New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1868-07-13
THE OLD MIS7AKE.

We have class of Republicans who would
have tried the patience of job. Whenever the
current sets against Us-as it did last Fall
they will do nothing; arguing that success Is
hopeless and effort fruitlcss; and, when the
current is with ms, they will do next to nothing
arguing that effort is needess-that we can't
help winning. Hence, in our good times, they
are worth exactly their own votes; while in
other times, they do not even vote, but, by
their dismal croalling, demoralize those who
otherwise would
Just now, this class have taken up the cry
that the adversary has ruined his prospects 10y
his prepOSterOus nominations at Tammany Hall.
1t lis impossible, they argue, that Seymours
War record and Blair's Jacobn letter, with the
Reputation proposed in the Tammany Plat
form, should not utterly swamp the concern.
To try to beat the General who took Vicks-
burg with the Governor who, at the very hour
of its surrender, was chuclling, in this City, to
a crowd of shouting Copperheads, that it had not
been taken, they hold so preposterous that
they regard the Democratic nomination as
joke, and are quietly settling down in the com
forting delusion that there viii be no contest
that Grant and Colfax will walk over the
course. And now, should the October Elections
60 against us, these very men viii insist
that we are beaten beyond hope, and will be
as torpid from despair as they now are from
undue confidence.
They arc wrong every way. Grant and Col
fax will be elected; but only by hard steady
work. If Republican effort should henceforth
be relaxed, under the presumption that it was
needless, We should be badly beaten. Fraudu-
lent votes alone would beat Grant, as thoy
beat Henry Clay in ~. Systematic prepare
ti0r. persistent vigilance, can alone preserve
the ballot boxes from wholesale pollution.
The recent judicial notification of the Reg
istIy Act OF Pennsylvania gives us timely
warning what to expect. In the words OF
the old song:
Theres none ever feared that the truth would be told
But they whom IN" ruth would ndict;'
and a party that makes systematic war on the
registration of legal voters does not mean to
have honest elections. Yet the late Democratic
Legislature Of New-Jersey repealed the Regis
Try Act Of the preceding Republican Lcgisla
ture, and thus opened wide the flOodgates Of
Fraud. Mind that they had absolute power to
amend and improve to their hearts content ;
but no registry at ALL with the ballot-box a
Sham Democracy of our day. So the act re-
curing the polls TO be closed at sunset was in
like manner subyertcd.
We do not know what the Pennsylvania
authorities propose to do; but we cannot doubt
that they will act They know that the Demo
cratic wire-workers have cheated heavily for
years they know that the heavy majorties re-
turned from Luzerne and other Democratic
strongholds are the fruits Of villainy; they
know that counterfeit Naturalization certifi-
Gates, stained with coffee to make them look
old, are plentiful as revenue stamps; and they
surely will not tamey surrender to the apostles
of forgery and perjury. We shall doubtless
hear from them in good time.
Mr.. Lincoln had over 100000 plurality, with
nearly all the Electoral votes, in 1864; yet
mark how small change in the popular vote
would have defeated him! He carried