The story of Maryland politics

Preface

This book does not profess to be a wholly complete political history of Maryland. The data for such a volume cannot be obtained because it does not exist. What I have attempted to do is to tell the political story of the State from the close of the Civil War to the present time, as accurately as possible and without bias.

I have tried to give the facts about every political struggle worth telling about; to trace the rise and fall of the political factors in each; to show their relations to each other, the way they played politics and the kind of men they were. I have sought to picture every campaign made in the State since 1864, to give the names of the men nominated for the principal offices and those elected, to show the political causes that swept them in anu out of office, the source from which they dc'-'ved their power and the way in which they used it. The "insiae" and unpublished politics of the many notable fights that have been waged in this State is here given and it has also seemed worth while to comoile the names of the men who have represented Maryland in ...e Legislature and in Congress since 1880, in that there exists no other record of these men, and unless put in a form where they can be preserved, all recollection of them is bound to fade.

It has taken nearly two years to gather the data upon which this book is based. In that time I have sought and obtained from men who were in the thick of the fights the information necessary to write the real story of the times. As the political reporter of the Baltimore Sun from 1900 to 1910, I had unusual opportunities for knowing the real politics played between those years. Prior to 1900, my information had to come from others and from the files of the Baltimore newspapers. I desire to take this opportunity to acknowledge my debt to the late John Prentiss Poe, the late William Pinkney Whyte, and the late Isaac Freeman Rasin, and to William F. Stone, Isaac Lobe Straus, Frank A. Furst, Frank Brown, Frank A. Richardson, Robert

Grain, Douglas H. Thomas, A. Leo Knott, T. J. C. Williams, Murray Vandiver, Judge J. Upshur Dennis, Carroll W. Rasin, Joseph Y. Brattan, J. F. C. Talbott, and many others who have aided me in getting at the truth of the past.

The book may not be free from errors, but these are not material ones, and if it is of any value in keeping alive the State's political history and in showing its political progress, I will be satisfied. F. R. K.

Chapter I

The Redemption of Mar\-land Froi- Militarism — Governor Swann and the Senatorship.

The close of the Ci\-il War found the flower of the manhood of Mar>-Iand disfranchised. In those days it was not only a one-party State, but there was practically but one ticket in the field. During the war the baUot was denied every man known or suspected to be in s>-mpathy with the Confederacy. The poUs were surrounded by Federal soldiers. Tickets known as the Union and the Union Republican tickets were put up and elections were carried and men put into oflSce by the votes of an insignificant fraction of the male population. The test oaths and intimidation tactics employed by the militar>- and the politicians that stood behind it disfranchised three-fourths of the white male citizens of Man-land. and popular suffrage was really almost extinct.

This was the situation at the close of the war. and there are

many men living in Mar>-land today who remember with painful

distinctness the high-handed and outrageous methods used to

gamer the spoils in those days. The beginning of the change

came after the election of Governor Thomas Swann in 1864.

Governor Swann was a Union man and was elected on the

Union ticket, but he had been in ofl&ce but a short time before

he gave unmistakable indications of a desire to cttt loose from

the Republican oligarchy which was determined to permanently

keep in fetters the Democratic majority. It was through him

the registration books were opened and the franchise restored.

It was his appointment of registrars who would not enforce the

obnoxious test oaths and who placed back upon the books the

names of the thousands of white men entitled to the privileges

of the ballot, but from whom it had been taken that finally

resulted in the withdrawal of the militar>- and the clearing of 3 ft TUK sroKV ov MAKVi wn iH>i rnrs.

(he whole political alinosphcro. rtior lo the Swann election the Oetnoetatie party was a feeble and futile oi-j^anization. overawed In the militia and hainstrutig: by such test oaths as these, manipulated and construed so as to deprive men of the right to vote:

"i i\o swear or atlirm that I am a citizen of the United States; that 1 have never !;iven any aid, countenance or supix)rt to those in armed hostility to the I'nited States: that I have never expressed a desire for the triumph of said enemies over the arms of the I'nited States, and that 1 will bear true faith and allegiance to the l^iited States and support the Constitution aiid tlie laws thereof as the supreme law of the land, any law or ordinajKe of any State to tlie contrary notwithstanding; that I will, in all respects, demean myself as a loyal citizen of the United States, and I make this oath or affirmation without reservation or evasion and believing it to be binding on me."

