Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1884-11-20
The Great Fraud Mine.
cinnati Commercial Gazette.

| Cincinnati Commercial Gazette.
We do not remember to have seen 4
| more striking statement of the method,
and capacities of the New York City
| Democrats for fraud, than that made by
The great lawyer engaged by the Demo-
Gratis in this case-Mr. Roscoe Conkling
In his speech on the army bill in 1879
senator Conkling said:
The election law came into effect to
correct abuses which reached their eli
maX in 1868 in the city of New York. ln
hat year in the State of New York the
Republican candidate for Governor was
ciected. The Democratic candidate was
count ed in. Members of the Legislature
we're fraudulently seated. The election
was barbarous burlesque. Many thou
sand forged naturalization papers were
issued: some of them were white ans
some were coffee>coloTed. The same
witness purported to attest hundreds of
thousands of naturalization atfidavits,
and the stupendous fraud of the whole
thing was aud is an open secret.
Repeating. ballot-box stuffing, rufian-
ism, and false counting decided eveIy>
thing. Tweed made the election officers,
and the election officers were corrupt.
In 1868, $4,000 votes were falsely added
10 the Democratic majority in the cities
OF New York and Brooklyn alone.
Wrongs and usurpations springing
from the pollution aud dissertation of
the ballot box stalked high headed in the
public way. The courts and the machin-
ery of justice were impotent in the PRES
ence Of culprItS too great to be punished.
The act of 1870 came in to throttle
Snch abuses. 1t was not born without
lhrJeS and pangs. 1t passed the Senate
atteT a day and a night which rang with
Democratic maledictions and foul asper-
sions.
In the autumn of that year an election
was held for the choice of Representa-
tigeS in Congress. l see more than one
friend near me who. for himself and for
others, has reason even unto this day to
remember that election and the appre-
hension which preceded it. 1t was the
first time the law of 1870 had been put
in force. Resistance was openly coun-
seled. Democratic newspapers in New
York advised that the officers of the law
be pitched into the river. Disorder was
afoot. Men, not wanting in bravery, and
not Republicans, dreaded the day. Blood
shed, arson, riot were feared. CHASTITY
spectacleS were still fresh in memory.
The draft riots had spread terror which
had never died, and strong men shudder-
ed when they remembered the bloody
assiZes of the Democratic party. They
had seen men and women, blind with
party nate, dizzy and drunk with party
madness, stab and burn and revel in MUIR
der and in mutilatiBg the dead. They
had seen an asylum for eolored orphans
made funeral pile, and its smoke sent
UP from their Christian and imperial
city tn tell in Heaven of the iRhuman
bigotry.
THE HORRIBLE BARBARITY OF MAN.
Remembering such sickening scenes,
and dreading their repetition, they asked
the President to protect them-to pro-
tsct them with the beak and claw of Ma
tional power. Instantly the unkenneled
packs of party barked In vengeful Choir
US. Imprecations, maledictions, and
threats were hurled at Grant; but with
that splendid courage which never
blanehed in battle. which never quaked
before clamor-with that matchless self
poise which did not desert him even
when contingent beyond the sea rose
and uncovered before him, he responded
in the orders which it has pleased the
honorable Senator from Delaware to
read"