The Indianapolis Journal

CLEVELAND'S CANT.
The
Ex-President Poses as a
Lover of All
Lofty Virtues.
Milwaukee Sentinel
Ex-president Cleveland has been making
another little speech. The occasion was
the services
in memory of the late Con-
gressman Cox.
The speech is only note-
worthy because of the characteristic quali-
ty which marks all Mr. Cleveland's speech-
es and letters intended for the public. His
main purpose always seems to be to invite
people to note what an embodiment of vir-
tue he is himself.
The trick of his utterances, whether by
mouth or pen, is to evoke a class of hypo-
crites and scoundrels; selfish, cold-blooded
enemies
of
the
people; and then to
emphasize his own sympathy with disin-
terestedness, virtue, the public welfare,
etc. Consequently, in speaking of Mr. Cox,
he used him as a foil to call attention to
his own fine sentiments. The things he
professed to admire in Mr. Cox were "un-
selfish public usefulness," "rigid adherence
to the demands of public duty," "zeal born
of public spirit," etc. As a matter of fact
Mr. Cox was not more distinguished for
these traits than the average
politician.
He was a
thorough-going
partisan, and
there is no evidence that he was more scru-
pulous than the average partisan.
No one
believes that he was
a corrupt man, in the
sense
that he would sell his vote for a pecu-
niary.
consideration, but congressmen who
sell their votes are few. We must conclude
that Mr. Cleveland assigned him all these
lofty virtues in order that Mr. Cleveland
might pose as their special admirer.
Mr. Cleveland never lets slip an oppor-
tunity to appear in this role. Even in
writing a letter to Tammany Hall last sum-
mer he employed the same subterfuge.
He painted Tammany as "a powerful in-
strumentality
for
meeting
and exposing
all
encroachments of selfish interest and the
stealthy advance of every corrupting in-
fluence," and he described it as "shielding
the people from error
and misrepresenta-
tion, championing the cause of the weak
who are right against the strong who are
wrong, and maintaining
the true spirit of
American institutions."
Verily, Mr. Cleveland
has made cant al-
most a fine art.