The Constitution of the State then in force also contained this clause which was particularly useful to the politicians in refusing the ballot to noany who did take the oath above:

"Any person declining to take such oath shall not be allowed to vote, but the taking of such oath shall not be deemed conclusive evidence of the right of such person to vote."

With complete control of the voting machinery it can be realized how easily these provisions could be used as weapons of disfrancliisement and they were so used. Bonie down under the weig^lit of these handicaps, the Democrats in the Mayoralty election in October, 1S64. had no candidates at all. John Lee Cliapman and Archibald Stirling, Jr., both Union men. were the only nominees for Mayor, and the Chapman ticket was elected by about 8,000 majority, the Democrats taking no part in that fight, but concentrating all their energies against the adoption of the Constitution of 1864, which was voted upon at the same time, and which was declared adopted by a small majority, notwithstanding tlie charges of fraud made by the Democratic committee to Governor Bradford. The "soldier" vote was denounced as a fraudulent one, and the accusation w^as nude that the returns liad been deliberately held back in order to pad them sufficientlv. Proof of this was offered, but it was vrarr or w^mruksn mtrxstm.

of no avaiL It is uiteniHiu^ to aafie tite w«ee Ae

be one. Oden Bowie was yf l aw hbw of tiic Desnooeatic State Csitral Commfttee at die tine, ami A. Leo Kflolfc was its aecretarj. At a meermg heki Oetofier 27. 1S64, go fonaoiate thdr protest against the frand by winch the Ctm^uk^ti^ f ^gs adapted, rhf following were present:

Baltiraorc Cottnty — W. M. Isaac, George H. Csrwtsm R. R. Boarman, Caleb D. Owing?. E. 5. Myers. Edward Sp r wr n and Thomas Todd.

Baltimore Citv — Bernard Carter. Albert Urn-hit^ James H. Brewer. W. H. Roberts. Edward B. Baffam. Ezra Whimian. Josfana yt Boslev, A. Leo Knott. J. Wc^ev Waddns. WHfiam Tomer, John Wlson, Dr. M. N. Tayior, W. H. Joimson. Nkhofas gite iii H, Edward J. Chaisty. Robert H. Wright: Thomas W. Caoip&eS!. Edward G. Starr anrf W. C. Scetshens.

Calvert — T. Lewis Griffith. Daniei R. ifa^ruder. Dr. 3. O.

Carroll — George Criuse. ~r Ze.t. , t VV. Maow ^id Ja'-:':b P-'z^e-

W. F. J. Henry, Dr. J. H. M ; ; Dr. J. J. Baddey.

Charles— Dr. T^- . - ^ -ck Stneu

Fredenck— t^en , ^_ V. Dbrsey, J<An

HarT:-i — R. R. \ ancf^er. I- ,1 J. Rnsfe Street.

Keat — James Alfrec Pearce.

0"-"-^ - -^ — Maci^n Brcwri and W. H. N'eal

Somerset — Levin Woolford and George R. Dennis.

St. Mary's— John F. Dent and C. F. Maddox.

Talbot — John Harrington and Captain Hardcastle.

Worcester — L. Derrickson and John R. Franklin.

Washington — Jacob H. Grove and William T. Hamilton.

In the Democratic State convention of that year Ezekiel F. Chambers, of Kent county, was nominated for Governor against Governor Swann. Mr. Bernard Carter made the nominating speech, and his friends endeavored to make him accept the nomination for Attorney-General. Notwithstanding his declination, they put his name before the convention, and it was not until the fifth ballot that he was permitted to withdraw, and I. Nevitt Steele was nominated. Later Mr. Steele got off the ticket and Mr. Carter became the candidate. Mr. Bowie, afterward Governor, was the candidate for Lieutenant-Governor. It was the year of the Presidential election and Swann ran on the ticket with Lincoln, who had been renominated for the Presidency by his party. The State candidates of the two parties in Maryland were:

UNION.

