1883 Election Results in Cortland County (Part One)

Joseph E. Eggleston

Stratton S. Knox

The Cortland News, Friday, November 9, 1883.

Election Results in Cortland County.

   Cortland county has done well on the general ticket and on most of the local candidates. The Democratic tidal wave is overcome here and beaten back.

   Last year Cortland county gave Cleveland 15 majority; this year the Republican State ticket has about 700.

   Last year a Democratic Assemblyman was elected by 700 majority; this year a Republican is elected by about 800 majority.

   Hon. Dennis McCarthy for Senator has about 700 majority, which, added to the 2,000 majority he receives in Onondaga, elects him handsomely.

   All good Republicans will regret the defeat of Joseph E. Eggleston, the Republican candidate for County Judge. His defeat is without justification or excuse, and the men who accomplished it will in the end regret what they have done. His fitness for the position and the purity of his private character was admitted by all. He has done good work for the Republican party in the past, and those Republicans who turned their backs upon him should repent in sackcloth and ashes. He was not a candidate for the position, nor was he nominated by any faction of the Republican party. In yielding to the solicitation of his friends to allow the use of his name, it was supposed that he would receive the votes of all Republicans. We hope the enemies of the Republican party will be satisfied with their work, and especially those men in our own ranks who aided and abetted them in slaughtering a good man.

   The defeat of Mr. Eggleston is due to the unexpected defection in the towns of Homer, Harford, Scott and Cincinnatus. Had those towns given him the vote which they did for the other Republican candidates, he would have been elected by a handsome majority.

“We Told You So!”

   The Cortland Standard of yesterday gave unmistakable signs that its support of Joseph E. Eggleston was hollow and merely for the purpose of retaining an appearance of regularity. While Mr. Eggleston was anxious to have the sincere support of the Standard, his friends understood that "deep down in the well" its editor did not desire the election of any candidate on the Republican ticket in this county, unless that candidate had acted with the "kickers" last fall. Does the Standard think that he [Publisher William H. Clark] can make his readers believe that if he had in good faith asked the Independents to support Mr. Eggleston they would not have done so?

    Every sensible man knows that the Standard was the head and front of the bolt last fall, and his followers would have accepted his advice had he told them in sincerity that Eggleston was worthy of their support It is known that the office of the Standard was the headquarters of the "kickers" who bolted Eggleston this fall. The men who stumped the county against Eggleston were welcome visitors at that office.

   In what we have thus said we do not mean to reflect upon the good faith of a large number of Independents in Cortland county who openly and boldly supported Mr. Eggleston. There were a large number of Independents who were just as enthusiastic and earnest for his election as the regulars. These men do not, like the editor of the Standard, run about the Streets and say "we told you so—we knew Eggleston would be defeated, because the “Ring” supported him.”

   But on the other hand, these men are outspoken against the "kickers" of this fall who defeated him. They acted the manly part. They said the convention that nominated Eggleston was fairly made up, that the caucuses were honestly held, and that it was the duty of all Republicans to support the whole ticket.

   The Standard man has now defined his position. He says that any man who supported the regular county ticket nominated last fall cannot be elected to any office in this county. We do not believe he speaks for the mass of the Independents in this county, but for only a small faction. We shall wait and see.

   The fact that the Standard published Rev. Mr. Wilcox's prohibition sermon in the interest of Mr. Knox, in its issue immediately following the county nominating convention, is proof that its editor was insincere in his support of Mr. Eggleston.

The Truth Plainly Told.

   The Homer Republican of this week in an article on Tuesday's election says that "the only matter of regret connected with our local campaign is the defeat of Joseph E. Eggleston, the Republican candidate for County Judge and Surrogate. The fight against him has been a most bitter and cruel one, and the most reprehensible feature of the matter is that the attacks did not come from his political opponents so much as from a little circle, composed mostly of clerical fanatics, who, inspired by hatred and malice, have gone broadside through the county and with venomous and lying tongues have persuaded people, over whom they unfortunately have influence, to bolt the fair and honest nomination of the Republican County Convention and to accept as their candidate the nominee of the Democrats. The warfare against Mr. Eggleston has been in some of its phases as disgraceful and indecent as has ever been waged against any candidate in the State. With this little junto, whenever a lie would serve their purpose better than the truth, the lie has been unhesitatingly used. With such men no man's character is safe."

   That is the truth aptly and strikingly put, and the Cortland Standard aids, abets and defends the "lying tongues" of those same "clerical fanatics."

Item.

   Now that Mr. Knox is elected County Judge, and they have the district attorney, the temperance men, if they believe what Rev. Mr. Putnam said in that Virgil speech, will expect every "gilded hell" to be dried up and the now red-faced "Temperance Democrats" will be seen about the streets pale and ghastly as old hay bleached through a long season of drizzling rain and "catching weather."

Item.

   The Standard says that Judge Smith is dead, and then proceeds deliberately and savagely to stab and kick the corpse, and all because the Judge did not give him his patronage. Money makes Mule Clark as well as the mare go.

Catholic Emancipation.

   MR. EDITOR: Your youthful readers will hardly understand the significance of this caption. Catholic emancipation is the name of an English statute which became a law in 1829. It put an end to a code which had been in force since 1691.

   Of the laws which disfranchised Catholics, the following are the chief provisions:

   No Roman Catholic may be the guardian of any child.

   No office, civil or military, can be held by a Roman Catholic.

   No Roman Catholic may vote or marry a Protestant wife.

   A priest celebrating such marriage shall be hanged.

   No Roman Catholic may practice law, or keep a school, or vote.

   A son of a Catholic turning Protestant could dispossess his father of his estate.

   A Roman Catholic heir could be deprived of his inheritance, in case the next heir was a Protestant.

   In view of such laws as these existing in free England up to 1829, it becomes us, when the topic of tolerance is up, to bow our heads and confess that there is a great deal of human nature in almost everybody.  

JUST SO.