Struggles and Triumphs P. T. Barnum (the beginning after the end read novel .TXT) 📖

compelled on the first Monday in April next, to decide whether you or myself shall represent their interests and their principles in the Fortieth Congress of the United States.

The theory of our government is, that the will of the people shall be the law of the land. It is important, therefore, that the people shall vote understandingly, and especially at this important crisis in our national existence. In order, that the voters of this district shall fully comprehend the principles by which each of their congressional candidates is guided, I respectfully invite you to meet me in a serious and candid discussion of the important political issues of the day, at various towns in the Fourth Congressional District of Connecticut, on each weekday evening, from the fourth day of March until the thirtieth day of the same month, both inclusive.

If you will consent to thus meet me in a friendly discussion of those subjects, now so near and dear to every American heart, and, I may add, possessing at this time such momentous interest to all civilized nations in the world, who are suffering from misrule, I pledge myself to conduct my portion of the debate with perfect fairness, and with all due respect for my opponent, and doubt not you will do the same.

Never, in my judgment, in our past history as a nation, have interests and questions more important appealed to the people for their wise and careful consideration. It is due to the voters of the Fourth Congressional District that they have an early and full opportunity to examine their candidates in regard to these important problems, and I shall esteem it a great privilege if you will accept this proposition.

Please favor me with an early answer, and oblige,

Truly yours,

P. T. Barnum.

To this letter Mr. William H. Barnum replied, declining to accept my proposition to go before the people of the district, and discuss the political questions of the day.

During the canvass I received the following letter, which, together with my reply, was published in the Bridgeport Standard and in the New York Tribune:

Litchfield Co., Conn., Feb. 20, 1867.

P. T. Barnum.⁠—Dear Sir:

Although Fairfield County was entitled to the nomination of the copperhead candidate for Congress from the Fourth District, and under ordinary circumstances it would have been given to William F. Taylor, of Danbury, you are, perhaps, aware that they have changed their tactics and nominated a wealthy namesake of yours, simply for the purpose of using his money against you. A democratic ex-Congressman is said to be preparing a tariff of prices to be paid for votes, and they boast that their candidate will expend $50,000 to secure his election. Already, I am credibly informed, the greenbacks are being freely circulated by his friends. I write to ask what your intentions are in regard to counteracting this effort of the copperhead party. Do you intend to fight fire with fire? The day of election is fast approaching, and we are confident of success, as all our friends are wide awake.

Respectfully yours, ⸻ ⸻

The New York Tribune, commenting upon the correspondence, said:

Mr. P. T. Barnum, Union candidate for Congress in the Fourth District of Connecticut, was lately solicited by a friend to spend money in a manner deemed objectionable by Mr. Barnum, and he responded as became a patriot.

The following was my reply to the above letter:

Bridgeport, Feb. 23, 1867.

⸻ Esq.⁠—Dear Sir:

Your kind letter of the 20th inst. has caused me painful emotions. I now wish to say, once for all, that under no conceivable circumstances will I permit a dollar of mine to be used to purchase a vote, or to induce a voter to act contrary to his honest convictions.

The idea that the intelligent reading men of New England can be bought like sheep in the shambles, and that the sacred principles which have so far guided them in the terrible struggle between liberty and slavery can now, in this eventful hour of national existence, be set up at auction and knocked down to the highest bidder, seems to me as preposterous as it is shameful and humiliating. But if it is possible that occasionally a degraded voter can thus be induced to “sell his birthright for a mess of pottage,” God grant that I may be a thousand times defeated sooner than permit one grain of gold to be accursed by using it so basely!

I will not believe that American citizens can lend themselves to the contemptible meanness of sapping the very lifeblood of our noble institutions by encouraging a fatal precedent, which ignores all principle, and would soon prevent any honest man, however distinguished for his intelligence and loyalty, from representing his district in our national councils. None could then succeed except unprincipled vagabonds, who, by the lavish expenditure of money, would debauch and degrade the freemen whose votes they coveted.

No, sir! Grateful as I am for the distinguished honor of receiving a unanimous nomination for Congress from the loyal Union party in my district, I have no aspiration for that high position if it is only to be attained by bringing into disgrace the noble privilege of the free elective franchise. Think for a moment what a deadly weapon is being placed in the hands of tyrants throughout the civilized world, with which to destroy such apostles of liberty as John Bright and Garibaldi, if it can be said with truth that American citizens have become so corrupt and degraded, so lost to a just estimate of the value and true nobility of the ballot, that it is bought and sold for money.

My dear sir, any party that can gain a temporary ascendancy by such atrocious means, not only poisons the body politic of a free and impartial government, but is also sure to bring swift destruction upon itself. And so it should be.

I am unaccustomed to political life, and