Life and Times of Frederick Douglass (1892)/Chapter 43
CHAPTER II.
A GRAND OCCASION.
IN the first part of this remarkable decade of American life and history, we had the election and grand inauguration of James A. Garfield as President of the United States, and in a few months thereafter we had his tragic death by the hand of a desperate assassin. On the 4th of March in that year, I happened to be United States Marshal of the District of Columbia, having been appointed to that office four years previous to that date by President Rutherford B. Hayes. This official position placed me in touch with both the out-going President and the President elect. By the unwritten law of long-established usage, the United States Marshal of the District of Columbia is accorded a conspicuous position on the occasion of the inauguration of a new President of the United States. He has the honor of escorting both the outgoing and the incoming President, from the imposing ceremonies in the U. S. Senate Chamber to the east front of the Capitol, where, on a capacious platform erected for the purpose, before uncounted thousands and in the presence of grave Senators, Members of Congress and representatives of all the civilized nations of the world, the presidential oath is solemnly administered to the President elect, who proceeds to deliver his inaugural address, a copy of which has already been given to the press. In the procession from the Senate I had the honor, in the presence of all the many thousands of the dignitaries there assembled, of holding the right and marching close by the side of both Presidents. The grandeur and solemnity of the occasion appeared to me no less great and uncommon because of the honorable and responsible position I that day held. I was a part of a great national event and one which would pass into American history, but at the moment I had no intimation or foreshadowing of how dark, dreadful and bloody would be the contents of the chapter. I have sometimes had what seemed to me startling presentiments of coming evil, but there were none on this grand inaugural day. The moral and political sky was calmly blue, bright and beautiful, and full of hope for the new President and for the nation. I felt myself standing on new ground, on a height never before trodden by any of my people; one heretofore occupied only by members of the Caucasian race. I do not doubt that this sudden elevation and distinction made upon me a decided impression. But I knew that my elevation was temporary; that it was brilliant but not lasting; and that like many others tossed by the late war to the surface, I should soon be reduced to the ranks of my common people. However, I deemed the event highly important as a new circumstance in my career, as a new recognition of my class, and as a new step in the progress of the nation. Personally it was a striking contrast to my early condition. Yonder I was an unlettered slave toiling under the lash of Covey, the negro breaker; here I was the United States Marshal of the capital of the nation, having under my care and guidance the sacred persons of an ex-President and of the President elect of a nation of sixty millions, and was armed with a nation's power to arrest any arm raised against them. While I was not insensible or indifferent to the fact that I was treading the high places of the land, I was not conscious of any unsteadiness of head or heart. I was United States Marshal by accident. I was no less Frederick Douglass, identified with a proscribed class whose perfect and practical equality with other American citizens was yet far down the steps of time. Yet I was not sorry to have this brief authority, for I rejoiced in the fact that a colored man could occupy this height. The precedent was valuable. Though the tide that carried me there might not soon again rise so high, it was something that it had once so risen and had remained up long enough to leave its mark on the point it touched and that not even the hoary locks of Time could remove it or conceal it from the eyes of mankind. The incident was valuable as showing that the sentiment of the nation was more liberal towards the colored man in proportion to its proximity, in point of time, to the war and to the period when his services were fresh in its memory, for his condition is affected by his nearness to or remoteness from the time when his services were rendered. The imperfections of memory, the multitudinous throngs of events, the fading effects of time upon the national mind, and the growing affection of the loyal nation for the late rebels, will, on the page of our national history, obscure the negro's part, though they can never blot it out entirely, nor can it be entirely forgotten.
The inauguration of President Garfield was exceptional in its surroundings. The coronation of a king could hardly have been characterized by more display of joy and satisfaction. The delight and enthusiasm of the President's friends knew no bounds. The pageant was to the last degree brilliant and memorable, and the scene became sublime when, after his grand inaugural address, the soldier, the orator, the statesman, the President elect of this great nation, stepped aside, bowed his splendid form, and, in sight of all the people, kissed his mother. It was a reminder to the dear mother that, though her son was President of the United States, he was still her son, and that none of the honors he that day received could make him forget for a moment the debt of love due to that mother whose hand had guided his infancy. Some thought that this act was somewhat theatrical and wanting in dignity, but as a near spectator of the scene, I thought it touching and beautiful. Nothing so unaffected and spontaneous and sacred could awaken in the heart of a true man other than sentiments of respect and admiration. On that day of glory, and amid demonstrations so sublime, no thought of the tragic death that awaited the illustrious object of this grand ovation could have intruded itself. It is not to be supposed that, even in the mind of the mad assassin Guiteau, the thought of murdering the President had yet dawned. I heard at his trial this demon-possessed man talk, and came to the conclusion that this deed was the result of madness for office, and that this madness carried the assassin beyond the limit to which the same madness sometimes carries other men. Others conspire, intrigue, lie and slander in order to get office, but this crazy creature thought that he could get office by killing a President. He thought that if he gave the Presidency to Mr. Arthur, the latter would serve him a similar good turn, and not only protect him from punishment, but give him an office. No better evidence of insanity could be wanted than this mode of reasoning. Guiteau may have been in some measure responsible, but I have always thought him hopelessly insane.
