corporations for public use to the same extent that the property of individuals may be taken."

I then committed myself to the doctrine that railways are public highways, and that any carrier or company of carriers might organize and carry freight or passengers to the extent that they might choose to determine, subject to such compensation for the use of the fixed facilities of railways to be ascertained by valuation.

With reference to the penitentiary, I said: "I still believe that with proper legislation and judicious management it may be made eminently useful as a penal and reformatory agency, and at the same time substantially self-sustaining;" and at the same time I felt it my duty to add: "The only practical system for the successful management of the penitentiary in my judgment is that which combines the retention of complete control of the discipline and government of the convicts by the state with the lease of their labor to persons engaged in special pursuits." In reference to the reform school and inebriate hospital, I said: "Juvenile offenders, whose crimes are most frequently the result of the incapacity or the negligence of parents or guardians or neglected orphanage, or, as experience has demonstrated, with respect to many of that class, of latent, intellectual or moral incapacity or disease, while they attract and enlist the sympathies of the philanthropic, furnish the most encouraging field for employment of reformatory agencies, and it is to be hoped that as the state advances in wealth and culture, a greater degree of attention will be given not only to the classes intended to be provided for and benefitted by the reform school, but to neglected childhood wherever it may be found in the state. As to the inebriate hospital, recent investigations have led the most intelligent thinkers to the conclusion that drunkenness is a form of disease that admits of treatment and But enough is known to inspire a measure of confidence in curing drunkenness, and no one familiar with the subject will hesitate to confess that

cure.

from its extensive prevalence and the mischiefs and dangers it is constantly producing, all efforts should be made to ascertain by experiments whether it does admit of permanent cure; nor would the failure of any experiment that might be made by the state relieve the subject from embarrassment, for there will still remain in the community a large and dangerous class to whom may be traced the commission of a large proportion of the crimes that afflict society and disturb social order, and the time has come when it is a reproach to the state that no measure can be devised which will bring relief. I am aware that some urge that total prohibition of the use of the liquors that produce intoxication is the proper remedy for the evil of drunkenness; but I have never observed any satisfactory evidence of a real intention on the part of the people to enforce prohibition, nor do I believe that total prohibition of intoxicating agencies possible. But if I am mistaken in this opinion, and the time shall hereafter arrive when the men who believe the total prohibition of intoxicating liquors judicious or possible will come to consider that object of enough importance to induce them to prefer its success to that of political parties and vote according to their convictions and succeed in giving effect to their views, the time is not so near at hand that the general assembly should on account of its approach delay to make provision to relieve society from the almost unendurable evils than drunkenness now produces. To me the theories

upon which the laws respecting drunkenness depend are manifestly absurd, as they are oppressive and unjust. If it is a mere habit that inflicts no public injury, all the laws that treat it as a crime are unjust and should be at once repealed. If it is a crime, it should be punished wherever committed.

"The laws should be enforced impartially without regard to the social standing of the offender, and if a crime, persons who become intoxicated ought to be subjected to the laws that authorize dangerous persons to

be restrained. If drunkenness is a disease or habit that produces physical alterations that assume the form of diseased mental or nervous action so that the subject becomes an object of danger to individuals or to the public peace, punishments that assume his legal responsibility are unwarranted and unjust, though his confinement may be justified upon grounds that are consistent with proper regard for the safety of the public and with the real interests of the unhappy victim. Accepting what I conceive to be the most enlightened as well as the most humane view of the subject, I recommend to the general assembly the establishment of an asylum or a retreat for inebriates, to which all persons conscious of their unhappy condition may voluntarily resort upon consenting to such conditions and regulations for the government of their conduct as may be prescribed under the authority of law, and to which all habitual drunkards and persons who become dangerous when intoxicated may be committed and, if need be, confined until cured. The safety of individuals and of society is involved in the success of the measure proposed."

After having referred to the revision of the laws, judiciary, the reports of the state officers in which I expressed the sentiment that I cannot permit myself to separate from these officers without testifying to the faithfulness with which all of them have discharged their duty to the state, I added proudly: "The State of Illinois is now substantially free from debt, and the time is not distant when it will occupy the proud position among the states of having discharged all its obligations and of imposing no burdens upon its citizens, except such as may be required to carry on its government," and concluded in the following language: "No one is more conscious than I am that in the necessarily active share I have taken in the varied affairs of this great commonwealth, I have in the judgment of some committed mistakes, but I have in all my important official acts been governed by my own convictions of

duty.

My duties to the government of the United States begun with my birth, and have never been forgotten nor neglected, and I have felt under the most solemn of earthly obligations to obey and defend and support the constitution and laws of the State of Illinois, and to enforce the laws of the state against all who might offend them."

CHAPTER XXV.

Presidential canvass of 1876-Hayes nominated by the Republicans— Tilden nominated by the Democrats-Visited Louisiana-Hayes' electors counted in-Correspondence between Democrats and Republicans-Report to Mr. Hewitt-Nominated for United States Senate Declined in favor of General Anderson-Election of Judge Davis.

The Republican party had succeeded in the presidential elections of 1860 and 1864 with Lincoln, and with Grant in 1868 and 1872, and were reluctant to concede the possibility of the election of a Democrat in 1876, and when its national convention met on June 4, 1876, it was supposed that any Republican could be elected. The convention afforded an example of a combination against the most popular candidate. During the session it was "anything to beat Blaine." A number of candidates were presented to the convention by their friends; among them were Benjamin H. Bristow, of Kentucky; Roscoe Conkling, of New York; Marshall Jewell, of Connecticut; Oliver P. Morton, the war governor, of Indiana; John F. Hartranft, of Pennsylvania; Rutherford B. Hayes, of Ohio; and James G. Blaine, of Maine.

Mr. Hayes was nominated on the seventh ballot, receiving 384 votes, and 351 for Blaine, and 21 for Bristow, and Wm. A. Wheeler was nominated for the vicepresidency. The two-thirds rule does not prevail in the Republican national conventions, and Mr. Hayes was nominated by a majority of the votes. The Democratic national convention began its session on June 27, 1876, and nominated Samuel J. Tilden, lately the governor of New York, for the presidency, and Thomas A. Hendricks, late governor of Indiana, for the vice-presidency. These nominations were received in a very different