Mark Twain Speaking

53. Turncoats

182 MARK TWAIN SPEAKING Text / "Speech at the Banquet of the International Congress of Wheelmen," MS, MTP. Published as "Speech," MTS(23):109. what bicycling is like / Mark Twain wrote an entertaining account of his troubles in learning to ride one of the cumbersome high-wheelers. See "Taming the Bicycle," What is Man? and Other Essays, ed. Albert Bigelow Paine (New York, 1917):285-96.· 53 · In the acrimonious presidential campaign of 1884, Mark Twain, hitherto a staunch Republican, defected from the party and its candidate, James G. Blaine, to support the Democratic nominee, Grover Cleveland. Date and occasion ofthe speech below are not clear, but it was very likely made during the last two weeks before election day. In the files of correspondence, MTP, a postcard dated October 23,1884, commends Mark Twain for his Hartford speech, which was probably "Turncoats." For his comments on local effects of the acrid campaign, see MTA, 2:13-36. Turncoats Political Meeting, Hartford, Late October 1884 It seems to me that there are things about this campaign which almost amount to inconsistencies. This language may sound violent; if it does, it is traitor to my mood. The Mugwumps are contemptuously called turncoats by the Republican speakers andjournals. The charge is true: we have turned our coats; we have no denials to make, as to that. But does a man become of a necessity base because he turns his coat? And are there no Republican turncoats except the Mugwumps? Please look at the facts in the case candidly and fairly before sending us to political perdition without company. Why are we called turncoats? Because we have changed our opinion . Changed it about what? About the greatness and righteousness of the principles of the Republican party? No, that is not changed. We believe in those principles yet;. no one doubts this. What, then, is it that MARK TWAIN SPEAKING 183 we have changed our opinions about? Why, about Mr. Blaine. That is the whole change. There is no other. Decidedly, we have done that, and do by no means wish to deny it. But when did we change it? Yesterday?-last week?-last summer? No-we changed it years and years ago, as far back as 1876. The vast bulk of the Republican party changed its opinion of him at the same time and in the same way. Will anybody be hardy enough to deny this? Was there more than a handful of really respectable and respectworthy Republicans on the north Atlantic seaboard who did not change their opinion of Mr. Blaine at that time? Was not the Republican atmosphere-both private and journalistic-so charged with this fact that none could fail to perceive it? Very well. Was this multitude called turncoats at that time? Of course not. That would have been an absurdity. Was any of this multitude held in contempt at that time, and derided and execrated, for turning his Blaine coat? No one thought ofsuch a thing. Now then, we who are called the Mugwumps, turned our coats at that time, and they have remained so turned to this day. Ifit is shameful to turn one's coat once, what measure of scorn can adequately describe the man who turns it twice? If to turn one's coat once makes one a dude, a Pharisee, a Mugwump and fool, where shall you find language rancid enough to describe a double turncoat? If to turn your coat at a time when no one can impeach either the sincerity of the act or the cleanliness ofyour motives in doing it, is held to be a pathetic spectacle, what sort of spectacle is it when such a coat-turner turns his coat again, and this time under quite suggestively different circumstances?-that is to say, after a nomination. Do these double turncoats exist? And who are they? They are the bulk of the Republican party; and it is hardly venturing too far to say that neither you nor I can put his finger upon a respectable member of that great multitude who can put a denial of it instantly into words and without blush or stammer. Here in Hartford they do not deny; they confess that they are double turncoats. They say they are convinced that when they formerly changed their opinion about Mr. Blaine they were wrong, and so they have changed back again. Which would seem to be an admission that to change one's opinion and turn one's coat...