Governor — Thomas Swann.

Lieutenant-Governor — Christopher Columbus Cox.

Attorney - General — Alexander Randall, of Anne Arundel county.

Comptroller — Robert J. Jump, of Caroline county.

Judge of the Court of Appeals — Daniel Wiesel, of Washington county.

DEMOCRATIC.

Governor — Ezekiel F. Chambers, of Kent county. Lieutenant-Governor — Oden Bowie, of Prince George's county. Attorney-General — Bernard Carter, of Baltimore city. Comptroller — A. Lingan Jarrett. of Harford county. Judge of the Court of Appeals — W. P. Maulsby, of Frederick county.

The Union candidates for Congress were J. A. J. Creswell, Edwin H. Webster, Charles E. Phelps, Frank Thomas and John G. Holland, while the Democrats had nominated Hiram McCullough, William Kimmel, A. Leo Knott, A. K. Syester and Benjamin G. Harris. James R. Brewer was a candidate for the ^State Senate in the city, and Jacob Frey, afterward Police Marshal, and E. J. Chaisty were on the House of Delegates ticket. The election was held on November 8, 1864. Every person applying to vote was required to take the test oath, and many were peremptorily challenged for alleged disloyalty and their votes refused. Swann was elected by about 9,000 majority, and the rest of the ticket went in with him. The Democrats secured a majority of 2 in the State Senate, then composed of 24 members, but the Republicans had a majority of 24 in the House and complete control. There was not a single Democrat from Baltimore City elected to either House of Delegates or Senate. Almost immediately after taking his seat Governor Swann began to co-operate with the Democrats in the Legislature in their efforts to free themselves from the bonds under which they had so long chafed. His course in this brought down upon him the bitter denunciation of the Republican politicians who had helped nominate and elect him, but it gained for him Statewide praise and commendation among the Democrats as well as among the fair-minded members of his own party, the decent element of which had become disgusted with the rank injustice and brutality with which elections were conducted.

There is a story that Swann's course was the result of a bargain made by him with the Democrats by which in return for his influence in opening the registration lists he was to have — and later he got it — the Democratic support for United States Senator. This accusation was made by the embittered men of his own party who regarded him as a traitor, but there is no evidence to sustain this charge, nor to show that Swann was prompted by any other motive than his own sense of justice and right. At all events by opening the registration lists lie made it possible for the Democrats to gain control of the Legislature of 1867, and this was the Legislature that called the Constitutional Convention of 1867. The Republicans declined to recognize the validity of the call, and ignored it. They refrained from going to the polls, believing up to the -last moment they would get help and encouragement from Washington. They did not get it, and in the convention that met in May, and adjourned August 19, 1867, after 75 days of continuous session, there was not a single Republican. It was a solid, conservative, substantial body of men, earnest and sincere. Judge R. B. Carmichael, who some time before had been clubbed ofif the bench with revolvers wielded by Federal deputy marshals, presided over the convention, and there were as members the men of brains, influence and character in the State. Among them were Bernard Carter, Judge Henry Page, the late Judge AJbert C. Ritchie, Henry Farnandis, of Harford county; George William Brown, the late Judge Wickes, George M. Gill, Judge Henry F. Garey and many others. When this body completed its work the present Constitution of the State had been framed.

In the January before the Constitutional Convention Governor Swann made his first fight for the United States Senate, and the incidents connected with this fight form one of the most interesting episodes of this period. At the time Maryland was represented in the United States Senate by Reverdy Johnson, who, a Whig before the war, had acted with the Democrats afterward, and John Andrew Jackson Creswell, of Cecil county, who was elected by the Legislature of 1865 to fill out the unexpired term ^ of Senator Thomas H. Hicks, who died in that year. Creswell was later Postmaster-General under Grant and was a most resourceful politician. Various accounts of why Swann at the last minute declined the Senatorship. to which the Democrats had elected him, and which he ardently desired, have been given, but the actual inside story of how he avoided the trap set for him by the Republicans, and how he obtained the tip, have never been told.

