The daily gazette., 1882-04-05
TILDEN ON JEFFERSON.
A GREAT sTATEsMAN's TRIBUTE TO
THE FOUNDER OF AMERICAN DEMO-
CRACY

cRACY.
The following is the full text of Mr..
Tilden's letter to the Jefferson Club OF
New Haven't
GREysToEE, March 80, 1ss2.-Gen-
tlemen: II have received your letter in
behalf of the Jefferson Club OF New
Haven, inviting me TO be present at
their commsmoration of the birth of
Thomas Jefferson. Although l am
obliged to deny myself the pleasure of
meeting with you on that occasion,
share the feelings which bring you To-
gether.
Mr.. Jefferson has many titles to the
reverence Of the American people and
OF all lovers Of liberty throughout the
world He was among the earliest, most
resolute, and most steadlast OF the pa
triots who upheld the popular rights in
the incipient struggles of our Ravolu-
lion, when the part he took required a
higher order of courage, of self denial,
and OF genius than were necessary at
any subsequent period of our history.
lie penned the immortal statement of
the principles that led our ancestors to
assert the indedendent existence OF our
| country, and which has been substan-
TALLY adopted as model for every peo-
pie who have since attempted to estab-
lish national Independence on the basis
of human rights.
He was first in his day to completely
emancipate his own mind from the
monarchiCal and aristocratical traditions
which still enslaved most of the best IN
tellects OF the country.
But the obligations OF the world to
Mr.. Jefferson do not end here. On the
completion OF the Federal Constitution,
Gouverneur Morris, being asked what
he thought OF 1t, nswered:-"That de-
peLds upon how it Is constr ued."
After the organization of the General
Government, powerful class sought to
impr si upon its practical working the
sim htnde of the British syttsm. Mr..
Jefferson we the great leader of tie
party formed to resist these efforts, and
to hold our institutions to the popular
character which wrs understood to be-
long to them when the Constitution was
ratified by the people
BY his infexible adherence to free
principles, by his untirIng efforts, by his
counssls, and by the magic OF his pen,
he was the principal agent in rescuing
from Its greatest peril, and while yet in
its infancy, government by the people
for tue people.
The aIduous contest resulted in DO
litical revolution which brought Mr..
Jefferson into the Presidency. He put
the ship Of State, to use his own express
sion, upon the republican tack.D He
arrested the centralizlng tendencies, re-
Snvlgorated local self-goVernment, re-
stored the rights of the States, and PR
tecled and enlarged the domain of the
individual judgment and coincidence.
For eight years he administered the
Government, and for sixteen
years 1t was administered by his
people under his observation and ad-
vice, Thus was established a habit
which largely shaped the standards for
the guidance Of the popular judgment,
the modes of thinking of statesmen, and
the general courss of Government for
sixty years. How important such a
habit is will be appreciated when we
consider that usurpation has often been
successfully accomplished In other
countries by men welding the execu-
tive power; and when We are reminded
that Jefferson sincerely feared that
Hamilton, who thought our Govern
ment "frail and worthless fabric"
would change it If he came into power;
and when we also recall the fact that
Ham ilton himself has left on record his
| belief that BUR- would have wrought
| personal usurpation If he could have
grasped the Presidency.
Mr.. Jefferson gave to our administra-
| tive system an aspect of republican SIM
| plicity; he repressed job berry as well as
perversions of power, and by his pre-
cepts, his influence, and his example,
elevated the standard of political morals.
In his personal practice he was not only
pure, but, to make his example more
effective, he refrained, while adm MIS-
tsling the greatest of official trusts, from
| all attempts to increase his own fortune,
even by methods open to every private
| citizen.
In period when there seems to be
| little respect tor the limitations ofpower
prescribed by our written Constitution !;
when assumptions of ungranted author
| Ity are rife In all the departments of the
Federal Government ; when that Gov
| ernment Is being gradually changed into
an elee6tve depotism, meddllng IN every
thing belonging TO the State or to indi-
| Yidusls; when every new assumption of
unRsanted power creates new opportun-
tiles, new facilities, and new incentives,
to tavorltlsm and jobbery; when the
| civil service hrs been converted into a
balauos of power to determine the cleo
ti0ns by pecuniary and other iileglti-
mate influences; when the perversion
of high trusts to the private gain of the
official is frequently committed with
| apparent unconsclousness of wronS,
and passes almost without rebuke, 1t is
time that the teachings and the example
of Thomas Jefferson be invoked to keep
, alive the glimmering spark of official
virtue and public honor. Your fellow