Staunton vindicator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1860-1896, 1877-02-16

N~JS W. Va l
ing quite hopeful of the latter. The case
will not be decided till Monday or Tues
day.
THE PROGRESS OF THE ELEC
TOTAL COMMISSION.
Florida for HAYES !! And now for
Louisiana!
And in the meantime there is a great
deal of idle f~retting and almost childish
peevishness among our Democratic friends
at the first-named result. We have made
to accept the result without whining over
it. Look at it for a moment This mo-
ton of arbitration was adopted against the
opposition Of nearly all the leaders of the
Republican conspiracy to hold on to the
government, even if it had to plunge the
country into wal to do it. 1t wa almost
unanimously supported by the Democrats.
The ablest men on both sides supervised
the preparation of the bill which created
it, and If it imperfectly covered all the
points the fault lies as much with our
leaders as it does in the craftiness of the
Republicans, of which we have but a soil
tary evidence, and chat is in the case of a
Republican Senator, who, previous to the
adoption Of the bill, declared that it would
admit the consideration of all the evidence
of fraud, and after the assembling of the
commission voted against such admission.
AS to the decisions of the justices We
are very far from being prepared to assign
to them an origin in partisan prejudice
an 1mputation that could be lodged as well
against the two Democratic Judges, who
vote the same way every time as against
the three Republicans. These men on
either side have n reward before them
that could tempt them out of the path of
right. That they may make wrong decisions
is possible, and that their life long politi-
cal education may furnish the bias is pos
sible, too, for where a fine question OF law
liz balanced on the edge of a knife, the
the merest habit Of thinking in certain
grooves may draw the decision one way or
the other, but that any of these justices
are ready, or could be made ready, to
trample down the law and the facts in
reaching out to serve their party predilec-
tions is something the people of this coun-
try are not yet prepared to believe. The
fifth man, upon whom so much int rest has
been centered, because he is the fifth mall
Justice BRADLEY-haS a record that
does not lay him open to the suspicion OF
a desire to serve his party. His decision
some time ago against the constitutlonallty
of the Enforcement Act was a blow in the
teeth of his party, and struck the sorest
and rottenest tooth in its head. If he had
had an eye to the future, based on service
to the Republican party he would never
have made that decision.
The-s'I told you so'-people are to-
day in the majority. Those men who saw
no way out of d national calamity, except
through this arbitration, but who are now
~denouncing the creation of the Commits
sion, belong to a class neither fit to lead
nor follow. AS leaders they originate no
thing. and as followers they are nervous
and crying out, at the first ala m, that all is
lost. We have just begun a great legal
fight, undertaken in preference to a civil
war, in which the ables5 minds of the na-
tion are engaged, and to arbitrate which
there sit five men of great legal lore and
unstained ermines, and yet in the first ad-
verse decision a cry goes up from the weak
ones that all is lost. If the Electoral Com
mission had decided that fraud was just,
corruption allowable and perjury in return
ing boards legal, and all reasonably proper,
there could not be more disappointment
than is evinced over the fact that it decid-
ed not to 60 into d course of investigation
shat would have been interminable.
With great hope we await the decision
Of the Commission in the case of Louis
lana. where the points to be made by the
Democrats may be briefly summed up as
follows |. That the Returning Board was
not a legal body under the State law, and ::
.. The ineligibility of two electors, Brew
ster and Levisee. TO meet the first case
the Republicans, rely much on a decis-
ION Of the late Chief Justice Chase in a
case well remembered in Virginia. 1t will
be recollected that Caesar Griffin, colored,
for assault with intent to kill, Was sentenc-
ed to the penitentiary by Judge H. w.
Shelley. The u. S. District Judge. Un-
derwood, ordered his release Oh the ground
that Shelley was not eligible, the 18th
Amendment disabling him. In the q. S.
Supreme Court. Underwood was reversed
on the ground that Sheffey was q judge de
.tfacto, though ineligible. On this de .facto
point, the Republicans hope to sustain the
acts of their ineligible electors. The Dem
ocratic counsel, Carpenter Marshall and
Judge Campbell are represented as ex-
tremely confident Of carrying their case in
the Louisiana vote.
While all these things are passing, our
people can only keep cool and keep their
telnpers. We subscribe to every share of
the following remark made by Mr.. S. J.
TILDEN, Of New York, a gentleman
whosename has appeared of late frequent
ly in the public prints. who remarked the
other evening, II I'M a fatalist SO far as I
believe, as the representative of the Demo-
crats-the final decision will be made in my
favor II. ..t. 49,.