Researching Family History Since 1999
We have been compelled to answer the above inquiry by letter, in order to accommodate, in response to letters from all parts of the State; and now being tired of answering a question that should have been satisfactorily settled by other parties long ago, we propose to state here one for all what we know about it.
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Penny Walling, finding no man to vote for him, “withdraws” from the contest for printer. In doing so, he says his candidacy has had the effect of causing many more farmers to be put on the Legislative tickets. None but a two cent demagogue would attempt to excite class jealousies of this character. We don’t suppose the matter has been thought of by a nominating convention in the State, or a single member of one; and we doubt if there are any more or less farmers running for the legislature than there has been in former years. The attempt to excite that kind of suspicion and jealousy is contemptible and will be scorned by the farmers. Not five of them would have voted for him if he had remained in the field, and the discovery of this fact is what drove him out. His championship of the “farmers” is transparent. All he cares for them is to make money out of them with his paper, and the only result of his being a candidate has been to advertise his secession sympathies and expose his instinctive.
Source: Oregon Statesman, May 26, 1862.
We see by advertisements in some of the Northern papers that this gentleman is an independent candidate for State Printer. He says he is a Union man. If this be true, we are astounded that he did not submit his claims to the convention at Eugene. Union men were pretty well represented there, and Mr. Walling has no excuse for not presenting his claims. That farmers are entitled to a voice in the government they build up in connection with others, is to us a self evident proposition; but why a printer who works upon a paper devoted to agricultural subjects is any more entitled to the office than any other printer, we can’t see.
Walling confesses to having voted for the traitor Breckinridge, but avers he is Union now. (All secession sympathizers declare that they are Union men.) If he is, why is he running to draw off votes from a Union candidate that a secessionist may be elected. He knows that a vote for his is a vote for the secessionist candidate.
Source: Oregon Statesman, May 5, 1862.
A Portland correspondent says “Little Walling talks about men being influenced by the dollar. He is not the man to throw that class of stones. Any who have had deal with him will testify that a more picayunish man never lived than Walling. A sixpence never leaves his grasp without being pinched till it is as thin as a shad scale.”
Source: Oregon Statesman, May 5, 1862.
Several secessionists have reported that Mr. Gordon, the Union candidate for State Printer, is likely soon to die, and a good many of them are indulging in that humane delusion. Walling, the secession [illegible] candidate for the same office, has been very industrious in peddling this report, and affects to pretend that if he “did not think Gordon would die before the election he should not run.” Mr. Gordon has been in poor health for some months, but is improving now. His physician pronounces his lungs to be entirely sound, and confidently anticipates his recovery. In short, Gordon is quite as likely to live during the coming four years as Walling is. And he will most likely live to record the merited hanging of thousands of the stripe who are predicting his death — the prediction being twice as expressive of their wishes as belief.
Source: Oregon Statesman, May 5, 1862.
Of the nominee for the State Printer, the least said the best. Between Harvey Gordon and A. Noltner, there is very little choice. Those who dream honesty a requisite in an official position, will hesitate about voting for either of the gentlemen who have been placed in nomination for State Printer. Happily, the name of Mr. Walling, of the Farmer, is before the public in connection with this office, and as between the three, we regard him as immeasurably the best man for the place.
Source: Portland Oregonian, May 3, 1862.
The Times thinks our assumption that it had been supporting Walling was not founded in fact. We are far from any disposition to be querulous or captious with the Times, and more especially now, when it has a responsive editor, and its improved tone evinces a cordial intention to support the Union candidates. But we maintain that before, our strictures were well grounded. For much of the week previous, the tone of the paper was varied and uncertain. On one occasion a direct attack was made in its leading column on the Union candidate for printer. A day or two after, a strange article on the “democratic” secession candidate appeared in its columns. All this we thought warranted the “heretofore.” But enough of this. We are informed that the paper now has a new editor, and its prior unsteadiness has not since been manifest.
Source: Oregon Statesman, April 28, 1862.
Albert G. Walling, of Portland, is running as independent candidate for State Printer, and seeking to prostitute the columns of the Farmer to the aid of secession, to that behalf. Walling is an indifferent journeyman printer, and a weak and a small man. He is ostensibly editor of the Farmer, but is wholly incapable of performing such duty. Mr. Francis has edited his paper for some time. Walling never has, and never can. Through the columns of an agricultural paper, he expects to inveigle men to vote for him, who could not otherwise be induced to touch secession, or any of its sympathizers. Walling is so unimportant that his political sentiments may not be [illegible]. He is a secessionist sympathizer, and voted for Breckenridge and Lane. A Portland correspondent says, “he was among the narrowest and most prejudiced secessionist sympathizers in Portland.” When these facts are known, his attempt to thus pervert the columns of the Farmer to political and secession ends will probably redound to his injury.
In 1862, Albert G. Walling was a candidate for the office of State Printer in Oregon. He was a job printer in Portland, where he ran a paper called the Oregon Farmer from 1858 through 1863. Coverage of the election in the Oregon newspapers provides interesting insight in the election process and the politics of the day. Starting tomorrow, I’ll be posting articles about Albert Walling, the election, and the politics of the day on a daily basis.
Enjoy!
