230 



CONGRESS, UNITED STA 



members he was bribing, whereas it now turns 

 out that MoCorab was the man. 



' In that publication were used certain pi-i- 

 rate letters, whether truo or untrue will bo 

 developed in the course of this investigation, 

 but which nevertheless were private letters, 

 and which were intended to ii.tlucnoe and 

 .lilio ininii pending the pre-i- 

 dcntial election, and to prejudice a largo por- 

 tion of the country, not o much against the 



:>>lican party as against the purity and 

 character of many of the most eminent m.-n 

 in that party. Sir, the public never think well 

 of any man who, for pelf or passion, ushers 

 private letters into print, and they are likely 

 to think the leas of that man who, claiming 

 to be a Republican, attacks or suffers to be 

 attacked leading men of his own party, in a 

 lawsuit where money only is what he is after. 

 The use made of these private letters develops 

 in part the character of Mi-Comb ; but I pro- 

 pose by-and-by, more at length, to develop tho 

 character of this calumniator. I availed my- 

 self at that time of all opportunities, public 

 and private (though I was not in good health 

 and seUotn appeared in public), to say that so 

 far as I knew tin-re was nothing of truth in 

 that publication ; and I spoke with sonu- knowl- 

 edge, because I was and am a director of the 

 I'm. in Pacific Railroad, and have been for 

 many years. 



And now, before I go further, in order to 

 answer this oiurge properly, it becomes neces- 

 sary for me to say that some six or seven 

 years ago I was appointed by the then Presi- 

 dent of the United States a Government 

 director of the Union Pacific Railroad. Two 

 great interests, the one located in Boston and 

 the other in New York, were struggling in 

 the executive department and in the Depart- 

 ment of the Interior to secure the Government 

 director for the benefit either of the Boston or 



York interest, so that they could so far in- 

 fluence and control the government of the road. 



ii presented its distinguish. .! candidates, 



i_- them eminent men; I believe Gov- 

 ernor Andrews, an ex-Governor of the State 

 of Massachusetts, was one; and New York 

 presented candidates also. 



I,,:, President of the United - 

 Mr. John- MI. unable to decide among all 

 gentlemen wl.o had been preferred liy tlu-ir 



it tor th- place, none of them claiming it 

 personally, I believe, for it was a place cii' no 

 profit, no pay, no salary, except I 



i> while actually serving the then Pn-i- 



of the United States, as I was informal, 

 said to both the Xi-w York and the Boston 



:, ' I do not know person i h the-.-m.-n 

 yon recommend; but I do know Mr. Brooks; 

 I have sat beside him or in close conn 

 with him in the Old Hall of tin- House of 

 rewntstives for four years, and I nm willing 



ike him one of the Government 



oommisiion was made out and sent to me. 

 without tli sonal solicit-. -ion ,,n my 



pert, to the then great regret of the Boston in- 

 terests, and with a complimentary and explan- 

 atory letter, which I should have brought here 

 but for the recent destruction of this with 

 other documents in the conflagration of my 

 printing and editorial offices in New York. 



"I happened, then, to be a Government di- 

 rector, without sulury, without pay, except 

 five dollars a day, I think, while on actual 

 service, and so much 1'or travel per mile, the 

 usual congressional mileage, which amounted 

 in my case to little or nothing, because the 

 hoard generally sat in the city of New York, 

 which was my residence. 



When General Grant came into power, 

 naturally enough so prominent an assailant as 

 I was, and one so offensive politically, I trust 

 not personally, to him and to his party, was 

 turned out of office, and a distinguished ex- 

 member of Congress, Mr. Wilson, of Iowa, 

 was substituted in my place. The stockhold- 

 ers of that road, not supposed to be a political 

 rood, having invested millions of dollars in 

 that great trunk-line of the continent, indis- 

 posed to have the least suspicion go to the 

 country that it was a political road, immedi- 

 ately elected me as one of the stockholders' 

 directors. And since that time I have been 

 elected and reflected as one of the stockhold- 

 ers' directors by the stockholders themselves. 

 Three-fourths of the stock was then held in 

 Boston, and by men whom I have been oppos- 

 ing in political life for the last eight or tea 

 years, I valued the compliment all the more 

 for this, and I accepted the post, in part for 

 that, but the more to gratify an honorable am- 

 bition of having my name identified with the 

 greatest achievement of the age. 



<iver thirty years ago, in the newspaper 

 with which I am connected, one of the origi- 

 nal projectors of that rood, Mr. Whitney, then 

 well known, published to the world a series 

 of article, which greatly aroused the attention, 

 and which even gave me a lively interest in 

 what seemed then to be a wonderful if not 

 iinp-issihlc scheme. And whatever political 



1 rs in this House and elsewhere I may 



hav,- received from my countrymen, yet tho 

 liL-hest ambition I have ever had was to bo 

 connected with that great trunk-road from tho 

 to the Atlantic. If there is to be here- 

 after, I said to myself, any monument of nny 

 value to my memory, tho proudest hoth for 

 mo mid my children will be the association 

 and the connection of my hnmhle name with 

 that link of rail from ocean to ocean the 

 band of a continent, and the bond of my 

 country in a union, one and indivisible. 



" Another, a lesser, but yet a significant 

 reason for my acceptance of this post of stock- 

 holders' director, when President (irant re- 

 moved me as Government director, was what 

 I then deemed a matter of justice mid im- 

 portance to the Democratic party and my 

 I ifinocratic friends. I felt it my duty to see 

 that the road should not be in any manner 



