year before had taken from us a good share of our restless peo ple—ana every town and community has a lot of them, who are always on the ' ook-out for that marvelous country where a pot of money is to be found at the end of every rain bow that spans its heavens and though some of them came back, as they invariably do, others drifted away, and the tide that was setting towards the western sea engulfed them, and they became a part of the lost tilings of the earth. The nomination of Abraham Un co In of Illinois by the republican national convention at Chicago, that met on May 10th of that year, as the candidate of that party for the of fice of president, was an inspiring 'circumstance that evoked the enthu siasm of every adherent of that party in all parts of the country, as much so in Nebraska as anywhere, notwith standing its citizens were debarred participation in the election on ac count of their residence in a ter ritory. It will be remembered that the ter ritorial governments of Kansas and Nebraska wore provided for and erected uud r the administration of Pierce, and of course all the terri torial officers were democrats; and1 to begin with, both territories were settled largly by democrats, but In | in.v.i the republicans held a convention at Ilellvieu in Sarpy county,and iioml noted Samuel G. Daily for delegate | to congress to fill the vacancy oc casioned by the death of Judge Ken ner Kerguson, whose term of office would not expire until the 4th of March. 18G1. Daily lived at Peru and had been a member of the legislature that met in the fall of 1858. He could make a pretty good stump speech, making up in self assertion and per sonal push and arrogance what lie lacked m education ami genuine anil ity. Tho nomination came to him much In the samo way Bryan got his nomination for congressman from the first district in 1890. Nobody thought the democrats could elect anybody that year and no serious effort was made by the old standbys like .1. Sterling Morton and others, and it easily went to Bryan, but in that year the prohibition amendment to the constitution came on to be adopt ed or rejected by the people and to make its defeat certain, Omaha, which was then a part of the first dis trict, with a legal voting strength of about 9,000 actually cast over 19,000 against the amendment, and every one of the 10,000 illegal votes so cast was a democratic one, and all for Boyd for governor ami llryan for con gress. In 18r>9 nobody thought the repub licans could win, and Daily was eas ily nominated on tho first ballot, and to the astonishment of everybody was elected. He posed as n lawyer, but 1 never heard of but ease in which he was counsel, and to make plain tlie kind of lawyer he was, I will toll something of his performance on that occasion. He was attorney for a man accused of the crime of rape, and after reading the indictment Dail ey concluded it was bad and moved to quash it, giving as a reason therefor, because it did pot charge that the crime was committed malicious ly; that is, it was not charged to have been committed with malice. There were several amused faces in court when the ground of Daily’s motion came to be known. The court re marked that that was the first time he had ever heard it contended that malice was an essential element of the crime of rape. It was not so at common law and it was very cer tain that tlie statute did not make it so, and the motion would have to bo overruled. It would be difficult to conceive of a more ridiculous prop osition, but it was not at all certain that Daily was conscious of it. He was nominated for the same office in I860, the year 1 am writing about, and was opposed by .1. Sterling Mor ton, who tnoti no lit ui<‘ onii'i' oi sec retary of the Territory, ail office that answen'il to that of our constitution al office of Secretary of State. It was during that campaign that I first saw Mr. Morton, and I thought then, as I did many times afterwards, that lie was the meanest democrat 1 ever saw. A republican in his esti mation was something more than in famous, nor was his opinion in that regard changed or modified during all the dark days of the Civil war, which he repeatedly denounced as not only unconstitutional, on the part of the Lincoln administration, hut every act of the government in trying to en force Its authority and maintain the integrity of the union was also con demned by him as unauthorized, bar barous and cruel. Mad lie lived in any loyal state, and talked as he did here on tlie outskirts of civiliza tion, he would have found his way to a military prison in short order. But here little attention was paid to him as he was powerless for evil, and com paratively harmless. There seems a grim sarcasm in the fact that such’ a man should be honored In his death with a monument by people who love the memory of Abraham Lincoln, who was abused in his life and shot to death in the same spirit that actuat ed the enemies of the nation in de nouncing the war to save the union, both north and south. The result of that election as shown by the face of the returns, was that Morton had been elected, but It turned out that in L’eau qul Court County, up on the Niobrara, a stupendous fraud had been commit ted. There were only about six legal voters in that county, but Morton’s agents and friends procured a return of the poll from that country showing that h. had carried it t>y about 220 majority, or something like that. I tally Instituted a contest and proved these facts. They were laid before Governor Samuel Black, and although In had issued a certificate of elec tion to Morton, when he became sat isfind that he was not legally elected he revoked his former certificate to Morton, and issued one to Daily. For that act Morton never forgave Gov. Black, and when the latter was kill ed at York Town in Virginia, in McClellan’s peninsular campaign in Die rebellion v, lien gallantly leading his command against the rebel forces, Morton actually exulted over the fact m a paper he was publishing in Ne braska City. When