Year: 1871




glory of the Wigwam have departed i was
but yesterday that Tammany, ike Caesar,
seemed strong enough to stand against the
world; ''and now there are none 80 poor to do
her reverence" She was the impregnable
citadel and base of operations of the demo-
cratic party Of the city, the State and the
Union but she is the stumbling block to the
party in the city, in the State and throughout
the country. The astounding and unanswered
accusations raised against her, of fraudulent
appropriations of the public funds, have
operated to weaken the democracy In the late
elections in Maine and California, and will
doubtless operate to strengthen the republi-
cans in the coming October elections in Penn
sylvania and Ohio, and will almost certainly
revolutionize the Legislature of New York in
November. In the midst Of profound peace,
comparatively dead calm in our political
affairs, catastrophe has fallen upon the
democratic party threatening to be more
disastrous in its consequences, looking to the
Presidential succession, than any misfortune
since the breaking up of the party in the
Charleston Convention-that dismal overture
to the Southern rebellion.


Since 1867, when the wrangling republicans
deliberately delivered this State over to the
democracy by nearly fifty thousand majority,
the republican party has never sufficiently raj
lied to recover it. They made vigorous
effort in 1861 through which they secured the
Legislature and thereby United States Sen
.ator (Fenton); but that was all. In all our
subsequent elections the democrats, through
the management Of Tammauy, gained ground,
till with the Legislature of last winter they
secured complete possession Of the State in
all its departments. The Tammany chiefs,
availing themselves Of the enlarged facilities
thus offered them in the reconstruction of our
city government so hedged about their new
administration with powers, privileges and
safeguards that it was supposed, even by their
adversaries, that 'the ring" could hardly be
broken or dislodged from city or State for
! twenty years to come. But it frequently hap
pens that, in the plenitude of their power and
fancied security, and when least expected,
empires dynastes and political parties, from
some fatal mistake or series of bhnders, are
undermined and overthrown. Thus fell the
splendid empire of Napoleon the Third; thus
our democratic party, imagined to be all-pow-
erful in the overwhelming election of Pierce,
began to fall to pieces under the blunders Of
his administration. Thus, too, from the fatal
mistakes Of Tammany in the estimates of her
| power and her security, she is suddenly
stricken down, and her weakness to-day is as
much marvel to the quiet, easy going citi-
zen as was her imposing strength of yesterday.
The prestige of Tammany is gone. The
chiefs of the rural democracy are arrayed
| agarst her, and within the metropolis she is
democratic army which from year to year has
followed TO the polls in this city the victorious
! ensign Of Tammany is broken up, and between
Tammany and the republican party even this
hitherto strong citadel of democracy, in a
popular vote this day, would doubtless be
prospect that, in the short Interval to our
November election, the democratic party Of
the State, demoralized and disorganized in
this Tammany ENHANCEMENT, can be put in a
position to avoid decisive defeat in the cleo
tions for the Legislature. In truth, while
there Is no ground for any hope Of democratic
reasons, In the existing intense excitements
and disordered condition of things in this city,
to fear that the elements Of sanguinary riot
are in process of formation here, which, In
bringing anarchy upon the city, may throw
the whole democratic party of the State and
of the United States into the chaos of dissolu-
ton.


How uncertain and capricious are the revo.
lutions of the whirligig of party politics!
The Orange procession and riot Of July last
brought out the powerful Irish element Of the
democratic party Of this city in favor OF Mayor
| Hall and in opposition to Governor Hoffman
| Now we find, from another turn Of the Wheel
the Irish element Of the party arrayed against
the Mayor and in favor of Mr.. Connolly,
Mr.. Green and the mixed Committee of
Seventy, while the solid German Americans
Of the city are quietly watching and waiting
the opportunity to bring up their reserves for
municipal reform. These complications serve
only to increase the decentralization of the
democracy and to strengthen the republican
party here and throughout the Union for
these Tammany disclosures of wastefulness,
extravaganza, negligence and corruptons,
looking TO the Presidential succession, have
operated and are operating by contrast, TO
rally the people around General Grants ad-
ministraton. But in this division of the New
York city democracy between Mayor Hall and
MIR. nolly-whch Is a division between
the American and the Irish American ele-
ments of the party-we have the break 10 the
ranks which opens the city itself to the repub-
licans; for it is break which not only
disArms Tammany as political centre OF
power, but the Irish American element as
political balance of power.


Here, then, as in the settlement OF the
slavery aneslion and the esliOn Of the civil