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266 HISTORY OF MARYLAND.
grown to maturity and power, as a very element of government, under the inefficiency
of a police force, as ample as it is costly, but which, in spite of individual and meritorious
exceptions, is defective alike in morale, material and administration. Organized bands of
conspirators and outlaws have usurped open mastery over important departments of
industry; controlling the owners of property in the exercise of their rights over it, as well
as in the employment of labor in connection with it, and driving humble and peaceful
men from the lawful field of their honest livelihood and toil. Outrages by day and night
upon unoffending citizens ; robberies on the public highways; savage assaults upon voters
while vainly attempting to exercise the right of suffrage ; murders of men at their own
hearths and in the streets—have become the burden of the press, until even the grossest enormities have almost ceased to startle a community, to which scarce anything would be a
novelty but peace and good government. The comparative infrequency of arrests, the facility
with which the most notorious offenders find release upon insufficient security; the tardiness of trial, the uncertainty of conviction and the inadequacy of punishment, even
when the crime is most heinous and glaring—all tend, if left alone, to the perpetuation
of a misrule which is utterly subversive of the objects of civilized society. If, to such an
array, be added the crowning outrage and shame of the last election day—when the
purity of the ballot-box was made a public mockery, and the secrecy of the ballot itself;
a farce; when access to the polls was rendered impossible, except at the armed and
absolute pleasure of the most abandoned wretches among us; when the most sacred and
fundamental prerogative of citizenship was trodden down, with perfect impunity, in
the presence of the constituted authorities, and the great mass of this whole community
was disfranchised by force and ostentatious fraud, before the eyes and without the intervention of the officers of the law—there surely can be no need of dwelling further upon
the causes which have induced the members of this Association to leave the quiet of their
homes and business for the purposes of their present organization. They have felt such
a step to be demanded not less by their own rights and interests than by the reputation
of the city, with such atrocities, amrebuked, have so sadly stained.
" The members of this Association believe that the evils under which they and their
fellow-citizens are suffering, are susceptible of easy cure, within the scope of the existing
laws, with good faith and reasonable efficiency on the part of those who are charged with
their administration. But they see enough, in the experience of the past, to satisfy them
that a temporary diminution or suspension of those evils is no guaranty for their permanent suppression; and that no momentary effervescence of official vigilance or activity
affords any certainty of the re-establishment of order and good government. They are convinced that the only positive security against the continuance of such grievances and their
augmentation, in the future, is the combined and resolute action of the citizens themselves, within the limits of the law also. They have therefore pledged themselves to each
other, to join, with such affiliated societies as maybe formed, for like purposes throughout
the city, in vindicating and re-establishing their rights and restoring the good name of
Baltimore. It is their declared purpose so to unite in guaranteeing hereafter the purity of
the ballot-box and absolute freedom of access thereto, and in promoting and securing, by
all lawful and fair means, the election of honest, competent and faithful men, without
distinction of party, to the various offices of Municipal, Judicial and Executive trust in
this city. Every member of the Association, while binding himself to the exclusion
of party purposes and preferences from its counsels and action, remains free and uncommitted to pursue his political convictions in all matters of State and General Government
and policy.
" The Association has been organized by the election of the permanent officers,
whose names are subscribed hereto. As its first and most appropriate public act it has
resolved to make the present appeal to the community, and its members therefore respectfully and earnestly invite their fellow-citizens to co-operate with them, by the formation
Object Description
| Title | History of Maryland - 3 |
| Creator | Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas) |
| Publisher | J. B. Piet |
| Place of Publication | Baltimore |
| Date | 1879 |
| Language | eng |
| Type | Books/Pamphlets |
Description
| Title | 00000297 |
| Type | Books/Pamphlets |
| Transcript | 266 HISTORY OF MARYLAND. grown to maturity and power, as a very element of government, under the inefficiency of a police force, as ample as it is costly, but which, in spite of individual and meritorious exceptions, is defective alike in morale, material and administration. Organized bands of conspirators and outlaws have usurped open mastery over important departments of industry; controlling the owners of property in the exercise of their rights over it, as well as in the employment of labor in connection with it, and driving humble and peaceful men from the lawful field of their honest livelihood and toil. Outrages by day and night upon unoffending citizens ; robberies on the public highways; savage assaults upon voters while vainly attempting to exercise the right of suffrage ; murders of men at their own hearths and in the streets—have become the burden of the press, until even the grossest enormities have almost ceased to startle a community, to which scarce anything would be a novelty but peace and good government. The comparative infrequency of arrests, the facility with which the most notorious offenders find release upon insufficient security; the tardiness of trial, the uncertainty of conviction and the inadequacy of punishment, even when the crime is most heinous and glaring—all tend, if left alone, to the perpetuation of a misrule which is utterly subversive of the objects of civilized society. If, to such an array, be added the crowning outrage and shame of the last election day—when the purity of the ballot-box was made a public mockery, and the secrecy of the ballot itself; a farce; when access to the polls was rendered impossible, except at the armed and absolute pleasure of the most abandoned wretches among us; when the most sacred and fundamental prerogative of citizenship was trodden down, with perfect impunity, in the presence of the constituted authorities, and the great mass of this whole community was disfranchised by force and ostentatious fraud, before the eyes and without the intervention of the officers of the law—there surely can be no need of dwelling further upon the causes which have induced the members of this Association to leave the quiet of their homes and business for the purposes of their present organization. They have felt such a step to be demanded not less by their own rights and interests than by the reputation of the city, with such atrocities, amrebuked, have so sadly stained. " The members of this Association believe that the evils under which they and their fellow-citizens are suffering, are susceptible of easy cure, within the scope of the existing laws, with good faith and reasonable efficiency on the part of those who are charged with their administration. But they see enough, in the experience of the past, to satisfy them that a temporary diminution or suspension of those evils is no guaranty for their permanent suppression; and that no momentary effervescence of official vigilance or activity affords any certainty of the re-establishment of order and good government. They are convinced that the only positive security against the continuance of such grievances and their augmentation, in the future, is the combined and resolute action of the citizens themselves, within the limits of the law also. They have therefore pledged themselves to each other, to join, with such affiliated societies as maybe formed, for like purposes throughout the city, in vindicating and re-establishing their rights and restoring the good name of Baltimore. It is their declared purpose so to unite in guaranteeing hereafter the purity of the ballot-box and absolute freedom of access thereto, and in promoting and securing, by all lawful and fair means, the election of honest, competent and faithful men, without distinction of party, to the various offices of Municipal, Judicial and Executive trust in this city. Every member of the Association, while binding himself to the exclusion of party purposes and preferences from its counsels and action, remains free and uncommitted to pursue his political convictions in all matters of State and General Government and policy. " The Association has been organized by the election of the permanent officers, whose names are subscribed hereto. As its first and most appropriate public act it has resolved to make the present appeal to the community, and its members therefore respectfully and earnestly invite their fellow-citizens to co-operate with them, by the formation |
