Year: 1876

LOUISIANA.

 LETTER FROM STAFF CORRESPONDENT OF

 THE NEW YORK TRIBUNE,

 NEW ORLEANS, Dec. 3,-The Return ing Board closed it's doors with yester- days session The next news which may be expected from it will be the announce ment of the vote of the State, probably on Tuesday morning. Counsel on both sides improved the last opportunity yes- terday to file great mass of testimony, to which the board will be obliged to give a very hasty consideration. As the case has now been fully made up, review of a few of the most striking points brought out and established by the boards of in- vestigation will be timely, and will be aid to a proper understanding of the verdict when it is rendered.

 First: No controversy exists touching the correctness of the returns of the cleo tion. At nearly every former election in this State the election officers or return ing boards have been accused of doctor ing the figures of some of the returns. This was true in 1874, and in one case that year supervisor swore before Mir. Hoar of the Congressional Committee that the returns shown him, and which were canvassed by the board. were chang ed after leaving his hands. Nothing of the kind has occurred this year. Every body agrees that the election commission CTS returned the vote at each precinct ex- actly as it was cast. and that, with two or three exceptions, the supervisor of each parish also reported the vote correctly. In.all those cases where the supervisors and illegally neglected to re- port the vote from certain precincts on account of alleged fraud or irregularity, the board after some hesitation, to be sure, either ordered the ballot-boxes with the original returns to be produced or sent for duplicates deposited with clerk of the parish courts. There is therefore no pretense that the figures have in any case been tempered with. The figures tEat are canvassed are unquestionably the correct ones.

 But while this is true, some things have beendone, either by members of the board or it's clerk, which were clearly H. legal and indefensible, and none the less so because they have not affected the fig ures of the actual returns. For instance, no one has any right to open returns from any parish after they have been filed with the clerk of the Returning Board until they are opened by the board itself at the regular meeting to be counted. There is an abundance of indisputable evidence that tho returns from several parishes were 80 opened, and that after papers had been inserted in the packages, they were again sealed up and laid before the board as original packages sealed by the super visors. All the particulars of the De Soto Parish case, which was one of this kind, have been published ;but there were others, one of the most notable being that of Ouachita, to which attention was called during yesterdays meeting of the board. In this case the record made by the clerk of the board showed that the re- turns from Ouachita were received Nov. A. When the papers contained in the package were handed over to the Demo- ocratic committee for examination they found among them the following:

 NEW ORLEANS, Nov. g, 1876.

 Mr. ABEL, Secretary of the Returning Board-DEAR SIR: Inclosed please find affidavit of Eliza Pinkston, which was re. Please say that it was brought in with the returns mentioned. Very respectfully.

 M. GRADY

 Grady was supervisor of the parish. AS this letter was sealed up in the same package with the returns, it proves two things-first, that the returns were filed with the secretary of the Returning Board prior to the date when he made the reco I'd of their receipt. and. secondly, that they were opened by him and sealed up again. AS this was illegal and dis honest, the board owes itself and the country either to explain, or to punish its secretary. Abell has charge of compil- ing all the returns, and if he will tamper with official papers in this way in any case, he is not fit to hold his responsible position.

 Second: There is no question in re- gard to the legality of the vote actually cast and returned. I do not mean by this that men who had right to vote were not prevented from doing so, or that some were not forced to vote against their wishes or or conviction, but do mean that except at one poll in New Or leans there is no pretense on either side that there was illegal voting, repeating, or any of the ordinary election frauds; or, if such accusation has been made, there has been no attempt to prove 1t. This fact simplifies the controversy here very greatly. As far as any evidence has been adduced, men who voted, with the ex- ception noted. all had the right to vote.

 Third: The election was remarkably quiet one, At no recent election in this Or any other State have there been so few disturbances On election day. The intim- idation and violence. what there was of It, occurred prior to the 7th of November In all the great mass of testimony which has been introduced, 1 remember very few cases of alleged intimidation or in- ter erence with the polls on election day. In Ouachita pickets were thrown out on the roads leading into Monroe, to pre- vent negroes going into that town to vote, and one constable was bulldozed on his way to the polling place with ballot box In some of the other parishes the men stood at the polls and made lists of the negroes who voted the Republican ticket. The Democrats say it was to prevent them from voting again elsewhere, but the Republicans claim It was to frighten them with the prospect of future punish ment. This was all. The evidence of violence of many kinds during the months preceding the election IS very voluminous, but there is very little touching election day.

 Fourth: Under the. election law of this State, the Returning Board has not to decide how Louisiana actually voted. for there IS no question that Tilden had a majority of about 5000, but whether there was full and free election in every parish. If there was, then the State must be returned for TiIden. If there was not. then the entire vote in every pre- cinct where the election was not free and fair must be thrown out aud not counted, and the result in the remainder of the State must be returned The duty of the Returning Board is not to find how the State voted, but how that portion of it voted where the election was fair, full and free.

 Fifth: The Republicans expect this State will be given to Hayes and Packard, because they expect that when the pre- ciucts in which the election was not free have been rejected, the majority for Til den and Nichols will disappear with them. z. l.. W.