The Morristown gazette. [volume] (Morristown, Tenn.) 1867-1920, 1878-08-21


{ the Democratic House of Represen
} tatiYes in the then existing state 0
} facts and law. was rightly perceiges
by Mr. Tiiden to bean impregnabl'
: fortress for the rights of the people
DEFEAT OF Conspiracy INEVITABLE
That high debate which he there
fore advised and pressed, would have
Summoned every law-abiding oitizer
in the land to a vivid knowledge o.
the fact that their Immediate Repre-
sentatives in the peoples House
we're uphol6ing the Constitution and
a linezof precedents without one ex
ception in the history of any count
/ by either party. to.wit; no false and
challenged vote to pass into the count
.IIwithoat the separate consent ofeaeh
Houses. The peoples gaze wonld
have been riveted upon the champ
ions OF the peoples rights. Mere
standing still by the House. or mere
standing still, plus an offer to take
any rule of Republican making or
adoption in the four courts twice
eleeting Lincoln, and twice eIecting
Grant, must haYe reduced the con-
spirators to compliance with law and
precedent, or else to the suicidalne-
cessity of open actual usurpation.
and it's backing by the troops obey
ing Grant. Threats must have risk,
ed their life in acts-and threateners
too. For nothing but such rank
treason and red-handed violence
could enthroned the beneficiary
of their crime. Nor kept him seated
for single hour, unless. indeed, the
Anglo-Saxon blood of the founders
of this Republic be milk in the veins
of their sons. An infexible House
always standing fast in the final
citadel ofpower, the keen bright sum
light Of publicity through the long
day of such debate, would have
shrivelIed and consumed the con-
spiracy root and branch. aa
A CHANGE OF BASE.
There were inexplicable delays at
Washington. The rules ofthe House
make delays easy, perhaps unavoid.
able. The cited resolutions of the
House Privileges Committee. which
we're. to raise the Democratic stand
ard there, were not otreported until the
18th efJanuary. Nor uutil the 18th
could the debate be opened. as then,
at last, it was opened. by the power
ful speech of Proctor Knott, its
chairman. ecz $50
No sooner was that speech uttered
and issue joiEed barely, indeed, was
time conceded for its utterance,
when Mr.. Knott was displaced the
debate and it's victories forestalled,
Mr.. Tilden's plan supplanted, the
responsibility elsewhere assumed of
otherwise eneountering the Rupubli-
can conspiracy, and the first step in
such encounter taken irreyoeably, by
the entry of another committee of
the House, and the announcement
+ u
of Democratic compromise. Sur
renders are alas /! irrevocable. Or
if not a surrender, at least the Elec-
toral Commission bill proffered the
conspirators too easy release from
every hard impossibiityin their plot.
and proposed to exact of them moth
ing more difficult than that eight of
the highest Republicans should put
on blindness. and grant impunity.
to the frauds which John Sherman in
Louisiana. and Index" Noyes in
Florida, had ahetted or defended the
committing of by Republicans the
lowest and vilest. Whereby those
frauds afterward got an effectual
validity otherwise than by force and
arms. sa
THE ELECTORAL COMMISSION SCHEME.
That bill, privately prepared by
the Senate Conference Committee,
had four days before first been di-
yulged to the House Conference
Committee and for three days only.
in the secrecy of committee rooms
alone, debated. Commended by SO
high authority, and with such com.
plete upanimity as that the ablest
and most trusted Democrats in the
leadership of both houses of Con-
gress, no wonder that its passage
into a law. seen to be inevitable,
was over in nine days. nor ru.
merously opposed from that hour.
Boards of trade. civic councils, self
constituted committees from all
sorts of four corners, all at once
made haste, as was natural for them
to do sighting the adoption of any
plan, to petition for its Immediate
enactment. Moreover. the cool, ,irm
temper which the discarded policy
had inspired and exacted was every
where. in a trice, melted into senti-
ment uneer the high temperature of
patriotic emotion which began to
prevail. For indeed, some mem
berssof Congress proclaimed them-