“Political Corruption in Bovina” 1889, Part One

On September 25, 1889, Bovina readers of the Delaware Standard, a prohibitionist newspaper published in Walton, likely read with great interest the following letter:

Political Corruption in Bovina, The people of this town have just had a wonderful exhibition of the G.O.P. machine matters of conducting a political caucus. A fellow townsman of good moral character and a member of the M.E. Church, presented himself as candidate for member of Assembly. Opposed to him was a candidate from a neighboring town, who by good Republican Authority is represented as drunken and licentious. Our town’s man urged the fact of his being a resident of the town, and his good moral character as strong reason why he should receive the support of the fellow partisans. Christianity, morality and good government, by supporting the popular candidate, and gave him their hearty support.

The last of the Favorites canvass in this town is variously estimated at from $300 to $700, and the result of the faithful work that had been done was seen in the very large caucus that assembled in the 14th inst when Boodle received 114 votes, and morality, 72.

In the evening following the caucus a small party of young voters flushed with the success of the afternoon, and somewhat under the influence of electioneering whisky (of which it is said there has been an ample supply during the campaign) decorated the place of business of one of our citizens with old boxes, barrels and agricultural implements, and made “night hideous” with terrible blasphemy. 

Remember these things occurred, not in the benighted Democratic cities of the Empire State, but in Moral, Republican Bovina, and under the auspices of the great party of temperance and morality.

To the honor of some of our Republican friends in our town be it said, they do not approve of the above described methods. The need of a new and clean political party becomes daily more apparent. 

Forewarned the Prohibition party.

X

This unsigned letter was followed on October 4 by this one:

Mr. Editor: The last ‘Standard’ informs us that our former article, ‘Political Corruption in Bovina,’ although partly omitted by an oversight of the compositor perhaps, still contains enough unpleasantness to the Republican candidate for assembly to cause him to serve a Writ on the Editor of the Standard…Every statement in the article is based on stories circulated by members of the would be assemblyman’s own party. If they are not true we are very sorry that he should be slandered in his own political household. But that they believed to be true by Republicans seems quite evident from the fact that many of the best men of the party in this town, men who have always voted the Republican ticket, have openly declared that they will not support this candidate, and the reason they give in nearly every instance is his immoral character. Many of the stories in circulation affecting his personal character are scarcely fit to be whispered in a dark corner, much less to appear in public print….”

The writer of these letters remained a mystery for about two years, but the target of the letters was clear – James Ballantine of Andes. Ballantine had served several terms as the Town of Andes Supervisor and decided in 1889 to make a run for the assembly. At the Delaware County Republican caucus on September 14, 1889, Ballantine was chosen to be the county’s candidate for the Assembly. As noted in the second letter, Ballantine almost immediately sued the editor of the Delaware Standard, Rev. W.H. Howie, for libel and slander.

These letters led to some newspapers, including the strongly Republican Walton Reporter, to suggest that Ballantine should withdraw. On October 9, the Delaware Gazette published a letter dated September 30 and addressed to W.T. Black and David Liddle, the two Bovina men chosen as delegates to the Republican county convention, highly critical of their vote, not so much for Ballantine but for how they voted for County Judge. The authors of the letter said that these delegates were to vote for John A. Kemp for judge, but they instead voted for A.H. Sewell. 

The authors accuse the two men of being in the pocket of “Little Jim,” aka James Ballentine: “If little Jim carries the people of Bovina in his vest pocket, we want to know it. If his despotism has reached a point where the Republicans of what was once called the banner Republican town of Delaware county can no longer elect two delegates and have them vote as they are instructed… then the sooner they realize [they] are no longer free to express their choice on any political question, the better.   If he really owns them, body and soul….then we respectfully move that Bovina be stricken from the list of towns, and hereafter this place shall be known as North Andes! Respectfully, Many Republicans.”

Some of the area newspapers turned on the Walton Reporter, accusing it of hypocrisy, claiming that the reason the paper would not support Ballantine was because he refused to give them $500 they requested to give him their support. 

In the meantime, W.T. Black and David Liddle responded to the letters in the Delaware Express (unfortunately, copies of this issue cannot be located so we don’t have the text of the letters). The Delaware Gazette (a Democratic newspaper, by the way) was critical of their “feeble effort to convince the people of Bovina that they did not sell them out on County Judge…” They noted that “’Uncle Jock,’ little Jim’s high priest, swore before they left Bovina they should not carry out the instructions of the caucus.” ‘Uncle Jock’ followed them to Delhi to ensure that they voted for Sewell, not Kemp for County Judge.

‘Uncle Jock’ may have been old John Hilson, who emigrated to Bovina from Scotland in the 1850s. Unfortunately, because critical issues of the Delaware Express and Delaware Republican are not available, we really can’t get the full story of the issues related to this caucus, including confirming the identity of 'Uncle Jock.'

In the end, James Ballantine was elected to the State Assembly by a slim margin, defeating Bovina native Isaac H. Maynard. As reported in the Hancock Herald, “James Got There, But Oh, It was a Lively Tussell!”  There was an issue over ballots in Sidney that were printed on the wrong paper. If these had been disqualified, the election would have gone to Maynard, but in the end it didn’t change the result. Maynard in the end announced he would not contest this, given that from all appearances, thought the ballots may have been printed wrong, the intention of the voters using those ballots was clear. “I can only say that under no circumstances would I accept a certificate of election at your hands unless it clearly appeared that I had a plurality of the votes cast for the office…An honorable defeat is always to be preferred to victory with dishonor.”

So Ballantine was elected. He did not drop his lawsuit against the editor of the Delaware Standard, however. In the next installment, more will be revealed about the lawsuit, including the author of the original letter.