Speech #490030682

When you had got to the second year you would have found that instead of twofourths you had nearly threefourths of the offices falling vacant. and into them you could have put Democrats. with the unanimous consent of this Republican Senate. given that the men named were honest and honorable and true as men. not the persons whom the Democratic party has decorated with its favors and admirations. as the Senator from Indiana showed us. because they had been in the penitentiary or whatever. but that other and smaller proportion of the Democratic party that contained and comprised and was embodied in honest men. You would have got into the offices of this Government before half your administration was out. at least threefifths of all the executive functions of the Government. and before the term of this present President would have been out by almost a year there would have been ninetenths of the offices in the hands of his political adherents. I should not say "adherents.I but in the hands of men whose political opinions were like histhat is to say. they would have been in favor of suspending silver coinage no more. they would have been in favor of encouraging the pauper labor of Great Britain. Germany. and France. &c.. at the expense of the honest labor of American citizens. That is what I understand by a Democrat. you know.