Abraham Lincoln

From Where Poles Have Settled Most (1877) by Sygurd Wiśniowski

      In some communities there are demagogues who deliver votes wholesale to American candidates.  The people out in the country, making up their own minds, incline on the whole to the Democratic camp, mainly because of the influence of the Irish, with whom they are linked by religious ties.  The link has become stronger when President Grant inaugurated his American Kulturkampf.  Dreaming of a third term as president, which by tradition is forbidden, he decided to set Catholics at odds against Protestants.  And so his clique made the school question, which by its very nature belongs to the communities and states, the slogan of party extremists.  The maneuver did not turn out to be a complete success, but it lost the Republicans many Catholic supporters.

      Republican Catholics formerly followed the lead of Archbishop Purcell of Cincinnati.  This prelate supported Lincoln and the enfranchisement of the Negroes, but from the time of the school quarrels he left the Republicans.

      Polish artisans, as protectionists, incline in part to the Republicans.  The intelligentsia is divided, but the majority, like the same group among Germans and Americans, are to be found in the Republican camp.

Pages 15 � 16.