The fact is that it was a woman who let the cat out of the bag, and spoiled the well-laid, carefully concealed Republican plan of knocking Swann out of the Governorship, as well as the Senatorship. The most interesting part of the story, which is undoubtedly true, is that the woman was Mrs. Creswell, wife of the man Swann proposed to succeed, and who was fighting to hold on to the place. Few men at the time knew the actual facts, and fewer still know it now. Two who did, however, were Mr. John P. Poe and Mr. Bernard Carter, and they gained their information more than a year after Swann's declination.

One day about this time, Mr. Poe and Mr. Carter were coming over from Washington to Baltimore on a Baltimore and Ohio train. Montgomery Blair, an uncle of State Senator Blair Lee, of Montgomery county, who had been Postmaster-General under Lincoln, and was also a brother of Francis P. Blair, Democratic candidate for the Vice-Presidency in 1868, was on the train, and the three men engaged in conversation. Montgomery Blair told this story. He said after Swann had been elected Senator by the Democratic Legislature, two men from Cecil county, one a Republican and one a Democrat, and both warm friends of Senator Creswell, were in Washington enjoying themselves. When the time came to go home one of them said to the other, "Let's go up and pay our respects to the Senator before we go. We can wait over for the next train just as well." The other Cecil countian agreed, and the two got on a car and went up to Senator Creswell's house. Senator Creswell was not at home, but Mrs. Creswell came down to greet them. She knew the Republican as a personal and political friend of her husband, and naturally supposed his companion to be a Republican, too. She began to talk of her husband's retirement from the Senate in a day or so, and one of the men said something about Governor Swann's election as his successor.

''Oh, yes," said Mrs. Creswell, "but we do not intend to let him take his seat," and she thereupon told of the determination of the Senate leaders to turn Swann down upon the ground that he had entered into a corrupt bargain with the Democrats to secure his election. The plan was to keep this a secret until Swann had relinquished the Governorship and Christopher Columbus Cox had been installed in his place. If this could be carried through the Republicans would have had the State and Swann would have been out in the cold and jobless.

Mrs. Creswell's naive and candid tale thrilled the Cecil county Democrat with interest. He drank it all in without batting an eye, but he was doing- some pretty fast thinking, and as soon as he got out of the Creswell house he made the quickest possible time getting in touch with Montgomery Blair, to whom he related what Mrs. Creswell had said. This was the first intimation the Democratic leaders had had that Swann would not be permitted to take his seat, and as he was to relinquish the Governorship the next day, it presented a most serious situation.

Blair immediately dispatched a trusted messenger to Annapolis with the news for Governor Swann. The messenger reached Annapolis about an hour and a half before the Legislature convened for the day, and delivered the news to Swann. Mr. Cox, the Lieutenant-Governor, elected on the same ticket with Swann, was in iVnnapolis with his wife, daughters and friends, waiting to be inaugurated immediately after Swann resigned the Governorship, and all the preparations for the inaugural were complete. Upon the receipt of Blair's message Swann hastily sent this letter to Cox:

"Having informed you of my purpose to resign the position which I now hold as Governor of Maryland on February 26 (this day), I now state in order that it may be communicated to the Senate to whom the announcement has been made, that I do not feel at liberty to take this important step without further time for deliberation. I shall communicate with the General Assembly at as early a date as practicable upon this matter.

"With great respect, I am, your obedient servant,

"Thomas Swann."

Cox may or may not have known of the intention of the Senate leaders not to seat Swann, but he knew nothing of Swann's purpose to decline until he got this letter, and this was just before he entered the old Senate Chamber to preside over that body. He had expected to be Governor in an hour, and the collapse of his elaborate inaugural plans brought great mortification and humiliation to him and his friends.

