Year: 1871

and Prosene-POlioy Of tho Dcmocratic


Party. f


There will be warm work in Rochester to-
day if we may judge from the portents in the
political sky. The strong men of the rural
democracy, who have made their voices heard
through the columns Of the HERALD, demand
the unconditional election from their State Con-
vention of the Tammany delegates, and Of
every individual who comes tainted with the
unsavory odor Of New York municipal corrup-
ton. The weaker brethren, with Horatio
Seymour at their head, although hesitating to
declare war TO the knife and the knife to the
hilt against the old Wigwam, unite in denunci-
alton Of the pestilent policy of the "Ring,"
and declare that something must ba done to
save the party from the evil effects OF its
misdeeds. Their words sound trumpet-toned
through the State, from Montauk Point
to Lake Erie, and the hearts of the
great mass of their followers respond to the
judgment they pronounce. 1t Is felt that no
half measures-no temporizing, timid compro-
mise must be permitted at this time to render
the position of the democracy uncertain or
even questionable that they must not alone
denounce official rascality and peculation, but
must prove the sincerity Of such denunciation
by driving out from among them the rascals
and peculators even as the thievish money
changers were driven from the Temple by the
| great Founder Of the genuine principles Of
democracy centuries ago. We may therefore
calculate upon an immediate. fierce and deter
1 v,sc &koo N kho
Rochester Convention is duly organized, so
that even In its initiatory proceedings it may
be free from contact with q corruption 0fen-
sive in the nostrils of the people.


But in the meantime what will be the course
of the Tammany braves who have travelled
towards the setting sun to be present at this
great gathering Of the democratic tribes, and
who expect to sit in council with the sages of
the rural districts and to share in the division
of the spoils? Will they crawl into their holes
and their filth, like the Digger Indian, with
out showing fight, or will they emulate the
courage of the Delaware, the Tuscarora and
the Mohican, and dash forward on the war
path to meet the enemyp We incline to the
opinion that the men who have grown into
bloated millionnaires upon the profits
Of municipal pluuder and legislative in
fuence, gained through the iron rule
they have established over the city de-
mocracy by means Of the close corporation
Of Tammany, will not give up their valuable
power without a desperate struggle. Follow
ing the policy they have SO long successfully
pursued, they will no doubt use their money
to influence the action of approachable dele
gates; but if this should prove insufficient to
secure their admission to the Convention, they
will declare war against its action and its
candidates. The demand of Tammany for
recognition will be based upon the strong plea
Of regularity. s'We are the regular organiza-
tion," they will argue, ''and to cast us out and
admit an unauthorized delegation to our seats
will be revolution in the party" They will
point to the last election, in which the Young
Democracy, as it is called, made strong and
| determined fight against the Tammanyites and
were defeated, as proof that the contesting
delegates cannot even claim to represent the
majority Of the party at this end of the State.
They will urge the enormous majorities Tam





year, overcoming the large republican vote in
other parts Of the State, and raising to power
the candidates Of democratic State Conven
tions, in protest against the destruction of the
organization. They will declare that the
eminent lawyer, Charles O'Conor, is not
representative leader of the city democracy;
that the venerable Tilden knows absolutely
nothing of the people, who know just as much
Of him, and that he is more in sympathy with
the dead Marcy and the gravestones of the
democracy than with the living masses
who roll up majorities, fairly or unfairly,
in favor Of the party nominees. They will
point to their sixty odd years of existence,
to their lifelong service in the demo-
cratic cause, to the many struggles through
which they have passed, to the recorded judg-
ment Of the State Convention that Tammany
and Tammany alone can claim the right to
speak for the New York democracy in that
body, and they will ask s'Are we to be set
aside for self-constituted delegation spring
ing from nobody knows where and represent
ing nobody knows whom?'


Now, there appears at first sight to be
justice in Tammany's claim, and it may be
said in her favor that men are not organiza-
tions, and that time and again, in just such
dilemmas as the present, leaders have been
changed but the organization has gone on as
before. "The king is dead-long live the
king!" has been proverb Of Tammany, as of
monarchies Since the union Of the hards and
softs al Cincinnati dynasty after dynasty has
risen and fallen in the old Wigwam, and yet
the camp fires have never died out. For
some time after the union Lorenzo D.
Sheppard was supreme in the councils of
the Sachems, as the favored representative
| of HOratio Seymour in hia nalrn;oat dou. rr;.