Gov. Black, dem ocrat its he was, surrendered his office as governor of tlie territory to his successor,Gov. Alvin Saunders, appointed by president. Lincoln, he vent to his old home in Pennsylvania procured a commission In the volun teer army of the Union, raised a reg iment of soldiers, went to the front and lost itis life in the defense of his country, hut who has ever said anything about rearing a monument t his memory? Not anybody that I ever heard of. Iho man who kept up a fire in the rear, the chief cop perhead of the territory, won his spurs slandering the great president and his loyal army, and dying is dis tinguished by people ignorant of the truth, as though he had in some signal way earned a monument for patriotic cervice performed for his country. It is not a very great feat, of patriotism to hold a civil office in time of peace, but it is something for a man to be true to his country even [ iu private station when traitors were making war to destroy it, and Mor j ton was not. These facts are men tioned hero that sycophants of all : degree, who delight in chiseling on brass or stone wondrous heralds of fame, whether deserved or not, may be estopped from denying the truth of history. Morton was a great man by mar | riage. The Joy family of Michigan j built railroads and became rich and i powerful, and Morton made the Hit of I his life when he hitched himself to their car and went whizzing through the world at record-breaking speed. Bryan sidetracked him however, and then he got mad, and pretty nearly changed his politics before he be came a democratic saint. The man of “ink and wind’’ will lose two feet or so off his monument for doing it. But to resume, when congress met in extraordinary session at the call of president Lincoln on July 4th, 1861 both Daily and Morton appeared arm ed with a certificate of election as delegate in congress from Nebraska. As Daily held the last in the series the clerk of the House recognized it j as the authorative document and put j Daily's name on the roll of members j •leet. That gave him the seat, and 1 Morton was compelled to become con- j testa,nt instead of Daily, and the ad- j vantage to that extent was against him Two other circumstances also stood ! as lions In his path, viz: the fraud his friends had committed in his fav or in L’eati riui Court county, and tin' changed political complexion of the house, brought about by the sec ession of the Southern States and the absence of their congressman from that. body. He was allowed however, to conduct his case in person, and to make a speech in the house in advo cacy of his right to sit instead of Daily, in which speech he emptied all the vials of his wrath on the head of Dundy, whom he accused of put ting up the political cards against him and inciting Gov. Dlack to nul lify his first certificate by issuing one to Daily; and by roundly abus ing his party and official associate in Nebraska, Samuel Black, for turn ing him down in favor of a black re publican. Morton could use that ad jective as applied to his opponents, with, what he believed to be, tremen dous effect. But it was no go. Mor ton didn’t get the seat and he never went to congress. i ms maae mm more sour man ever, and all through the war he talked like a man who would have been glad if the South had succeed ed in breaking up the Union. His intense partisan zeal and per sonal egotism outweighed everything else, and blinded him to the natural effect of his intemperate expressions on the subject of the Civil war. I trust 1 do his memory no injustice in what l have here written, for 1 certainly have no such intention, but the facts recited I know to be true of my own personal knowledge. There are others yet in life who know them to be true quite as well as I do. The great year of 1860 saw Lincoln elected president and the Union act ually dissolved so far as a state res olutions could accomplish that ob ject, but there was a man and a people, descendants of the worship ers of Odin and Thor, to reckon with before the fabric that Washing ton and Hamilton had built could be torn down and destroyed, The reck oning came, and the regenerated Union, stronger than ever still stands and will stand forever. When the digestion is all right, the action of the bowels regular, there is a natural craving and relish for food. When this is lacking you may know that you need a dose of Chmberlain s Stomach and Liver Tablets. They strengthen the digestive organs, im prove the appetite and regulate the bowels. Sold by all druggists. If it is Dirty Clean It Clean that Straw Hat of yours with REXALL STRAW HAT CLEAN ER. For 15 cents j ou get enough for two cleanings, at McMillan’s Pharmacy Opposite Postoffice Falls City, Neb. The Best Bargain in reading matter that your money can buy is your local pa per. It keeps you posted on the doings of the community. This Paper will tell you the things you want to know in an entertaining way; will give you all the news of the community; its every visit will prove a pleasure; it gives more than full value for the price asked for it. * - ^ If your liver is sluggish and out of tone, and you feel dull, bilious, con stipated, take a dose of Chamberlain’s Stomach and Liver Tablets tonight before retiring and you will feel all right in the morning. Sold by all druggists. Sure to Get Some. “Anything on deposit?” asked th* girl's father, brusquely. ‘‘Not exact ly in my owh name,” replied the rising young attorney, “but I’ve Just been ap pointed receiver of a bank." After this the essential “Bless you, my children,” was a foregone certainty. r ✓ TO introduce fine materials, clean methods, scientific equipment into the making of soda crackers was one triumph— To actually bake into them a subtle goodness, a real individuality, never before known, was another triumph— But to effectually protect them so that the fullest benefit of these fine materials, this careful, cleanly baking, this unique goodness comes to you unaltered, was the crowning triumph that gave the world Uneeda Biscuit
