CONGRESS. (THE ELECTION AT CINCINNATI.) 



205 



fevr days prior to that time. I think it would 

 be very important, before we are prepared in 

 this house to impeach the United States Mar- 

 shal at Cincinnati, that we should know the 

 whole situation surrounding that officer at the 

 time he undertook what I allege to be all that he 

 undertook to do, to wit, to provide that there 

 should be a peaceable election, that all persons 

 of all races properly citizens of the United 

 States might go and cast their ballots. I would 

 like it to appear, if such be the case, that at 

 the very time these deputy-marshals were ap- 

 pointed in Cincinnati there were going about 

 the streets of that city officers, claiming at 

 least to be officers of that municipal corpora- 

 tion, seizing men simply because they were 

 colored men, and carrying them off and putting 

 them in the station-houses and locking them 

 up by the hundred, keeping them there until 

 the polls closed on the 14th day of October, 

 and then turning them out without any charges 

 of any kind against them. I may not be en- 

 tirely correct, but the newspapers undertake 

 to tell us that there were in one station-house 

 over three hundred colored men at one time, 

 against whom there was no charge alleged at 

 all, and that they lay there in that station-house 

 all through election-day, being kept there in 

 order that they should not go to the polls and 

 vote. 



"Now, it ought to he known what was the 

 condition of things surrounding this United 

 States officer who had certain duties cast upon 

 him under the laws of the United States, and 

 I would like this investigation to be broad 

 enough and full enough to bring to us and lay 

 before us all the circumstances that surrounded 

 him. This might help us to determine whether 

 or not he acted wisely and prudently, in the 

 light of the great responsibility which was 

 thrown upon him, when he appointed an unu- 

 sually large number of special deputy-marshals. 

 It might also enable us to tell whether or not 

 this officer acted within the proper scope of 

 his legal power when he directed his special 

 deputy-marshals to go to the polls and do their 

 duty resolutely under all circumstances. While 

 I am not going to object in any sense to the 

 investigation here proposed, I would like it to 

 be thorough and complete. It might be well 

 enough for this committee when they go out 

 to Cincinnati, when they are taking this testi- 

 mony, to find how many persons have been 

 indicted for violating the laws of the United 

 States in the manner which I have indicated 

 how many persons a grand jury, having as its 

 foreman a distinguished Democrat of Cincin- 

 nati, has indicted for seizing men on the street 

 and imprisoning them for no other reason and 

 no other purpose in the world than to prevent 

 them from voting how many have been con- 

 victed after fair trial for this kind of crime. A 

 presentation of such facts might enable us to 

 tell whether or not an honest, able, resolute 

 officer of the United States, clothed with power 

 under the law, acted wisely in appointing a 



very considerable number of men to go to the 

 polls and sue that peace, quiet, and order were 

 preserved there. 



" Mr. Speaker, I am one of those who be- 

 lieve that no peaceable, quiet citizen of the 

 United States, North or South, is ever injured 

 by having a strong peace power around the 

 ballot-box on election-duy. Only such persons 

 as go to the polls to create riot and disorder, 

 and prevent others from voting peaceably and 

 quietly, ever object to a strong power at the 

 polls on election- day for the protection of vot- 

 ers. In years gone by I have raised my voice 

 here and elsewhere in favor of such protection 

 to the rights of voters. I have voted in the di- 

 rection of having a strong power to protect the 

 quiet, peaceable voter everywhere in the United 

 States. 



44 1 believe in the power of the United States 

 in all national matters. Gentlemen on the 

 other side of the house have but recently upon 

 the public rostrum boasted of their readiness 

 and willingness to go, with all the power and 

 strength of the United States, into foreign lands 

 and upon foreign seas to protect a citizen of the 

 United States whenever he should be wronged 

 or harmed in any way. I would go as far as 

 he who goes the farthest in that direction. 

 But I also believe in protecting a citizen of the 

 United States under the flag of the United 

 States and within its boundaries. Therefore I 

 believe in an honest, fair, resolute power ex- 

 hibited, when the law authorizes it, to preserve 

 peace and quiet and order at elections in the 

 United States, and whether violations of law 

 of a character to prevent a peaceable citizen 

 from voting may exist in Ohio, in Mississippi, 

 or in South Carolina, I would apply every- 

 where the same rule and the same power." 



Mr. Follett, of Ohio, on the other hand, said : 

 " Now, Mr. Speaker, before this election was 

 held, this marshal was waited upon by citizens 

 of Ohio, with the request that he should dis- 

 close what his intentions were for the election- 

 day, and that he should co-operate with the 

 State officers for the purpose of securing a fair 

 and honest election. He said, in his immacu- 

 late dignity, as an officer of the United States, 

 that if the mayor of our city and the other per- 

 sons whose duty it was to see that there was 

 a fair election saw fit to wait upon him, his 

 majesty would be at his office at certain hours 

 in the day. One of these citizens, the presi- 

 dent of one of our leading railroads, one of the 

 most prominent citizens of Cincinnati, replied 

 to him in strong and vigorous language: 'Were 

 I the Mayor of Cincinnati, I would see you in a 

 hot place before I did so. Your little dignity 

 assuming to control the affairs of the State of 

 Ohio 1 And your office greater than that of the 

 Mayor of Cincinnati 1 ' 



"Now, Mr. Speaker, there were there on 

 that day, decorated with marshals' badges, men 

 professing and glorying in the cognomen of the 

 * Terror of Black Hills 'men just out of the 

 penitentiary from the State of Kentucky men 



