Posted on 01/27/2020 7:09:41 AM PST by Steven Scharf
Portland Press Herald, Portland Maine
On this date in Maine history: Jan. 27 BY JOSEPH OWEN
Jan. 27, 1893: Former U.S. House Speaker James G. Blaine of Augusta dies at his Washington home. Blaine was the Republican nominee for president in 1884, when he lost the general election to Grover Cleveland.
. . .
Jan. 27, 1964: Maine’s U.S. Sen. Margaret Chase Smith (1897-1995), a Republican, announces her candidacy for president.
At the GOP convention in July near San Francisco, she becomes the first woman to have her name submitted for nomination at a major U.S. party convention. U.S. Sen. Barry Goldwater wins the nomination but loses the November election to President Lyndon Johnson.
U.S. Sen. Margaret Chase Smith, R-Maine, arrives at the Republican National Convention in San Francisco in July 1964. Associated Press photo
(Excerpt) Read more at pressherald.com ...
James Gillespie Blaine (January 31, 1830 – January 27, 1893) was an American statesman and Republican politician who represented Maine in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1863 to 1876, serving as Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives from 1869 to 1875, and then in the United States Senate from 1876 to 1881. Blaine twice served as Secretary of State (1881, 1889–1892), one of only two persons to hold the position under three separate presidents (the other being Daniel Webster), and unsuccessfully sought the Republican nomination for President in 1876 and 1880 before being nominated in 1884. In the general election, he was narrowly defeated by Democrat Grover Cleveland. Blaine was one of the late 19th century's leading Republicans and champion of the moderate reformist faction of the party known as the "Half-Breeds".
Blaine was born in the western Pennsylvania town of West Brownsville and after college moved to Maine, where he became a newspaper editor. Nicknamed "the Magnetic Man", he was a charismatic speaker in an era that prized oratory. He began his political career as an early supporter of Abraham Lincoln and the Union war effort in the American Civil War. In Reconstruction, Blaine was a supporter of black suffrage, but opposed some of the more coercive measures of the Radical Republicans. . .
As Secretary of State, Blaine was a transitional figure, marking the end of an isolationist era in foreign policy and foreshadowing the rise of the American Century that would begin with the Spanish–American War. His efforts at expanding the United States' trade and influence began the shift to a more active American foreign policy. Blaine was a pioneer of tariff reciprocity and urged greater involvement in Latin American affairs. . .
Relevant to some of the current discussion here on Free Republic, he attempted to pass the Blaine Amendment
In late 1875, President Grant made several speeches on the importance of the separation of church and state and the duty of the states to provide free public education. Blaine saw in this an issue that would distract from the Grant administration scandals and let the Republican party regain the high moral ground. In December 1875, he proposed a joint resolution that became known as the Blaine Amendment.
The proposed amendment codified the church-state separation Blaine and Grant were promoting, stating that:
No State shall make any law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; and no money raised by taxation in any State for the support of public schools, or derived from any public fund therefor, nor any public lands devoted thereto, shall ever be under the control of any religious sect; nor shall any money so raised or lands so devoted be divided between religious sects or denominations.
The effect was to prohibit the use of public funds by any religious school, although it did not advance Grant's other aim of requiring states to provide public education to all children. The bill passed the House but failed in the Senate. Although it never passed Congress, and left Blaine open to charges of anti-Catholicism, the proposed amendment served Blaine's purpose of rallying Protestants to the Republican party and promoting himself as one of the party's foremost leaders.
[Unlike Brian Williams], On July 2, 1881, Blaine and Garfield were walking through the Sixth Street Station of the Baltimore and Potomac Railroad in Washington when Garfield was shot by Charles J. Guiteau.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_G._Blaine
Margaret Madeline Chase Smith (December 14, 1897 – May 29, 1995) was a United States politician. A member of the Republican Party, she served as a U.S Representative (1940–49) and a U.S. Senator (1949–73) from Maine. She was the first woman to serve in both houses of the United States Congress, and the first woman to represent Maine in either. A moderate Republican, she was among the first to criticize the tactics of McCarthyism in her 1950 speech, "Declaration of Conscience".
Smith was a candidate for the Republican nomination in the 1964 presidential election; she was the first woman to be placed in nomination for the presidency at a major party's convention. Upon leaving office, she was the longest-serving female Senator in history, . . . To date, Smith is ranked as the longest-serving Republican woman in the Senate.
In the spring of 1940, [her husband US Representative] Clyde Smith fell seriously ill after suffering a heart attack, and asked his wife to run for his House seat in the general election the following September (Maine elections were in September back then because by November, snow could impact turnout). He prepared a press release in which he stated, "I know of no one else who has the full knowledge of my ideas and plans or is as well qualified as she is, to carry on these ideas and my unfinished work for my district." He died on April 8 of that year, and a special election was scheduled on the following June 3 to complete his unexpired term. Facing no Democratic challenger, Smith won the special election and became the first woman elected to Congress from Maine.
