New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1875-11-09
TUE NFYT TRICK ~ POLITICS,

people so often duped, and the political gam
blers so invariably successful. The Custom
house management Of the canvass in this State
was so full of small tTckery from the moment
the delegates to the State Convention assem-
bled at Saratoga to the closing of the polls,
and the trlckeyy was so patent, or at best so
thinly vailed, that the degree OF success
which attended it seems almost to be
burlesque upon the ballot SAID
very active and influential Administra-
ton leader at Saratoga when asked the
day before the Convention met what would he
done, "rll tell you what we're going to DO
"We're going to nominate John Bigelow Tor
Controller, and just steal Old TIldens thun-
"der. That's the only way We can beat EN-,
"by playing their own game on EN-" Every
body who heard anything OF the gossip at Sar-
atoga, on the day before the Convention,
knows that this was the plan and that it was
chuckled over and discussed with mods and
winks and rubbing of hands, and agreed upon
as a piece Of smartness rising almost to genus.
When his curt telegram, Under no circum-
"stances,r came little later, the tune was
changed. And when little later still
he was nominated for Secretary OF State
by the Democrats there was still greater
change. The very men who invented him as
q candidate for Controller denounced him as
no man ever was denounced before, rs fraud,
a renegade, q traitor, liar, and everything
thai was corrupt, dishonest, and vicious. And
vet these very men, the managers and leaders
of great party were able to draw after them
the bulk of their organization, even after they
had so publicly disclosed their lack of pEinci
Il -. Is in n
good plan, is it wise policy, to encourage that
sort of business? What can people be think
ing of-how much self-respect can they be
possessed of-when they see the tricks upon
their credulity announced beforehand, and then
calmly submit to the impostion}
And now there's another and larger piece
of political trickery in course of preparation.
1t is for q larger audience and to be put upon
larger stage. The last Of the important
State elections before the Presidential campaign
opens has taken place. The issues upon which
the contest will be fought are i'll great
measure to he made up in the next four or
five months. Congress may do something by
its action or inactiOn to set them i'll shape
before the country, or the politicians outside
Congress may make them up and force them
to the front. They are already busy
at it. The defeat of the Force
bill in the last Congress, and the late action of
the Federal authorities with regard to the cleo
ton in Mississippi, which left the people of that
State to regulate their own elections and man
age their own affairs virtually take ont of
politics the disturbing question of recOnstruc-
ton upon which elections have turned for
several years. The outrage mill may be con-
sidered closed, not for repairs, but permanently.
Administration leaders, elated with the victory
which the financial follies of their opponents
brought them, may naturally think the finan
cial question settled, and removed from
party politics. Upon the question of admins
tIatiye reform, the Administration party Will
not dare make fight, for the reasons-first,
that all the abuses to be reformed have orig
mated under their rule. and the few reforms
they have instituted were begun very late and
ONLY under the very strongest public pressure;
and secondly, because the Democrats, having
been out of power and so without opportunity,
are not responsible for abuses, aud conse-
quently cannot be attacked; and thirdly, be-
cause the only prominent RcfOrmer who has
actually done the hard and dsagreeable work
Of reform is the Democratic Governor OF
New-Yo
So what is left? The Administration man-
ayers III Ohio thought they had made q dis
coverv when they invented the school question
and raised the religious issue. They were
forced out of it to some extent in the prog
ress of the canvass and compelled finally to
make their fight upon the vital question OF the
currency. The New-YOrk managers took it
,m and put it in their platform, and though
they made very little OF it i'll the press and OH
the stump, they flooded The State with tracts,
pamphlets, and docuIUnts IL was quietly, hut
very shrewdly and mdustriously pushed "wher-
lever it could do most good" President
Grant showed that he thought there were " mil
Lions in it," by making it the subject OF
his Dcs MOincs speech, and leaving the pub
lie mind divided between surprise ut the
phenomenon of lis speaking at all and
wonder at his abrupt breaking out upon that
particular subject. These and other things
shortly TO appear are only tentative. They
arc experiments upon the public preparatory
to the Presidential campaign. The new de-
parttre of ne Administration party-for il is
left by events practically without any ground
10 fight upon-now promises to be upon the
religious issue Of opposition to Catholic III
6uence and the maintenance OF the common
school system. 1t matters not that in
most of the States, in sober truth no
such issue has been made by the Catholics
themselves or any preicxt given by them
for its being raised nor that it is n sub
jcct for State legislation purely, and not in
any sense entering into national politics nor
do these men care that their agitation OF 1t
will embltter political strife as nothing but
religious question can. They simply see in it
a chance to retrieve what they have lost and
retain their hold of power by infiaming the
passions of the ignorant and exciting the
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