On March 2 — four days later — Swann sent this communication to the Legislature:

"Gentlemen: — I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of an official communication from the President of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Delegates informing me that the General Assembly of Maryland had elected me a Senator of the United States for the term of six years from March 4, 1867. This honor has been conferred upon me, as is well known throughout the State, without any urging or solicitation upon my part. It had been my purpose in response to the action of your honorable body and what was then the wish of the people of the State, to have accepted this high trust, and I had so expressed myself on various occasions and more recently in an interview with the Lieutenant-Governor. Within a short time past, however, and up to the date of my communication to that officer on the 26th ultimo, when my resignation was expected to be officially announced, I have been visited by such appeals from the representative men of the State, urged with an earnestness and unanimity which could not be mistaken, asking my continuance in the Gubernatorial chair, that I did not feel at liberty to consult my individual preferences in making up a final judgment upon this subject. I have no right from any motive of personal ambition in connection with the Senatorial office, if such could be supposed for a moment to influence my action, to disregard my paramount obligation to the people of my State. With this brief explanation I deem it proper to avail myself of the earliest opportunity compatible with the public interests, and in deference to what I believe to be my duty to the people of the State of Maryland, to decline appointment of Senator of the United States for six years from March 4, 1867, and to return to the General Assembly my grateful appreciation of the distinguished honor it has conferred upon me."

The fact that Swann had learned of the plan to refuse him admission to the Senate after he had given up the Governorship, of course, became known after a while. Swann, at the time, got the credit of sacrificing his own personal ambitions in order not to turn the State over to the Republicans, and a resolution was passed by the Legislature by the vote of every Democrat highly commending him for his stand, and practically pledging him its support next time. After Swann's declination the Legislature again went into the throes of electing a Senator, and all the candidates who had been in the fight before again came to the front. Among them were E. K. Wilson, Isaac D. Jones, George R. Dennis and James T. Earle. After balloting for some days Philip Francis Thomas was chosen, but he was not permitted to take his seat in the Senate on the ground that he had given "aid and comfort to the enemy," his crime consisting of the fact that he had given his son $io to go South during the war. Following this, the Legislature elected General George' R. Vickers, of Kent county, and him the Senate seated.

An interesting incident connected with General Vickers' election is that his vote was necessary to sustain Andrew Johnson in the impeachment trial then pending in the Senate, General Vickers was at his home in Chestertown when he was elected. Word came to the Democratic leaders from Washington that his vote was needed. After the Legislature adjourned on the day of his election an ice boat was obtained and General Vickers' friends, led by J. Q. A. Robson, of Baltimore, made the trip from Annapolis to Chestertown, breaking the ice in the bay as they went. They reached General Vickers' home late at night, and it is stated got him out of bed, notified him of his election, took him to Baltimore by boat, put him on a special Baltimore and Ohio train furnished by John W. Garrett, and got him to Washington just in time to be sworn in and cast his vote in favor of the President. The impeachment proceedings against Andrew Johnson failed of success by one vote, and the claim has been made that but for the prompt action of the Democratic leaders in Maryland they would have been successful.

Chapter II

The Rise to Power of Gorman and Rasin — Entrance of the Negro Into Politics.

In 1866 both the late Arthur P. Gorman and the late I. Freeman Rasin were active in politics, although they had not then met and had no claims to leadership.

Mr. Gorman during the Civil War was assistant postmaster of the United States Senate, and while Swann was Governor he was made Collector of Internal Revenue for the Fifth Maryland district by President Andrew Johnson, with whom he was a great personal favorite. He was then about 27 years old, and was possessed of a certain amount of strength in Howard county, but had no real following. Those who knew him recognized the power and ability of the man, and even at that age he had a reputation for political astuteness and sagacity. At that time he is described as dressing in a ministerial blackness unusual for a man of his age and preserving a grave and serious countenance. His absolute impassiveness and imperturability were then, as in the years to follow, most marked. No one can be found who even in his youth can remember a moment when Mr. Gorman was thrown off his balance or lost either his head or his temper. He took defeat and victory with equal coolness and calm, and he showed no emotion even under the most exciting conditions. In this, as in many other respects, he was a remarkable man. The mountains of abuse and villification heaped upon him in the long course of his political career left him unshaken and serene. Nor did they shake the affection and loyalty of his friends. In a speech at the Lyric in his last Senatorial campaign, when some man in the audience rose up and denounced those who were attacking him, Mr. Gorman replied, with a smile on his face: "My friend, don't you mind what they say about me. It does not hurt the ticket ; it gives those fellows something to write about, and it is the best advertisement I could possibly have."

