Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 4.djvu/313

Rh the first section of twenty miles of said road,” thus keeping the land grant for the benefit of that road alive by Congressional action beyond the time originally conditioned. He knew further that in addition to this, Congress had in 1872 passed an act relieving the Little Rock road of certain restrictions concerning the sale of granted lands which had been imposed in 1869. And now I ask you, Senator, whether in the face of all these acts of Congressional legislation, Mr. Blaine's solemn statement before the House of Representatives, by which he tried to whitewash himself—that “the company derived its life franchise and value wholly from the State,” and that “the Little Rock road derived all that it had from the State of Arkansas, and not from Congress” and that the company was “amenable and answerable to the State and not in any sense to Congress,” was anything else than a deliberate, unblushing untruth, known by him to be such?

You also deny that when Mr. Blaine, on the same solemn occasion, declared he had never received any Fort Smith bonds, “except at precisely the same rate that others paid,” he said what was not true. Again, what are the facts? Mr. Blaine's words before the House of Representatives were these:

In common with hundreds of other people in New England and other parts of the country, I bought some of these bonds—not a very large amount—paying for them at precisely the same rates that others paid. I never heard, and do not believe, that the Little Rock Company ever parted with a bond to any person except at the regular price fixed for their sale. Instead of receiving bonds of the Little Rock and Fort Smith road as a gratuity, I never had one except at the regular market price.

When Mr. Blaine said this to the House of Representatives on April 24, 1876, before the Mulligan papers