The Cairo Daily Bulletin

The Bulletin.

LOGAN AND THE SENATORSHIP.

A Stinging Article From the Chicago Republican.

Why Logan Should not be Elected.

[From the Chicago Republican.]

That John A. Logan should be his own tempestuous champion in the Senatorial contest is not a matter of surprise to the attentive student of American politics, since experience leads to the conclusion that qualification and candidacy are generally in an inverse ratio to each other. When a man is wanting in every essential element of character which should enter into the make-up of a suitable candidate, he finds it necessary to atone for his deficiency by a large amount of personal exertion: and hence, while men of the Trumbull type are content to let the problem of political preferment work itself out, believing that selection will fall where fitness is found, the stern-wheel statesman of the Logan pattern betakes himself to personal solicitation and individual trumpeting. It remains to be seen whether the "forcing process" will be successful in elevating to the highest office in the gift of the people of Illinois a man whom nature and education seem to have united in recommending for a very moderate share of public honors.

That Mr. Logan will be elected to the United States Senate we certainly do not believe; that he ought not to be elected we are very confident; that the honor would be unworthily bestowed, and the State and people of Illinois infinitely belittled in the bestowal, we assert very positively. Once, upon a memorable occasion, in presence of the "Grand Inquest of the Nation," he essayed a conspicuous part on the floor of the Senate chamber. The humiliation of that failure would have checked a moderate ambition. A man in whom the cancer of egotism had not eaten out all sense of propriety would have been content with one ignominy, so great, so palpable, and yet self-sought. Forcing himself, then as now, above and beyond his betters, he intruded himself into a high office, and failed ingloriously on the very threshold.

For the present it is sufficient that we point out three substantial reasons why Mr. Logan should not be elected to the Senate: The first is moral: the second is intellectual; and the third is economical.

Morally he is unfit, because his political career has been that of a political freebooter—shifting ever on the strongest side, without any regard whatever to the considerations which should govern the actions of a conscientious man. Ever ready to advocate to-day what he denounced yesterday, and to cause to-morrow what he contemns to-day, he has been in turns traitor to everything and everybody from whom he has ever received honor or reward. His faithlessness to individuals has been as notorious as his faithlessness to principle: he has ever been on the alert for an opportunity to desert one or the other, when greater rewards beckoned him to the treason. Step by step he has made his way into public favor by dishonorable betrayals, backed by unblushing effrontery. And now that the people of this great state have a high office to bestow, must it be given to this petty Cut-throat? and must the United States Senate be converted into a Magdalen asylum for political harlots?

Intellectually, he is unfit to be the associate of such men as Trumbull and Carpenter and Schurz, and others of more or less ability who occupy seats in the higher branch of Congress. It is very true that the intellectual average of the Senate is now greatly below what it was twenty years ago; but the deterioration is perhaps no greater there than in other departments of public life. If there are no Clays, no Bentons, and no Calhouns in the Senate, so there are no Websters in the Cabinet, and not even a Fillmore or Tyler in the White House. But because we cannot find a giant for the successor of Douglas, we are not, therefore, compelled to go to the other extreme, and accept a pigmy.

Illinois has more than one State's share of public men capable of filling any great office with credit, if not with distinction, to themselves, and with honor to the people. Among these, however, we cannot include Mr. Logan, unless we are willing to exalt lungs above logic, and to mistake the loud-voiced babblements of the stump for the matured utterances of the forum.

Certainly we have a right to expect in a man who aspires to mingle his name with the great ones that have made the United States Senate conspicuous in history, at least the rudiments of a good education. Not that he should be capon crammed with useless literature, like Sumner, or able to discourse in the dead languages as they say of Mr. Patterson, of New Hampshire. But in these days of civil service reform and competitive examinations for $1,000 clerkships, it is not unreasonable to ask that the Senatorial standard shall involve the ability to speak and write the English language correctly, a moderate acquaintance with history, and a small amount of what is called general information.

Economically, the objection appeals to the pockets of the already overburdened taxpayers of Illinois, and presents itself to them in this form. Are they willing to pay $250,000 to elect Mr. Logan to the Senate? It will cost them every dollar of that amount to choose his successor as Congressman at large: and it must be distinctly understood that every man who seconds Mr. Logan's Senatorial aspirations favors the expenditure of this sum out of the State treasury. Our very decided opinion is, that there is a much better use for any $250,000 the State Treasurer may have on hand.