Year: 1876

Having demonstrated by arguments which
seem to us cogent how vain and futile would
be all attempts to instate Mr.. Tilden If the
regular certificates from the Electoral Col
leges should fail to give him majority, we
now proceed to consider different branch
Of the question. Since there can be no resort
to force nor to any sort of revolutionary
or quasi-revolutionary proceedings. even to
redress a manifest wrong, it remains to con-
slider what the democratic party can do to
prevent the consummation of frauds, II
frauds are meditated by the other side. The
only defensive weapon which they can use
with any effect is an appeal to the honest
public opinion of the country. They must
rely on the justice Of their cause and their
ability to convince at least some candid
men outside of their own party that
their claim is really just. In order to
accomplish this they must make it apparent
to fair minds that they ask nothing beyond
strict equity and that they will have re-
course only to regular and constitutional
methods to enforce their rights. With every
one Of the suspected returning boards in
republican hands, with Senate under re-
publican control, with resolute and per-
haps prejudiced republican President in
Office in the interval between the final
count in the presence of Congress
and the Inauguration, every advantage
is on the side Of their opponents unless they
can make it appear not only to themselves,
but 10 others, that they are intrenched in an
impregnable fortress of legal right. Unless
their claims and complaints are indorsed by
the public conscience they have no ground
to stand upon in a contest with the mass of
official authority arrayed against them.


The democratic party must, therefore,
make no mistakes. If it puts itself in the
wrong in any stage of the controversy
its keen-sighted adversaries will take prompt
advantage Of it's blunders and expose them
with fatal effect If it is foolish enough to
indulge in menaces and threaten force, that
alone will be fatal If, hurried on by mere
passion and blind impulse, it charges fraud
where no fraud can be proved, it will be un-
able to get an impartial hearing on points
where it has q strong case supported by
good evidence. The democratic party must
be careful throughout this controversy to
keep the law on its side; to make no state
ments broader than the facts and thus ex-
pose itself to refutation and, above all, it
must not fritter away the real strength OF its
case by o multitude of petty, captious
charges on minor points. Every time they
are confuted on petty charge they lose
nf <hair RI
tention to substantial grievances. 1t
is only by the utmost fairness, by
a spirit of moderation, by insisting
on nothing which. is not clearly just,
by putting their strong arguments in the
foreground and abstaining from doubtful
cavils and questionable positions, that they
can get fair hearing before that great
tribunal of public opinion to which their
only appeal lies from the injustice of adver-
saries in secure possession of all the official
machinery by which the final result will be
determined. There was never an occasion
on which it so much behooves those who
may think themselves strong in right but
deficient in power, to ''be as wise as ser
pents but harmless as doves" and to avoid
exposing weak side to the enemy.


The democrats are justified in regarding
the Southern returning boards with suspi-
cion and in watching their proceedings With
vigilance; but they make mistake in
bandying charges of fraud in advance
of the facts. Frauds in former cleo
tions do not prove that frauds have
been committed now, and it is a
political blunder to toss about vague
charges without specific evidence to sup
port them. We have as yet no accurate and
complete information. When the official re-
turns are all in and canvassed we shall know
which side they favor, and we cannot know
before. 1t is possible that they may give at
least one of the three States to Tilden,
and if this shall appear by the
record he has q primd tdcie case.
A returning board cannot throw out
his votes without positive evidence of fraud
or intimidation, and this evidence will be
subject to the scrutiny of the 'cloud of
witnesses" of both political parties who are
visiting the South to qualify themselves to
testify before committees of Congress-


Whatever is done in those boards will be
done in full blaze of publicity, under the
immediate inspection of witnesses Of the
highest character for intelligence and
veracity If the democrats have a
strong case in any of the doubt
full States its strength, as presented to
the public, will depend on the testimony Of
these distinguished witnesses, and the
democrats would do we'll to wait until they
see what their provable case really is before
weaken their influence by bandying indis-
criminate and Wholesale charges of fraud
before they know what precise evidence they
will have to 60 upon. The more they in
dulge in bluster the more fatally