New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1877-02-17
PICKETT,s PUT.
He sbakes His Dirty Associates.

He Sbakes His Dirty Associates.
The New York Herald, of Thursday, Feb
ruary 8, contains the following:
WASHINGTON, February 6, 1877.
To the Editor of tho Herald:
You have, unadvisedly, trust, done NE
injustice in your Issue of last Friday. to
which my attention is Just now called. You
refer. i'm an editorial ON the Returning
Board, to "the testimony of Littlefeld,
their secretary, and of Pickett and Maddox,
their aceomplices.n / have never been &C.
quainted with nor held any communication
with any member of the Returning Board,
and the term ''sccomplce," which you ap-
ply to me, signifies netarious association.
Little field, the secretary, stands selt-con-
fessed fOrger of returns, and Maddox, a
confidential agent of the government, was
infOrmer against the iniquitOus pur-
poses of the board. l simply used
that information TO thwart their pur-
poses. 1t is a strange confusion of
ideas which would place me in the same re.
lation to that board as either of these Off
cial persOnages. They are Republicans;
am Democrat. Lttletield was used as an
instrument in the preparation of q stupen-
dOus fraud upon the constitution and laws
of his country, the object of which wac to
deprive the people of their choice of Presi-
dent. Maddox was sent to New Orleans
by the administration as an agent OF its
secret service, ostensiblv on revenue mat
tiers, but with collateral instructions to look
into and report on the political situation.
Some days after he was gone / learned the
fact incidentally, and inasmuch as he had
said he was going to lSt. Louis II Y suspi-
ciOns were aroused, and so | warned my
Democratic friends in New Orleans to be-
ware OF him, as knew that his former high
standing in that community would secure
i'm he. .aaaFa kr mi flo oNu nd
perhaps, the uDguarded confidence of many
with regard to political movements.
When he return ed to Washington he COM
planned that had impeded his work; but he
also informed me of the fact that Tilden had
carried the State by more than 5000 ma
jorlty, and that the Returning Board was in
the market, and would not relieve the sus-
pense of the country until the last day the
law allowed, namely, the sixth of Deem
Der. He furthermore showed me the Wells
letter, which authorized him to act las it
seemed to mel for that individual; he named
his (Wells') price, and said if il were not
forthcoming the vote of the State would be
declared for Hayes. He asked me to become
the bearer of these facts to the managers of
the Democratic party in New York, and
undertook to do so, not with the slightest
expectation that they would consent to buy
such rascsls at any figure, but in order to
be able when the time came to show the
country what they we're willing to do. Had
] failed to lay The facts before Messrs
Hewitt and Morrissey | should have lost
the connection with the authorities of the
party to sustain the case, and nothing
would have remained beyond Mr.. MaddOx's
statement of what they wished him to do.
He has given his own reasons for not aid
ing the Returning Board to consummate it's
villainy, and l need not repeat them. He
gave me the opportunity of doing a service
az ks.a ~
and of establishing the guilt of the Louis
lana Returning Board For this l am
roundly abused by the press, even by the
bypOcritical and cowar6ly portion of the
Democratic press, which ia quite willing to
avail itself of the advantages of my move
ment, but exceedingly anxious to avoid all
responsibility for it. My past lite is re-
viewed with harshness, but ! am not
ashamed Of it in any of irs features.
JOHN F. PICKETT.