The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1876-07-20
GOV. TILDEN'S REPLY.

GOV. TILDEN's REPLY.
The following is Gov. Tilden's response
Gen. McCzernand, and Gentlemen of the
Committee:
shall, at my earliest convenience pre-
pare and transmit to you formal accep-
tance of the nomination which you now
tender me, in behalf of the Democratic
National Convention and do not de-
sire, on this occasion, to anticipate any
topic which might be appropriate to that
communication. 1t may, however, be
permitted to me to say my nomination
was not mere personal preference be-
tween eminent citizens of this Republic,
who might very we'll have been chosen
for so distinguished an honor, and so
august duty. 1t was rather declara-
ton of that illustrious body in whose be-
half you speak in favor of administrative
reform, with which events had associated
me in the public view. The strength,
the universally and the efficiency of the
demand for administrative reform in all
governments, and especially in the ad-
ministration of the Federal Government,
with which the Democratic masses every
where were instinct, have led to series
of surprises in the popular assemblage
and perhaps in the convention itself. 1t
would be unnatural, gentlemen, if pop
ular movement so genuine and so power
full should stop with 100000 of Demo
Gratis; that it should not extend by con-
tagion to that large mass of independent
voters who stand between parties in our
country, and even to the moderate portion
of the party under whose administration
the evils to be corrected have grown up,
and perhaps in what we have witnessed,
there may be an augury in respect to what
we may witness in the election about to
take place throughout our country. At
least let us hope so, and believe so. am
not without experience of the difficulty
and labor of effecting administrative re-
form, when it requires a revolution in
policies and in measures long established
in government. If l were to judge by
the year and half in which I have been
in the State Government, 1 should say
that the routine duties of the trust have
had imposed on me are small burden
compared with that created by the at
tempt to change the policy of the Gov
ernment of which I have been the execu-
tive head. Especially is this so where
the reform is to be worked out with more
or less of the cooperation of public Off
GERS who either have been tainted with
the evils to be redressed, or who have
been incapacitated by the habit of toler-
ating the wrongs to be corrected to which
they have been consenting witnesses. I
therefore if your choice should be ratified
by the people at the election, should en-
ter upon the great duties which would
fall upon me, not as holiday recreation,
but very much in that spirit of consecra-
ton in which the soldier enters battle.
Applause. But let us believe, as do
believe, that we now see the dawn of a
better day for our country, and that diff
cult is the work to which the Democratic
party, with many allies, former members
of other parties, has addressed itself, the
Republic is yet to be renovated to live in
all the future, and to be transmitted to
succeeding generations as Jefferson con-
tributed to form it in his day, and as it
has been ever since, until recent period,
blessing to the whole people and to all
mankind. Applause.
Gentlemen, / thank you for the very
kind terms in which you made your COM
munication, and extend to you collec-
lively and individually most cordial
greeting.
The committee and their friends then
entered into a social conversation as to
the prospects of the coming canvass, and
remained short time in the hospitable
mansion of the Governor.