Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1878-11-14
Confession of Guilt.

| ( The first chapter Of translated cipher dis
patches was published on the 8th Of October.
A month has passed. Not one of the many
persons implicated in crime by that publica-
tion has dared TO commence legal proceed
ings, either to establish his own innocence or
to bring penalty upon the Tribune. There
is no question but that the charges made, if
not essentially true, were grossly libellous.
Many men of prominence were implicated;
for, if the dispatches were genuine and cor
rectly translated, they must have known of an
infamous criminal conspiracy, advised it, aid
completes by concealing it. Not one of the
persons thus accused has ventured to ask vim
dicatiOn, even from a Democratic court in
this Democratic city. Does anybody believe
which success in such suit would give ?
They have taken infinite pains to publish in
senious cards, but unsworn denials are cheap.
III any one of them was able to deny under
oath that the important dispatches alleged to
have been sent or received by him were so
sent or received, does anyone believe that he
would not have rushed into the courts at once?
Had the dispatches not been genuine, had any
important one of them been forged or falsely
translated, the person thereby effected would
instantly have gone before court, and held
the Tribune to responsibility for that dispatch
alone. The coparceners knew that one such
,,f lia i,,Arr
ment. 1t would have raised a doubt as to the
genuineness or correct translation of other dis.
patches. All the other conspirators, however
guilty, would bave sheltered themselves for a
time behind one such suit, if either of the
parties implicated could have commenced one
with safety. Had the Tribune been imposed
upon as to any important dispatch, Or had its
translation been in any material respect erro.
neous, it is not absolutely certain that suit
would have been commenced at once?
1t is three weeks since Mr.. Smith M. Wood,
of New York, and other prominent Democrats,
were either justly accused of more or less par
ticipation in ihe schemes to capture the vote
of South Carolina, or grossly slsndered. If a
single false charge was made, either inten-
tionally or by the Tribunes having been de-
ceived as to the genuineness of any important
dispatch or by any material error in trausla
ton, it is very certain that the matter would
not have slept three weeks without an appeal
to the courts. Finally, these two publications
brought home great crime to the door of Is
Granercy Park, and caused in the minds of
all intelligent readers very strong impression
that Mr.. Tilden himself could not have been
ignorant of the transactions between his most
intimate friends and confidential agents at the
South, and his nephew and confidential secre-
tary in his own house. If publications neces-
sarily creating so strong an impression against
him we're not injuries for which he could seek
redress in person, it would at lesst have been
his first desire to break their force by inducing
some one Of his agents to attack the genuine
ness of some one of the dispatches, or the
correctness of the translation given. But Mr..
Tilden, also, has confined himself to a denial
not sustained by an oath. His nephew has
not even ventured to deny anything. His
agents, while denying unimportant scraps,
have not dared to dispute either the genuine
ness os the cipher dispatches published or the
essential correctness of the translations, but
have confessed that in many most important
respects the story told was true. We submit
that they have thereby confessed the genuine
ness of all the important dispatches published,
and the correctness Of the translations in eve
ry material respect.
That is not the end, though there the case
might rest if only the character of individuals
was concerned. No enemy can possibly wish
to place Mr.. Tilden in a worse position than
that in which his own card and his continued
intimacy with Mr. Pclton place him. But the
men who do not venture, even in unsworn
statements, to dispute the genuineness of dis
patches published, or the correctness of trans
lations given, and who have been giving to
this day the best possible proof that they
have no ground of complaint in the matter,
will next be required to state, under oath,
what they know about 1t. If they then deny,
either the genuineness of any important dis
patch, or the correctness of the translation
given, it will quickly be made to appear
whether they are or are not guilty of perjury.
In the meanwhile, it is not at all surprising
that, knowing what they know, to commence
no suits for their vindication. York
Tribune, 9th inst.
Divine vengeance comes. with feet of
| lead, but it strikes with hands of iron.