The Eaton Democrat. (Eaton, Ohio) 1875-1903, 1886-07-08
1T YET RANKLES.
The Outrage of 1875 by Which Fraud
Triumphed-General Hancock's Manly,
Patriotic, StatesmanIfke Attitude.

acknowledgement Hancock's Manly, |
Patriotic, Statesmanlike Attitude.
At recent meeting of the Military
Service Institution, held to honor the
memory of Winfield Scott Hancock,
there were read or spoken a great
many interesting letters and addresses
from persons of weight and eminence
in civil and military life. But none of
these tributes bears such impressive
and enduring witness to the virtues OF
the dead, or establishes SO strong a
title to the national respect and graft
tude, as letter sent by Hancock him.
self to General Sherman in December,
1876. Here the writer sets forth, mod
estly but firmly, his conception of the
duty of the army, and especially of Of
fcers intrusted with high command,
in the event OF grave connections
being excited by failure of the Sem |
ate and House of Representatives to
agree in declaring the result of the
Presidential election. In Hancock the
country lost soldier who was first of |
all patriot, soldier who would have
let no fiction of Difference to military
orders supersede his fundamental oath
to obey the constitution, and who, in
such conflict of technical and real
obligations, would have stood forth a
bulwark, and not a betrayer, of our
liberties.
What were the rights and duties of
| the House of Representatives in the
event of the Senate's refusing to con-
cur in pronouncing Mr.. Tilden the
choice of majority for President, is
now plain enough to all men of sound
brains and honest hearts. By General
Hancock they were recognized with
unerring exactitude in December,
| 1876, and in his letter to Sherman they
are incidentally defined with rare SIM
plicity and cogency. "f," he writes,
''the Senate and House, on the occa-
sion of the count, do not unite IN de-
claring some person legally elected by
the people, there is lawful machinery
already provided to meet the contin-
gency and to decide the question
peacefully. 1t has not been recently
used, no occasion presenting, but our
forefathers provided it. 1t has been
exercised, and has been recognized as
lawful on every hand. That machinery
would probably elect Mr.. Tilden
President and Mr.. Wheeler Vice-Presi-
dent"
General Hancock proceeds to make
| uuu1lStdhdUlc, Ills
which is that, should the House of Rep
ought to do, pronounce it irreconcila-
BILE with its conscience to bestow on
Mr.. HAYES the electoral votes of the
three States of South Carolina, Florida
and Louisiana, or the votes of any one
of them, then there would be no cleo
ton by the people, no candidate hav-
ing majority of the Electoral College,
and the right to choose a President
would by the constitution devolve upon
the House. .'Some tribunal" says Han
cock, "must decide whether the people
have duly elected President. pre-
sumo, of course, that it is the joint af-
firmative action of the Senate and
House, or why are they present to witt
ness the count, if not to see that it is
fair and justp If failure to agree
arises between the two bodies, there can
be no lawful affirmative decision that
the people have elected President,
| and the House must then proceed to
act, not the Senate The Senate elects
Vice-Presidents, not Presidents.
No wonder that Secretary Bayard,
who had read these imperishable words,
should have commented upon them in
letter read before the Military Service
Institution in terms that reflect honor
at once upon Hancock and himself 81
take leave here to say" writes Mr..
Bayard, ''that no wiser, ADLER or more
patriotic deliverance, no sounder con-
ception of constitutional duty and
function, or solution based more sol
idly upon law and justice, can be found
in the history of that period than is
contained in the letter of General Han
cock to General Sherman"
But there is something else deduc-
ible from the frank and pregnant text
of Hancock's communication. From
his conception of the powers and obi
cations of the House of Representatives
in the crisis then at hand there were
for him, as being an officer in high
command, certain practical corollaries
of the utmost gravity and moment.
Whom was he, Hancock, to obey in the
event of the nonagreement of the SEN
ate and House, and a consequent mis-
} carriage of the election by the peoplep
From whom was he to take orders on
March 4, 1877, providing the House OF
Representatives had not yet discharged
its function of naming an occupant
for the Presidential Officer He bluntly
tells General Sherman that in his judg-
ment General Grants term of office
would cease with the expiration OF
March 8, and it followed that not for
an hour afterward would Hancock have
taken orders from Grant in the ca
pacity of President and Commander-in-
Chief. He did not doubt that General
Sherman's authority, such as it was,
would continue, and he acknowledged
that the President of the Senate would
be on March ''the legitimate person
to exercise Presidential authority for
the time being, until the appearance oi
lawful President"
These admissions are qualified by
the firm notification that neither in the
S President of the Senate nor the Cen
3 eral of the army would Hancock recog-
: nize right of influencing in any de-
gree by military measures the selection
1 of a President, and that any orders
apparently directed to that end would
/. be construed and treated by him (Han-
: cock) in the light of reason and of con-
a science. "Should,' he says, 1.-THE
: military authorities be invoked, it is
necessary in such great crises for the
superior officers of the army, and es.
= = pecially for those near the head of it
to dare to determine for themselves
= : what is lawful and what is not Lawful
!, under our system.
= Would that words so righteous ant
courageous as those Of Hancock coulc
>, have wakened echoes in the hearts o
the pusillanimous majority Of the
= House of Representatives! We shoult
not then have seen the sacrifice of {
o paramount and vital constitutions
. right to the bugbear of coercion by thu
o military arm. We should then hav'
been spared the spectacle of fraud tri
umphant in the chair of the American
= Executive.-M Y. San.
The political scheme of maxim.
= State out of Southern Dakota, con
: cocted by few politicians, withou
consulting the wishes of the people O