The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1876-04-20
Hon. Montgomery Blair's Letter on the
Presidency,
WAsHINGToN. March is, 1876.

WASHINGTON, March is, 1876.
DEAR SIR: I have your letter request
ing for publication the views expressed
by me in recent conversation with re-
spcct to the pending Presidential contest.
The sum Of them was that we ought to
continue the contest rs we began in 1872,
when VIC agreed to forcgo all other issues
save that Of reform in the administration
of the government. The adversary then
struggled and still strives, with the help
OF tho Hon. Ben. Hill, to keep alive the
issues of the war for the purpose of pro-
longing abuses which, however great, go
unchecked while sectional strife holds the
public mind. We did not carry the cleo
tions in 1872, because we were not fully
successful in making the issue of reform.
But we made such Il beginning that the
victory of our adversaries has proved a
barren one. We so far succeeded that a
show of investigation had to be made.
The Credit NIobilcr fraud, which, though
well known before to all public men,
could not command public attention. now
absorbs it. Spoliation was checked. Jay
Cooke & Co., who had largely advanced
the money to carry the elections, could
not be reimbursed by Congressional in
dorsement of the Northern Pacific bonds,
and therefore failed. The so-called in
ycstigating committees, organized not to
convict, were experts in finding out how
not to do it, and the departments helped
them assiduously; but the Independent
Press did the work so efIectually that a
large Democratic majority was returned
to the present House of Representatives.
Unfortunately, this tide of success, which
assured the reformcrs of the government,
this year has been arrested and turned
back by the intrusion into the canvass
last fall of another issue, of which the
Radicals have eagerly and successfully
availcd themselves. And their effort is
to hold on to that issue, and make the
Presidential election turn on the question
of resumption, upon which they have
won, instead of upon the question of re-
form, upon which they have lost the day.
If they succeed in this, the result will
invariably be unfortunate for lis. Our
friends having been beaten OH this issue
last fall in the States where anti-resump-
ton was strongest, our vote in New York,
even without which success for us would
be hopeless having been largely affected
by the attitude of our friends in those
States, no rational mind can fail to see
that such an issue would defeat us.
1t is plain, from this brief statement
of the situation, that our success depends
upon our ability to reinstate the issue of
reform as the issue of the canvass and
it is equally plain that this is not to be
done by resolution, but BY such action as
will not only proclaim it, but will of
itself verify it as the issue to all men.
The nomination of Tiden will of itself
force this issue, and make the election
turn upon it. The friends of other cam
didates object to the nomination of
citizen of New York and claim the nonl-
ination for the West. But Jackson was
not selected because he was citizen of
Tennessee, or Jefferson because he was
citizen of Virginia, or Grant because he
was for a short time in Illinois. Selec-
ton on such ground has no political sig
ni6cance, and ignores altogether the only
consideration upon which candidate
ought to be selected, viz: as the repre-
sentative of the idea sought to be adj
ranccd. My preference for Tilden is
only because his nomination would of
itself force on the issue Of reform, which
is our sure card in the pending canvass.
do not doubt that the other gentlemen
spoken Of would prove vigorous reform
crs, and l have no personal preference
for Tiden over any one of them; but
neither of them is so identified with
"rctorm" in the public mind as Tildcn.
They have either not had the opportuni-
ty. or not availcd themselves of it, to
manifest the resolute purpose he has
shown to purge the State of fraud and
jobbing. They have not joined hands
with political adycrsarics to overthrow
and arraign and convict as criminals the
master spirits of their own party whilst
they seemed to be imprcgnably intrcnch-
cd in the control of its organization, and
have not by such conduct been lifted into
power by the support of large bodies of
political opponents, even against repub-
lican whose integrity was not questioned,
but who had not manifested the same
zeal in the cause of reform. Nor have
they, after reaching power, so signalizcd
their administration by unsparing war on
jobbery.
BY this course Tildcn has made him.
self, more than any other man of our
day, the representative man of the idea
to which the Democratic party so em-
phatically pledged itself in 1872, and his
nomination would he accepted, not only
by the Liberal Republicans, who then
acted with us, but by thousands who then
held back, as a sure guarantee that the
pledge would be faithfully redeemed;
and his war record and his financial views
would chcctually prevent diversion by
false issues.
The active cnmty which Tilden has
provoked in his own party serves only 10
attest his fitness for the occasion. No
man ever drove more men out of the
Democratic party than Jackson; but no
man ever recruited it SO rapidly from the
true men in the ranks Of his opponents
ut the same time. And this vitallzing
process must be renewed. The curse of
the Democratic party has been its Twcctls.
The strength Of It's opponents, who use
the government for class ACKNOWLEDGEMENT,
is derived from vast expenditure, by cor
rupting the people in one form or another
with their own money, and by misleading
them with false issues. But Old Bullion
never said anything more true than that
'thc Democratic party, to be strong,
must be clcan"
Tildcn is the type of the men who
were honorcd by the party in the days of
its strength; and his nomination being
sure bond for a return to their policy,
will insure its return TO power.
Yours truly,
MONTGOMERY BLAIR.
SAMUEL NJ. SHAW,
Editor Finrmat's Jour-, Coopcr$fo"m, ". J..