Year: 1878

most intimate friends were doing in his
interest. II he had only known what
they were doing, il the Infamous dick
er in which they were engaged had Z" at
any time come within the range of his
power" he would instantly have exert
ed that power to crush it out. Lucky
was it for Havemeyer, Smith, Weed,
Pelton, and the rest of the corrupt fell
lows surrounding him, that they did not
let any knowledge of what they we're
doing as his representatives come with
in the range of his power. Lucky was
il for Marble, Woolley, ct al, that they
did not send any cipher dispatches di-
rectly TO the saint-like Sam. He was a
virtuous person, so he confesses, that
would have instantly crushed out the
infamous intrigue. But he allows it to
be understood that his most confiden-
tial friends who carried on the cores
pondence were not virtuous persons.
The extraordinary virtue of Sam Til
den rendered him incapable of encour-
aging or tolerating for an instant such
a scheme of corruption. But he lets
us understand that his most intimate
friends and associates were not posses
sors of any such extraordinary virtue.


One is led to ask why there should
appear this very remarkable difference
between the virtuousness of the master
and the virtuousness of the disciples.
Sam has been kind enough to shed some
light on this curious point. He con-
fesses that he was virtuous because it
was necessary he should be virtuous.
He was the political personifcation of
the discovery that Reform is neces-
sary." 1t was a corollary of that prop
osition that virtue is necessary. 1.-The
main interest of the victory which re-
suited in Dly election" he says, " was
the expectation that through the chief
magistracy a system of reforms similar
to that which had been accomplished
in our metropolis and in our State adj
ministration would be achieved in the
Federal Government. For this object
it was necessary that l should be un-
trammeled by any commitment in the
choice of men to execute the official
trusts of the Government, and untram-
meled by any obligation to special in
terests." In other words, it was nee
essary that the Messiah of reform
should be virtuous. But it was not nee
essary that the men whom he brought
around him, and by and through whom
his will was to be manifested in the re-
formatory effects, should be virtuous.
While the assertion, Reform is neces-
sary," made it necessary that the great
reformer should be virtuous, it left him
at liberty to surround himself with a
crowd of unmitigated corruptionists,
and to give them carte blanche to draw
against his barrel of money for any cor
rupt purpose or infamous conspiracy
they might choose to enter upon on his
behalf, provided only that they did not
let the virtuous reformer know the vii
lainy they engaged in!


In tacitly admitting that the men
by whom he was surrounded, in whose
discretion he trusted his case, who
were his personal friends and conf
dants, and the dispensers of his
"bar'l," may have been the corrupt
rascals which the cipher dispatches
prove some of them to have been, Mr..


Tilden virtually admits the whole case
against him. In the significant words
of the World Zone of his own organs) he
denies only what needed no denial
and explains only what needed no ex-


PLANTATION" He denies only personal
knowledge of the corrupt acts of his per-
sonal agents. 1t needed no such denial,


because no rational man would suspect
Sam Tilden to be such an asinine idiot
as to personally instruct his agents to
buy up Returning Boards, or to report
to him any negotiations for that pur-
pose. He explains why he could not
personally engage in the corrupt buy
! ing and selling; in other words, why he
could not act like the idiot which no
one, until some time after the election,


ever suspected him to be. Though he
denies any personal knowledge, he vir-


tually admits his belief that PROPOSE


tions looking to the sale of the Electoral


votes by corrupt Electors were made to


persons known to be his intimate


friends and advisers. He might as


well at once have admitted everything


which the publication of the infamous
cipher dispatches has brought to light,
to the shame of the American nation.
Chicago Times (Dem.