Litchfield enquirer., 1880-03-11
The Machines and their Men.

whlr or their wheels and the rattle 0f their cogs is heard throughout the land. Their u.o- tive powers. their: methods and their aims, are so like that it is perhaps mors proper to regard them as separate halves of a'single, gigantic, political abuse. Hence willie they seem to be working separately, they are in reality work ing together. While the one is trying to force Grant upon an unwilling Republicanlsm, the other is just as busy forcing Tilden upon g re- bellious Democracy. If they both succeed, there will be such triumph of the machine principle as has never before been seen The better men of the Republican party repudiate Grant the better men of the Democracy re- pudiate Tilden; but if both are nominated, what are these excellent people of both par ties, "going to do about it?" Will reforming republicans bolt Grant and elect Tilden? Will respectable Democrats bolt Tilden to elect Grant3 It Is in precisely this dilemma that the joint and several, Democratico- -Republi- can political machine propose to place the American people at the coming presidential election. Whichever party succeeds wheth: it is Grant or Tilden that is to be president the machine wins
 In short, the political machine, as a whole, is contriving such an exquisitely balanced choice of political evils that politics can, after all work it's perfect work in spite of the peo. pie. What the machine proposes, this year, is, not that the respective candidates shall be equally good, but that they shall be equally bad. Then, about as many voters will bolt Grant as bolt Tilden; about as many Inde- pendents from one party as the other will vote for neither and the machine is as completely triumphant as if there were not an honest man or an honest principle in American politics All the machine fears now is lest the whirligig of national conventions should happen to set a good candidate on 8 good platform against a poor candidate on a poor platform. All the very expert politicians on both sides are hard at work to prevent any such mischance. For what would become of Tilden if the Chicago Convention should repudiate Grant or of Grant, if the Cincinnati Convention should re- puok0sC AiAOCuS ai
 Let us suppose, however, that the politicians are successful, and that Grant and Tilden are pitted against each other, and take glance at the men: 'L # Hf .i ! .f z
 A difference is obvious at the outset: Grant is the candidate of the machine, but Tilden is the machine. He is the embodiment of all that Is evil in American politics. We have a right to speak thus of Mir. Tilden because our former opinion of the man, often and very frankly stated in past years, was very differ ent. All through his career as an opponent of the Tweed Ring; and, afterwards. when as Governor he attacked the corrupt Canal Ring ; we gave Mr. Tllden the credit of being an honest reformer. Such was the attitude of the Enquirer towards MT. Tilden throughout the of 1876, as our Republican readers,at least, will recollect. We thought him elected, and so frankly stated and, when the momen- tous question of the Florida and Louisiana re- turns was finally submitted to the arbitration of the Electoral Commission we frankly stat cd our belief that their decision, based as it was on technicalities, had failed to reach the merits of the case. '- F-.>.- " "a '-' That Samuel J. Tilden was no real reformer, but mere politician Tn reformer's clothing, first began to be evident with the discovery of the correspondence for the purchase of an Or egon elector. Finally thers appeared the translation of the cipher despatches, proof strong enough to have convicted Beecher before Brooklyn jury. All along with this evidence has come side Lights of railroad trick cry, indications of sort of political head at Gramercy Park, similar in kind and in methods to that 80 long dominating Connecticut congressional and state politics from Salisbury-a kind of expanded and na- tIonalized Barnumism. Indeed, it is Mir. Wm. H. Barnum himself that is the executive force, the grand disbursing agent, of this corrupt conspiracy to force second nomination of Mir. Tilden upon his reluctant, not to say re- bellious party. .,..s .4r ..s .-.
 It is unnecessary to add that we greatly preferfhe man Grant to the man Tilden yet, aside froal the fact that the machine of which Grant is the tool and the machine of which Tilden is the soul, are as like as two peas, the man Grant is by no means such man as We would prefer for president. That he is great soldier that he is an honest man, that he is in one sense strong man, we admit at the out set. If Von Moltke were in New Jersey, at the head of an invading army, there is no American we would so soon trust with the command of our national forces as Ulysses s. Grant. ..E ....
 It would be absurd to deny that the quail ties which go to the making of great gener- al would not be valuable in President but, after all, statesmanship and soldiership are two very different trades The eminent civil ian who undertakes the command of armies in middle life usually fails but not more surely than the eminent soldier who tries to lead cabinets. A very few men of genius, in all history, have shown marked power in civil as we'll as in military positions; but, conceding to Gen. Grant the ability of C@sar, a Cromwell, or Napoleon, can we trust such a.man with cupCut POWChg kuCtO WCtC oupECuIc CtltSf- gencies which palliated if they did not ex. cuse the usurpations of these great rulers Is there any such emergency in American affairs as calls for an autocrat? Mr. Conkling says that the next Republican president, if elected, will be obliged to fight for his seat-a declara- tion which means, if candidly made, that re- publicanisiu is A failOre and that fhe times are ripe for an American Caesar There will be no such emergency. We submit that the Garcelon business has not been SO successful ID Augusta that it is likely to be tried on a larger soale in Washington. If Bourbon Democracy ever meant to fight for a presidency, it would have fought in 1877. It will never have so good 6 chance again.
 Even if the country needed Cesar, we doubt whether it would find one in Grant. If he were such, his first real business would be