Year: 1877

There Ia to those who keep in mind the
origin Of the Constitution and the uniform
construction which has been placed upon
It, something incongruous and unsatis.
factory In the numerical division Of the
Electoral Commission in the judgment
Just rendered by that body. The ques-
ton was an old one--that Of Jurisdiction
of the residence of the power to pass finally
upon the fact Of the choice of electors. If
this power was In the States, then Con-
gress had nothing to do In the case Of two
classes of electors, but to ascertain which
of them came supported by the require
ments of statutory and Constitutional law,
as TO regularity and sufllciency; and that
fact being found, to count the vote thus
sustained. If 1t was In Congress, then that
body was authorized to go into the ques
tion of the fairness of the election not
only. but to inquire into the validity of
State laws regulating elections and
providing official sanction of the returns
which should be considered final, and also
Of the laws couferring the right Of su ffrage
upon the inhabitants Of the several States.
That the decision was against the exercise
Of this extraordinary power by the Fed
eral Government is not strange. To have
held otherwise would have been to find
that the States have no authority what
ever in the matter Of electing the Presi.
dent which Is ultimate, absolute, but only
the right to originate measures looking
TO that result which are wholly subject to
the Federal control in respect to their final
operation. In other words, that the States
are assigned the duty Of opening and su.
pervising the polls in trust for the United
States, and that the latter have the right to
an accounting by the several States for the
manner in which they discharged the du.
ties Of the trust, in conducting and return.
ing the results of the election, and this
would be to deprive the States Of all the
attributes with which they have been
clothed by the express terms Of that Con-
stitution whose implications arelinvoked to
vest supervisory power in the General
Government


In view, therefore, ofthe anomalous posi-.
tion assumed by one of the parties to the con-
troversy, and of the gravity of the ques.
lion, and the far reaching effects of the de-
cision to be made, 1t is to our mind and
will be to the minds of the historians of
the present, matter for inexpressible won
der and astonishment, that there were in
that body not only eminent lawyers, but
distinguished judges who could find cause
TO vote to sustain such Federal power
But II does not follow that they were cor.
rupt because they did so, nor that they
lacked sentiments Of patriotism and virtue.
Surprising asst would seem at first thought,
It may even be taken as an evi-
dence of their possession of these qualities
in an unusual degree. 1t may be that in
the minds Of those who voted thus, the
conviction Of monstrous fraud in the elec-
ton was SO all controlling that their judg-
menis were constrained to assent TO the
proposition that 1t we're better to violate
the Constitution in an effort to uproot the
evil which they believed fatal If allowed
to exist than that the supreme law should
become Its refuge and protection. Charity
suggests this view and we adopt 1t as the
only one consistent with high character.
still marveling at the moral phenomena ex-
hibited by the occasion. 1t is another
illustration Of the lamentable fact in life
that great public peril when ex-
isting or believed to be imminent
has the effect to divide the peo.
pie into parties or factions held together
by common interests and cementod by
bonds Of common sympathy rather than by
the dictates of reason. In our late civil
war even the Christian Church divided
with the country upon the section line,
, and continued throughout that bloody
q conflict to worship the same GoD from
their different standpoints, and to implore
His divine assistance, each in behalf Of an
interest adverse TO the other; as II both
could be blessed with triumph on the same
field. This was a display Of that singu
lar moral obliquity which closes the vision
Of the mind against just perceptions of the
truth In all the emergencies Of Nations,
And at such times all seem to think with
their hearts, and not with their heads; and
this will doubtless ever remain the expe'
rience Of human life, until by some mira
Gle Of the undeveloped law Of our nature,
we are endowed with higher faculties.





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