The daily gazette., 1877-01-08
From the Washington Union.
The Crime Against
the People.

|
1t may be set down for certain that the
Tour million three hundred thousand vot-
ers who cast their ballots for Tilden and
Hendricks in November will not lightly
surrender or abandon the fruits of their
victory at the polls. To attempt to wrest
| 1t from them by force or fraud will prove
dangerous. 1t was victory of no ordi-
nary significance. 1t was something more
OF a popular vote of want of confidence in
the party which for eight years has held
and abused the legislative and executive
| ought to be enough. In monarchical and
aristocratic England no ministry would
tmnk ofretaining officein the face of such
| popular condemnation. Our Radical
caDal however: are seeking to hold on to
power In contempt of the popular verdict
and in the teeth of the people, although
they profess that this is a govern
ment OF the people, in which the majority
should rule.
The result of the November election
was an affirmative declaration by the
people in those principles of administra-
| tive reform with which the name of Mr..
Illden has become associated. His nomi-
nation at st. Louis, equally with his cleo
ION in November, was much more the
work OF the people than of the politicians
IL may be doubted whether he was the
Aloo NhOitc VI mum Der
Oh the latter, and his nomination was
rather an act of acquiescence on their
part in the popular demand for reform
candidate for The Presidency than trib-
| ute paid to recognized party leader. He
oWedlt not to any personal magnetism" !"
| or to. the alliance formed or influence ac-
quired by years of party service in either
house OF Congress, but to the simple fact
that his gallant and successful fight with
the Tammany ring in his own party, and
withthe canal ring and his adherents in
both parties in New York, had made his
name familiar as "household words"
throughout the country as typical re-
| former, aud the people desired to see the
part which he had so usefully played in
| the politics of his own State enacted on a
larger scale in the politics of the Union.
When the people made Mr.. Tilden
their candidate, and when they cast their
| ballots for him at the polls, they perfectly
understood what they were doing and
had a definite object in view. They were
voting for change of administration, to
be inaugurated on the 4th of March, 1877,
and pot simply preparing the ground for
Democratic party victory in 1890. Gen
tlemen who think that this presidential
question is to be considered in the light
OF its possible effect npon party prospects
or upon the fortunes of particular candi-
udtCo lOul .ltdIS HeHcb, OF Uluu SeUtle-
ment should be influenced ever so remote
ly by any such considerations, make the
tremendous, and so far as they are per-
sonally concerned, the fatal mistake of
leaving the people and the wishes of the
people out of their calculations. Who
may be elected in 1880, and whetherDem
ocrats or Republicans shall then win the
fight are questions which may be safely
adjourned until 1880. comes. The question
| Al io1, fha Oh =
now is-who was elected in 1876?
General Grant says that if Hayes is the
man che will see him inaugurated," and
he may rest assured that if 1ilden is the
man, the people will see him peaceably
inaugurated. As we said yesterday the
question is one primarily of fact. Itonly
becomes constitutional question in con-
sequence of the difficulties suggested in
regard to the mode of counting the cleo
toral votes, the respective powers of the
two houses, the functions of the Vice
President, the right of Congress to go be-
hind the face of the electoral certificates,
and to inquire into their genuineness
and regularity, and into the validity of
the appointment of the electors Not
one of these questions is a new question.
Eighty-eight years of national existence,
during which twenty-three presidential
elections have taken place, have furnish
ed precedents for the settlement of every
one of them. Party spirit has run as
high or higher on the occasion Of former
elections than during the canvass which
has just closed. The electoral colleges
have failed to elect in consequence of
tie, and the election of President has
been thrown into the House, and that of
Vice President into the Senate. That
which distinguishes the present oc-
caSion from all past contests is the fact 1
that never before have the leaders of the |
defeated party, the friends of the minori- |
ty candidate, attempted conspiracy 1
against the people, or sought to reverse /
the popular verdict by q resort to uncon-
stitutional and revolutionary measures.
We have had in the past Benedict |
Arnold and an Aaron Burr, but never be-
fore such cabal of desperate and un.
scrupulous politicians as are now seeking
to turn the defeat sustained by the Re-
publican party in November into a vic
tory for Hayes. All the difficulties which
have arisen, and which embarrass the
final settlement of the question are to be
ascri bed to these men and their machina-
tions. They have planned and executed
the larceny of the electoral votes of
South Carolina, and Florida
for Hayes. In two States (Florida and
Louisiana) they have converted maiori-
ty upon the face of the returns for the
Democratic candidate into manufactur
ed and fictitious majority for Hayes. In
South Carolina, by the intimidation of
Democratic negroes, and by wholesale
frauds in the black precincts of the State
i'm the low-country parishes particu-
arly-they obtained n majority to which
upon fair vote they We're not enti-
lied In two States (South Carolina
and Florida) to compass their ends they
lid not hesitate to set at defiance and
reat with contempt the highest judicial
of the State. In Louisiana,
while apparently having the color of law
or their acts, the law itself is one of the
provisions and manifest unfair
less of which should condemn it as I'M I
constitutional, while in its application to
he facts of the recent election every prin.
iple of justice and every appearance of
lecency even were outraged aud disre-
,arded. Then, to prevent the fraudulent t
eizure of the electoral votes of these t
'tates being inquired into, the same cabal S
AYE invented the theory, first that there t
, IL, 70 / 4