New-York tribune., 1879-04-10
Mr. TLLDEN1S TELEGRAM.

MR. TILDEN'S TELEGRAA
Mr.. Samuel J. Tlden has telegraphed
letter to a political club in Pittsburg, and has
made 1t an occasion for again defining his
position. There is no mistakIng his motive
in writing it; and when we remember what
desperate efforts one wing of his own party is
making to get rid of him, there is no mis-
understanding the significance of the stdlwart
passage in which he declares that the one
great responsibility resting upon this genera
ton is to reverse the result OF the election OF
1876. Mr.. Tilden will never abate jot of
his pretensions. For more than two years, IN
season and out of season, by private DISCOURSE
and public speech, and newspaper letters, he
has insisted that the first duty Of the Democ-
racv, transcendng all other obligations and
involving g all the best hopes of mankind"
is to raise HIM in 1850 to the position which
he came so near reaching IN 1876. lie as
serts that the party has no choice of candl-
dates for 1880. He is the candidate he has
been the candidate ever since the last cleo
ti0n; he will be the candidate to the bitter
end This one small voice pipes Fraud"
long after the chorus has been hushed, and
the shrewdest leaders of the party have ac-
a.
blunder.
There is something so grotesque in the re-
lations between Mr. TIlden and his party, so
ludicrous in the contrast between the Demo
cratic policy year ago and the Democratic
policy to-day, that the temptation to laugh at
the situation is almost irresistible. But there
is a serious side also to Mr. Tilden'5 behavior
which we may as well not lose sight
of. For more than two years lie has per-
sisted in an atfectatiOn of indifference
TO matters very closely touching his own
reputation, which indicates a contempt
for public opinion and he has ignored no.
torious facts of history with calmness which
argues contempt for tho public common
sense. Mr.. Iiden declaring that he was
cheated out OF the Presidency is the very
incarnation of impudence. Before the cleo
toral controversy Of 1876 was decided, the
startling discovery was made that Mr.. Til
denis nephew and confidential political agent
had offered on his behalf $1,000, with
other considerations payable after the in
anguration, for the vote OF q Republican
elcctor in Oregon, and had obtained the money
for this criminal transaction from Mr.. Illden's
bank. Confronted with this disclosure, Mr..
Tllden made no answer but went on calmly
preaching Reform and denouDcing Fraud"
Later, the whole story of the conspiracy, i'll
which this formed only a short chapter, was
brought to light. 1t came out that AS soon "a
the election was over gang OF the next
friends and secret managers OF Mr.. Tiiden
started for the South, and keeping themselves
in hourly communication with hls house, be-
gan "a systematic plan for the bribery of Re
turning Boards, pledging $4,000 i'll one
State, $4,000 III another, We know not
how much more III third, if the
canvassers would so count the votes
as to give Mr.. Tilden a majority. 1t was dis
covered that the bargains made in Columbia
and Tallahassee were ratified at Gramercy
Park and promises of prefermcnt after the
Inauguration, and of gifts contingent upon
Mr.. Tilden's Success. were held out as adj
ditionai temptations to the Returning officers
to violate their oaths. 1t has never been OK
planned who was to furnish these large sums
OF money. 1t has not been positively as
certaiued whether indeed part OF the
money was not actually drawn. Confronted
with these sensational disclosures, Mr.. Tilden
simply washed his hands of the whole bus-
ness, and went on crying Fraud ~
But this was not all. In the course Of the
investigation it appeared that Mr. Tilden did
know what was going on when the conspiracy
was in mid-operation, and yet took no pans
to stop it. The futile attempt of Colonel
Pelton to buy the vote OF South Carolina was
brought to his attention by Mayor Cooper,
and yet after that discovery Pelton returned
to Gramercy Park and thence carried on ne
Gotlatlons with Marble for the purchase of
Florida, and sent money to Patrick for the
corruption of the electoral college of Oregon.
The nefarious operations of Smith Weed at
Columbia were revealed to Mr. Tilden, yet
after that Weed remained here in New-York
conducting another secret scheme for the
seizure of the vote of South Carolina-ths
time by vioence-in which tho agent
at the scene of action was man
who stands in the closest possible
relations 10 Mr. Tilden, both personal and
political. And ever since that day, Mr. Smith
VI. Weed has been one OF Mr. Tilden's most
trusted advisers and confidential men of busi-
ness. II was he who led the Tilden forces in
the State Convention of 1873. 1t is he who
manages the Iilden campaign-at Auburn
Prison and elsewhere-in 1879. None of the
men implicated in the gigantic conspiracy for
the purchase of the Presidency were dismissed