No doubt there were many present at this inauguration who, like the assassin, thought that in the bestowment of patronage, the new President would not forget them. It is painful to think that to this selfish feeling we may rightfully ascribe much of the display and seeming enthusiasm on such occasions; that because of it, banners wave, men march, rockets cleave the air, and cannon pour out their thunders. Only the common people, animated by patriotism, and without hope of reward, know on such occasions the thrill of a pure enthusiasm. To the office-seeker the whole is gone through with as a mere hollow, dumb show. It is not uncommon to hear men boast of how much they did for the victorious party; how much marching and counter-marching they did, and how much influence they brought to the successful candidates, and on the strength of it threaten that they will never do the like again if their services shall fail to get them office. The madness of Guiteau was but the exaggerated madness of other men. It is impossible to measure the evil which this craving madness may yet bring upon the country. Any civil-service reform which will diminish it, even if it does not entirely banish it from the minds of Americans, should be supported by every patriotic citizen.
Few men in the country felt more than I the shock caused by the assassination of President Garfield, and few men had better reason for thus feeling. I not only shared with the nation its great common sorrow because a good man had been cruelly and madly slain in the midst of his years and in the morning of his highest honors and usefulness, but because of the loss which I thought his death had entailed upon the colored people of the country. For though I at one time had my fears as to the course Mr. Garfield would pursue towards us, my hopes were stronger than my fears, and my faith stronger than my doubts. Only a few weeks before his tragic death, he invited me to the executive mansion to talk over matters pertaining to the cause of my people, and here came up the subject of his foreign appointments. In this conversation he referred to the fact that his Republican predecessors in office had never sent colored men to any of the white nations. He said that he meant to depart from this usage; that he had made up his mind to send some colored men abroad to some of the white nationalities, and he wanted to know of me if such persons would be acceptable to some such nations. I, of course, thought the way clear to this new departure, and encouraged the President in his proposed advanced step. At the time this promise was made and this hope was held out, I had little doubt of its perfect fulfilment. There was in the President's manner the appearance of a well-matured, fixed, and resolute purpose to try the experiment. Hence his sudden and violent death came to me, not only with the crushing significance of a great crime against the nation and against mankind, but as a killing blow to my newly awakened hopes for my struggling people. I thought that could this new departure in the policy of our Government be carried out, a death wound would be given to American prejudice, and a new and much needed assurance would be given to the colored citizen. Thereafter he would be more respected at home and abroad than he had ever before been. It would be conclusive evidence that the American people and Government were in earnest, and that they were not trifling and deceiving him when they clothed him with American citizenship. It would say to the country and to the civilized world that the great Republican party of the American Union, which carried the nation through the war, saved the country from dismemberment, reconstructed the Government on the basis of liberty, emancipated the slave and made him a citizen, was an honest party, and meant all it had said, and was determined hereafter to take no step backward. Cherishing, as I did, this view of what was promised and should be expected from the continued life of Mr. Garfield, his death appeared to me as among the gloomiest calamities that could have come to my people. The hopes awakened by the kind-hearted President had no support in my knowledge of the character of the self-indulgent man who was elected, in the contingency of death, to succeed him. The announcement, at the Chicago Convention, of this man's name as that of the candidate for the Vice-Presidency, strangely enough brought over me a shudder such as one might feel in coming upon an armed murderer or a poisonous reptile. For some occult and mysterious cause, I know not what, I felt the hand of death upon me. I do not say or intimate that Mr. Arthur had anything to do with the taking off of the President. I might have had the same shudder had any other man been named, but I state the simple fact precisely as it was.