The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1878-08-13
Tn. Potter commiss.. o.e. ars.

The Potter Committee Onee More.
The Potter Committee reass embed yes
terday in upper room in the Custom
House, and will, rumor says, hold some OF
its most interesting sessions here and at
this time. We wish we could believe that
the sessions would be as important as they
promise to be interesting, and We suspect
that most of the members of the committee
devoutly though secretly entertain the
| same wish.
So far the committee has added very little
to what was generally known about the cleo
ton of 1876. It has failed to convince the
public that the charges made against Score
tary Sherman and Minister Noyes were
true, and it has, as most Congressional in
vestigation committees do, made the public
heartily tired of the subject, besides
muddling it so that, as Lord Dun
dreary says, mo fellow can be ex-
pected to understand" the voluminous and
contradictory testimony given. One thing
it has done-and possibly the result was
worth the effort--it has shown the country.
what manner OF men were the trusted
agents and officers of the republic
can party in such States as Loui-
siana and Florida. They were men, as
they themselves have shown, to whom per-
jury was joke, to whom the sanctity of
an election was a laughing matter, who
would not be believed in any court what
Northern voters during many weary years,
and notably in 1876, as heroes and
martyrs, as the ''true Union men
Of the South" as the only men
in many Southern States fit to
be intrusted with federal Offices and as
worthy to be defended by federal troops
and to be supported by the votes of decent
and intelligent people in all the Northern
States. They turn out to be perjurers,
thieves, murderers, highwaymen, political
tricksters of the basest and most unblushing
kind. traders in votes who had not, it seems,
even the poor merit of fidelity to their
party, for they played only for their own
hands If there was any danger of the re-
vival of the Southern question, which we
do not believe, the witnesses before the
Potter Committee have certainly and
entirely removed this peril. No party
leaders, whatever they may now
pretend, will ally themselves in 1880 with
the Kelloggs Packards, Madison Wells,
Tom Andersons, James Andersons, Powers
whom yet, it would seem, the present adj
ministration respects and values sufficiently
to trust many Of them in important federal
posts.
But, aside from this, what has the long
investigation accomplished 1t appears to
us to have been useful mainly to cover the
real wrongs committed. 1t has, for in
stance, wasted many days in On attempt to
prove that Secretary Sherman wrote GER
tain letter, which, if no had testified that he
had written it, would not have amounted to
anything whatever. But in doing this it has
drawn public attention away from. the
really important fact that the Louisiana
Returning Board, charged by law with
making o canvass of the vote Of Louisiana
for President and Vice President according
to certain specified rules, violated those
rules openly, and plainly for no other .pur-
pose than to enable themselves to make
false count. The law creating the Returning
Board commands that it shall consist OF five
members. representing all the political par
ties. Wells and Anderson, both now holding
important federal places in New Orleans,
refused to allow the Board to be
filled to its proper and lawful number Of
five, and refused to allow a democrat to act
as a member. There could be but one oh.
ject in this--it was plainly that they might
manipulate the vote of the State as they
chose in their secret meetings. But the
foolish fuss about trifes stirred up by
the Potter Committee has caused the
public to forget this central fact,
and has not even reminded people that the
republican visiting statesmen, most of
whom also now hold Office, saw this clearly
illegal action going on and never protested;
though, if they had required it. Wells and
Anderson would not have hesitated
a moment to admit democrat, and
thus make the number and character
OF the Board conform to the strict
requirement Of the law. Again, the Louis
lana election law requires that protests, to
be received, shall be made directly after
the election and at the places where the
election was held. 1t is notorious that this
necessary guard was utterly broken down.
and that protests were made in New
Orleans, in the Custom House, long
after the election, and under the eye
of federal officers interested as partisans in
the result. A grosser violation of neces-
sary guard against fraud was never COM
mitted; but the Potter Committee, while
giving almost endless days to trivial details,
has scarcely touched this vital fact, and has
certainly failed to impress its Significance
on the public mind.
II has now summoned before it.. the pa
pers inform us. Mr.. Roberts, O Louisiana
gentleman who, it may be remembered.