. . .
In August 1947, after three-term incumbent Wallace H. White Jr. decided to retire, Smith announced her candidacy for his seat in the U.S. Senate.[ In the Republican primary, she faced incumbent Governor Horace A. Hildreth, former Governor Sumner Sewall, and Reverend Albion Beverage. . . . When the wife of one of her opponents questioned whether a woman would be a good Senator, Smith replied, "Women administer the home. They set the rules, enforce them, mete out justice for violations. Thus, like Congress, they legislate; like the Executive, they administer; like the courts, they interpret the rules. It is an ideal experience for politics." On June 21, 1948, she won the primary election and received more votes than her three opponents combined. In the general election on September 13, she defeated Democrat Adrian H. Scolten by a margin of 71%–29%. She became the first woman to represent Maine in the Senate, and the first woman to serve in both houses of Congress.
. . .
Declaration of Conscience On June 1, 1950, Smith delivered a fifteen-minute speech on the Senate floor, known as the "Declaration of Conscience," in which she refused to name McCarthy directly but denounced "the reckless abandon in which unproved charges have been hurled from this side of the aisle." She said McCarthyism had "debased" the Senate to "the level of a forum of hate and character assassination." She defended every American's "right to criticize ... right to hold unpopular beliefs ... right to protest; the right of independent thought." While acknowledging her desire for Republicans' political success, she said, "I don't want to see the Republican Party ride to political victory on the four horsemen of calumny—fear, ignorance, bigotry, and smear." Six other moderate Senate Republicans signed onto her Declaration: Wayne Morse of Oregon, George Aiken of Vermont, Edward Thye of Minnesota, Irving Ives of New York, Charles Tobey of New Hampshire, and Robert C. Hendrickson of New Jersey.
In response to her speech, McCarthy referred to Smith and the six other Senators as "Snow White and the Six Dwarfs." He removed her as a member of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, giving her seat to Senator Richard Nixon of California. He also helped finance an unsuccessful primary challenger during Smith's re-election campaign in 1954. Smith later observed, "If I am to be remembered in history, it will not be because of legislative accomplishments, but for an act I took as a legislator in the U.S. Senate when on June 1, 1950, I spoke ... in condemnation of McCarthyism, when the junior Senator from Wisconsin had the Senate paralyzed with fear that he would purge any Senator who disagreed with him." She voted for McCarthy's censure in 1954.
. . .
1964 presidential election On January 27, 1964, Smith announced her candidacy for President of the United States. She declared, "I have few illusions and no money, but I'm staying for the finish. When people keep telling you, you can't do a thing, you kind of like to try." She lost every single primary election, but did manage to win 25% of the vote in Illinois. At the 1964 Republican National Convention in San Francisco, she became the first woman to have her name be placed in nomination for the presidency at a major political party's convention. She placed fifth in the initial balloting, and denied unanimous consent for Senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona after refusing to withdraw her name from the final ballot. She nevertheless campaigned for Goldwater in the general election, appearing in a television ad in which she defended his position on Social Security.
. . .
1972 election: She was defeated for re-election in 1972 by Democrat Bill Hathaway, the only election she ever lost in the state of Maine. In her last election, Smith had been plagued by rumors of poor health (she had been using a motor scooter around the Senate). A Republican primary challenger taunted her for being out of touch; she did not have a state office operating in Maine. Smith lost the election by 27,230 votes, a margin of 53%–47%.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_Chase_Smith
Blaine and Smith are just two of the forgotten giants from Maine politics, partly because we have moved so far left in this state.
The interesting thing about Blaine is that he gets stuck with the label of anti-Catholicism yet his mother was Irish Catholic and his parents (father was Protestant) decided to raise his sisters as Catholic but him as Protestant. He gets tagged with the “rum, romanism and rebellion” statement that he never made - it was by a minister who had nothing to do with the campaign but the statement was made late in the election and could not be countered.
I remember the jingle “James G. Blaine, James G. Blaine, the continental liar from the State of Maine”. I cannot remember who said it or about what, or whether there was anything to it.
Cleveland was still a bachelor when he ran for President. There is some uncertainty whether he was really the father of the illegitimate child. Apparently the mother had had affairs with several men but the others were all married so Cleveland agreed to take responsibility. I think the child later grew up to be a doctor. It would be interesting to find a descendant and do a DNA test to determine whether Cleveland was really the father.
Apparently James G. Blaine's first child was born three months after their wedding.
I had the benefit of a great history teacher in high school, which I think is where I learned the jingle. I know for sure he told us about Ma, Ma, Where’s my Pa, and the Democrats’ rejoinder, as well as “Rum, Romanism and Rebellion”.
On this date in history it is January 27th 2020.
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