Page:The World's Famous Orations Volume 10.djvu/127

 GARFIELD

HIS SPEECH NOMINATING SHERMAN FOR PRESIDENT^

(1880)

Born in 1831, died in 1881; President of Hiram College (Oliio), 1859-61; promoted to be Brigadier-General of V^olunteers in the Civil War, 1862; Major-General in 18G3; elected to Congress from Ohio In 1803, serving until 1880; Member of the Electoral Commission of 1877; elected United States Senator from Ohio in 1880; elected President in 1880; shot by an assassin on July 3, 1881, and died September 19.

I HAVE witnessed the extraordinary scenes of this Convention with deep solicitude. Nothing touches my heart more quickly than a tribute of honor to a great and noble character; but as I sat in my seat and witnessed this demonstration, this assemblage seemed to me a human ocean in tempest. I have seen the sea lashed into fury and tossed into spray, and its grandeur moves

1 Delivered in the Republican National Convention at Chicago, June 5, 1880, immediately after the speech of Roseoe Conkhng, nominating General Grant for a third term. See Hinsdale's " The Works of James A. Garfield," 2 volumes, Boston, 1882. This speech made a deep impression, and has since been generally cited as the Immediate cause of Garfield's own nomination a few days later. The correspondent of the New York Times, writing on the day following the delivery of the speech, said:

"Curious remarks were made about it. Those who were utterly unable to recognize the secretary of the treasury in the ideal man whose portrait Garfield drew, begin to think that the picture was Garfield's picture rf himself. Suggestions to this effect have been frequently made to-dny by men who ai-e in no vay hostile to Gar- flela, and who see in the course he lias pursued during the Conven- tion indications of an honest desire to advance his own fortunes."

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