Many of the things said about Mr. Gorman, however, stung

10 THE STORY OF MARYLAND TOLITICS.

him to the quick, and he neither forgave nor forgot his enemies, but he showed no feeling about it either pubhcly or privately. The few replies he made to attacks upon him were made for political and not personal reasons. His policy was to ignore assaults upon himself, believing the most effective answer to be the majorities for his tickets on election day. At this time, however, he was not a factor in Maryland politics, and was not taken into consideration by the leaders.

Mr. Rasin, some years older than Mr. Gorman, was then a well-known figue in Baltimore city politics. In the old Know Nothing days he had been secretary of the Ashland Club, a Know Nothing organization of East Baltimore. He, however, cast only one vote for a candidate of that party, and that was for Mayor Hicks in 1856, and his connection with that element was temporary and rested upon slight ties. During the war he seems to have been occupied by business pursuits and was for a while in the millinery business. He had, however, a considerable personal following and a local reputation for keenness and capacity in ward politics. His strength in the party was recognized to such an extent that as soon as the State was reclaimed from the military and Federal rule he was nominated upon the city Democratic ticket for the important place of Clerk of the Court of Common Pleas. This was in 1867, and is significant mainly in showing that he was even then an acknowledged factor in the party organization. He was elected in that year, and it was from that office which he held for a period of 18 years that he developed his early leverage as a leader. At the time his pecuniary resources were small, but he was thrifty.

After his first election in 1867 Mr. Rasin went along quietly extending his power from ward to ward, rapidly growing in strength and importance politically ; but it was not until the Brown-Hodges fight for Mayor that he swept the city of all opposition to his leadership and secured a grip upon the organization of his party which until the day of his death was never relaxed nor shaken. His absolute and complete domination of the party in the city, in season and out of season, through the fat years when the City Hall patronage was all his own, and through long, lean years when the power of rewarding his fol-

ArtiujR p. Gorman, lowers was taken entirely away from him and the Mayor's chair was occupied either by a Republican or an anti-Rasin Democrat (who treated him with even less consideration), was a feat practically without precedent in this country and his whole political career has stamped him as one of the ablest political leaders in the land. He was in equally close touch with the best and the worst elements in the city. Men like "Tom" Smith, the negro Democrat of the Seventeenth ward, and the "Muldoons" of politics saw him at his office, while men like Douglas Thomas, William Shepard Bryan and hundreds of others of equally high standing, including some of the best known clergymen in Baltimore, saw him at his home and were his friends.

He knew everything and everybody. The gossip of the slums and the gossip of the local "400" came to him,, with equal facility and he was keenly interested in both. He was an inexhaustible mine of personal information about people and nothing worth knowing in the town escaped him. No man who ever lived in Baltimore has been in anything like as close touch with the people as was Mr. Rasin, and no man who ever lived here had the acquaintance or the friends he possessed. The subterranean methods of communication he had in operation were numerous and marvelous. In a number of instances men who were actively fighting him on the stump and throughout a campaign on the surface were in reality his agents and under cloak of darkness went to his house nightly to report. The names of some of these men would astonish the citizens of Baltimore. Like Mr. Gorman, Mr. Rasin bore the brunt of many battles and had more than his share of abuse and villification. Unlike Mr. Gorman, however, he did not bear these attacks serenely or with a philosophic mind. On the contrary, he bitterly resented them, writhed under them and violently denounced his enemies to his friends, freeing his mind of his opinion of them and relating whatever of a discreditable nature he knew of them.