New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1877-01-14
Especial Correspondence Of the Republican.
FROM WASHINGTON.

Counting the Electoral V0te-Pet Projects
PIentiful-Lcss Law and More Conn
mon Sense Required-LawyerB' Briefs
in Free CIrculation-PrInted Opinions
for sale In the Junk shops-The Ore
gon Trick.
WASHINGTON, January 8, 1877.
The man who has not yet submitted his
pet project for counting the electoral vote
10 wanted in Washington. He will become
a curiosity at once. The man who visited
the centennial nd called upon anewspaper
editor to have that fact published, was not |
aware that a few others among his neighbors
had made similar visits; bat he whose plan |
for counting the electoral vote still remains |
uuherslded, would be of as much interest at |
this time as the question among Demo |
Gratis is as to where they are going to get |
that odd vote for Tilden. You can scarcely
get from the Senate to the House without
encountering some half dozen wild appear
ing, studious looking individuals who at
once inveigle you into an alcove and procsed
to expatiate some new system, some horrible
incomprehensible isrgOn about the only
perfect solution of the present presidential
imbroglio. Printed pamphlets, open letters,
unpublished views, the perusal of which
would give one the nightmare or make one
q fit subject for commission de lssnGtiqOe to
sit upon, are as thick about the national
capital as rag paper and hard money pam
phlets were not a great while ago, when the
great question sgitating the public pulse
was, "Shall we resume, and when9" at which
time the Junk shops did thriving bust
ness in trading off the aforesaid documents
with the paper mills, There are rather too
many lawyers lingering the presidential
pie. A little less sharp practice on the part
Of lawyers in the States when the electors
met, and ON the part of lawyers in Con-
gress, would have prevented many disa-
greeable features arising under the present
discussion over the November election.
Governor Grover is lawyer, and by no
means stupid one. The "Oregon trick"
so called, by which the elector having the
highest number of votes was refused a GER
tifcate, was legal trick, enianating from
mind stored with legal knowledge. The
Democratic Governor of Oregon, Mr..
Grover, is wiry built, cool, crafty lawyer.
IT you could watch him in the committee
room undergoing the shrewd close question
ing of Senator Morton, another lawyer; the
rigid examination of Senator Mitchell, like
wise lawyer, you would say at once,
"Here are three men pretty equally
matched" You would, moreover, be-
come convinced that this legal trick
by which CrOnn, a Democrat, got the
Governors certificate in place of Watts,
who ought to have had it according to the
law of Oregon, which says nothing about
eligibility or ineligibility, only directing the
Governor to "issue the certificate to the cam
didate having the highest number of votes,
say you would become convinced that
Governor Grover as a lawyer had studied
his way to perform that "trick," because be
thought he saw his way clear from oppro-
blum by falling back on law of Congress
general in it's features, and also the consti
tuition, under which he claims to have
acted. A less legal mind would have
Obeyed the law of his State, and left the
question of the constitutionaIity of that
State law to be decided by the Supreme
Court of the United States or Congress
! which Governor Grover seems so much tt
revere.
Senator Wright. a lawyer, in his speecl
. in the Senate on Friday last upon his pro
ject for messing up the result of presidential
elections by referring all contests over then
to commission Of judges, whose deCisionl
!: can be appealed from to the Supreme Court
s said: "How did he (GrOver) know Watt
= was postmaster7 He could not. he did not
I know it, for there was no way in which b
) could legally find it out. How did b
I know that if he held the Office this ren
dered him ineligiblei He did not, he coul,
i not know it, for he had no legal means +
! ! ascertain it nor power to decide it. HOY
! did he know that if ineligible, the minorit
: candidate was thereby eleOtedY He did moi
% he could not, know 1t, for he had neithe
right nor authority to make the in
quiry, and if he had both, the al
sumption was as bald in morals a
it was in legal support" Well, Governo
Grover did not lack legal backing. Law
JoAS OPAAAoAn oaAAo w hlu LEOIu I'LL 0lEGt
/. tions Who but lawyer would have dare,
# violate the law of Oregon as Governor Gre
d yer didq l do not know what this gentle
L mans record is in regard to the doctrine O
z State rights, but as he belongs to the Dem
ocratic party he doubtless believes in tn
, State rights theory, yet he dismissed tn
idea from his mind entirely and claims tina
in this case he regarded the law of 0regOl
!. as nothing where the constitution or act o
t Congress conficted with it. Now the laV
: is noble profession. 1t untangles man,
J webs and through its machinery justice cai
{ be arrived at and Chicanery defeated. II
+ application to q clear case serves onll
1 to involve that case in q mag,
Of perplexitiss. The legal lore thai
: is being brought to bear upon the presen
system of counting the electoral vote i
calculated to end in legal trickery an,
nothing more. Although the majority 0
the electoral votes for Mr.. Hayes is small
/ it is enough to make him President. If tn
!, House of Representatives did not have
!, Democratic majority. the one who advC
GATED throwing the election into the Hous
4 would have been looked upon as an idiot
& The legal opinions sent out by TElden'
I agents in tho Oregon case, the ''open lei
tersp Of Democrati0 lawyers and other
carry no weight. In most cases they az
rendered for love of party or are bought