Mexico weekly ledger., 1876-11-30

going back four years, We beg again to resur
to the chief points of that Testimony.
The election Of 1872 in Louisiana was
| properly characterized by President Grant
in q message as "a gigantic fraud and
! the electoral vote Of the State was thrown
| out by Congress. In what the fraud con-
sisted is well shown by Senator Carpenters
speech In January, 1874. The so-cal!ed
Lynch Returning Board,' or Demo
cratic F~usion'' Board, took the returns OF
the local authorities, which gave McEnery
65, SO and Kellogg IS, 973 votes, and so
changed and cooked them up that they gave
Kellogg Y, 800 votes and McEnery 54.029.
These returns were thus tempered with by
s'the Democratic Fusion' Board. which
was in itself illegal, which, il it had been
legal, had only ministerial power to count
the vote, and which thus violently usurped
these powers, without the evidence of a sim
gle riotous act or fraud being submitted.
This was in 1872, and first elevated Gov.
Kellogg to power. . e-ge...rt .a4z
In 1874, d Republican Returning Board,
claiming that the Republicans throughout
the State had been "intimidated and
kept from the polls, as they probably had
to some extent-though Mr.. Foster rather
questions this-fOllowed the same course,
changing by wholesale the local vote. The
report signed by W. A. Wheeler, now Re-
publican candidate for the Vice-President,
as well as by George f. Hoar and W. p.
| FRYE, Of Maine, says that this Returning
Board undoubtedly kept out of power the
| party who were in the real majority, electlng
those who were rightly defeated, and de-
feating those who were r%ightfully elected.
With q prophetic sense that does these gen.
tlemen credit, they %forebode the time when
6 electors gaining their office IN Ike man
| ner shall turn the scale I'm the election Of q
President of the United States. Singular
turn Of fortunes wheel, that William A.
Wheeler, by virtue of his candor on that &C.
cssion, should be nominated for the Vice
Presidency, and should now stand in danger
Of just such a d~ishonorable election!
1t is impossible, in view of this testimony
of men when they were candid, not to re-
gard with suspicion the action Of the Lou
isiana Returning Board, to-day, the same
men who in 1874 illegally kept the Demo
cratic majority of the State from power.
The country revolted at the cOoked-up re-
turns in 1872, when the voice of the State
had no weight in the Presidential contest;
it will revolt from them still more. to-day,
as giving the casting vote of the Presiden-
tial contest. Give us the fair and undoc-
tored returns of the local authorities, where
there was a peaceable and honest election
where not, throw them out entirely. Let
| the Returning Board confine itself to its
ministerial function of counting the prima
facie vote, and one party or the other win,
as the poll may decide. That is the only
course which will satisfy the homer Of the
country and the better impulse Of both par
ties. Amy other course, any compromise
with, or acceptance Of these fraudulent
methods and stained LOCALITIES will faint the
| choice which is based on it, and hopelessly
| smirch the administration which succeed:
to power by it's aid.