Year: 1879

The Potter committee has not gone
very far in its investigation of the
cipher kilograms, but it has gone far
enough to indicate clearly that what
ever Of obloquy there may be on one
side is well balanced by series of we'll
planned rascalties on tho other The
unblushing confession of Brady, who
occupies the position Of Second Assis-
tant Postmaster General, establishes
all that, and, accustomed as people
have become to the various phases of
moral deformity as developed in the
conspiracy which led to the theft of
the Presidency, they must think with
horror from some Of the revelations of
this government official. Not alone
did men high In department authority
conspire to commit one OF the greatest
crimes of the age, but they lent their
personal aid and threw their subordi-
mates into the work uutil Southern
State was invaded not only by willy
politicians, but by government officials
ranging from an Assistant Postmaster
General down to special agents Of the
department, with wellfilled pockets,
ready for any emergency. Descend
ing 10 this level and becoming thus u
part of the crime itself it was the most
natural~thing that the highest Of these
officials should afterward become an
accomplice in the theft and in the sup
preston of the evidence of guilt in the
transaction.


Nothing is needed beyond the dis
graceful story which Brady tells to
satisfy honest men of the character of
the whole business, II any were left not
already satisfied. When the Senate
committee bad come into possession of
the political kilograms the Republicans
who were concerned had the fullest
opportunity to go and select the dis
patches dangerous TO them. Brady
personally secured those which had
passed between him and Postmaster
General Tyner, and when there was
lull in this neat work of discrimination
the messenger of Mortons committee,
one Bullock, stole carefully assorted
lot and turned them over to Brady,
who had them copied by clerks in the
Post Office Department; some he sent
Tor publication and others he turned
over to William Il. Chandler, who had
no moro business with the stolen mat
ter than Brady had. 1t was all in the
line of their business, however, for
these were the Democratic ciphers, and
it was desirable they should be given
publicity, the Republican evidence of
crime having been destroyed What
the Republican dispatches were can, of
course, never be known, unless some
conscience striken participant in the
outrage should be moved TO confes-
sion, and then be would be certain TO
have to face the contradiction of all bis
fellow conspirators. No one will have
the hardihood to claim that these tele-
grams were innocent in their charac.
ter; had they been so they would have
been preserved with the greatest care,
as their value for purposes of vindica-
tlon must have been recognized. But
having been DESTROYED there can be
hut one suspicion in the ppblic mind
regarding the motive for such des.
perato resort. Nor does that complete
the evil. Evidently the value Of the
cipher dispatches as incnlpatine eyi.
dence ia DESTROYED by this stealing of
sucb Of them AS would have implicated
one side. and so far as the inyestipa.
tion il further concerned il will never
be able to clear the skirts of ono party
while besmirchine the other. There
was no better way to show the iniqui
ty of the Democratic cipher telegrams
than by contrast with the Republican
dispatches had the latter been innocent
and honest The opportunity to do
this has been lost by tbe crime of those
who abstracted the Republican docu.
ments and /, will always remain to be
remembered that while one side, with
ALI its cipbers failed to hold that to
which il was entitled. the other side
got that which did not belong to it by