The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Vol. 09 (of 12): Dresden Edition—PoliticalIngersoll, Robert Green
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The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Vol. 09 (of 12): Dresden Edition—Political
Ingersoll, Robert Green
Free thought
Now, my friends, the Democratic party (if you may call it a party)
brings forward as its candidate Samuel J. Tilden, of New York. I am
opposed to him, first, because he is an old bachelor. In a country like
ours, depending for its prosperity and glory upon an increase of the
population, to elect an old bachelor is a suicidal policy. Any man that
will live in this country for sixty years, surrounded by beautiful women
with rosy lips and dimpled cheeks, in every dimple lurking a Cupid, with
pearly teeth and sparkling eyes--any man that will push them all aside
and be satisfied with the embraces of the Democratic party, does not
even know the value of time. I am opposed to Samuel J. Tilden, because
he is a Democrat; because he belongs to the Democratic party of the city
of New York; the worst party ever organized in any civilized country.
No man should be President of this Nation who denies that it is a
Nation. Samuel J. Tilden denounced the war as an outrage. No man should
be President of this country that denounced a war waged in its defence
as an outrage. To elect such a man would be an outrage.
Samuel J. Tilden said that the flag stands for a contract; that it
stands for a confederation; that it stands for a bargain. But the great,
splendid Republican party says, "No! That flag stands for a great,
hoping, aspiring, sublime Nation, not for a confederacy."
I am opposed, I say, to the election of Samuel J. Tilden for another
reason. If he is elected he will be controlled by his party, and his
party will be controlled by the Southern stockholders in that party.
They own nineteen-twentieths of the stock, and they will dictate the
policy of the Democratic Corporation.
No Northern Democrat has the manliness to stand up before a Southern
Democrat. Every Democrat, nearly, has a face of dough, and the Southern
Democrat will swap his ears, change his nose, cut his mouth the other
way of the leather, so that his own mother would not know him, in
fifteen minutes. If Samuel J. Tilden is elected President of the
United States, he will be controlled by the Democratic party, and the
Democratic party will be controlled by the Southern Democracy--that is
to say, the late rebels; that is to say, the men that tried to destroy
the Government; that is to say, the men who are sorry they did not
destroy the Government; that is to say, the enemies of every friend of
this Union; that is to say, the murderers and the assassins of Union men
living in the Southern country.
Let me say another thing. If Mr. Tilden does not act in accordance with
the Southern Democratic command, the Southern Democracy will not allow
a single life to stand between them and the absolute control of this
country. Hendricks will then be their man. I say that it would be an
outrage to give this country into the control of men who endeavored to
destroy it, to give this country into the control of the Southern rebels
and haters of Union men.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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