"HIGHLAND-FALLS-ON-HUDSON, _June 19, 1904_.
"MY DEAR MR. ELY,--I am extremely obliged to you for the
clipping you sent me from the _Evening Post_. Though familiar with
rumors of that nature, it is the first statement with any semblance
of authenticity I have met with of the reasons why Conkling did not
keep faith with our friends. I am not sure that Conkling himself did
not weaken at the pinch as much as the recalcitrant Senator. Had he
stood up on that occasion, as he should have done, he would have
established for himself a reputation for virtues which no biographer
can now claim for him.
"I do not remember the name of the Senator alluded to, because I
never knew the fact. Was it Kernan?
"Yours truly.
"P. S.--Cannot you give us a candidate for the Presidency without
making prostitutes of the judiciary?[18] When we made judges
elective we went as far in that direction as was safe, and farther
than was prudent. It was a perversion of the representative system
when we submitted the choice of experts, like judges and district
attorneys, to the popular vote. If we encourage judges to aspire
to the Presidency the suitors for justice will have to take their
check-books to court, and their cases will be argued, as they are
said to be, before Turkish cadis.
"Yours Truly,
"JOHN BIGELOW."
[18] At the date of this note a judge of the Court of Appeals of
the State of New York had been nominated and was running for the
Presidency.
* * * * *
About the middle of January, 1877, and before the Electoral
Commission had given its decision, I received a telegram from
Washington that a friend of the Honorable S. S. Cox, then a
representative in Congress from New York city, wished to confer with
me in reference to the Presidential contest pending in Washington.
Cox's friend proved to be Mr. Corbin, a brother-in-law of President
Grant. I replied to my correspondent that he might arrange for an
interview with me anywhere in New York city except in Mr. Corbin's
house, Corbin at that time having a residence in New York city.
It was arranged that we should meet at the Westminster Hotel, about
noon, on the 27th of January. I had known something of Corbin
through my relations with Colonel Benton many years before, and
had become slightly acquainted with him. What I did know of him
disinclined me to give him my confidence. I had no idea of the
motive which led him to invite this interview. He had intimated
to Mr. Cox that he would talk with me, but with no other of Mr.
Tilden's friends. The grounds for his taking me into his confidence
exclusively was equally unintelligible, beyond the fact that we had
been political friends of long standing as common friends of Senator
Thomas Benton, of Missouri.
He opened the interview by giving at considerable length what he
regarded as evidence of Senator Sherman's expectation that his
brother the general would have been nominated at Cincinnati in 1876
instead of President Hayes, and of the intrigues already making
for the general's nomination of 1880. At length he proceeded to
speak for and in the name of his brother-in-law, the President.
He said Grant wished to retire with grace and honorably from his
office, and had no special interest in the success of either of the
candidates whose fate was depending upon the action of the Electoral
Commission. He said that for himself he preferred Tilden forty times
to Hayes, and that all the ladies of Grant's family were champions
of Tilden. He wound up by saying that if he could be useful in
letting the President's views be known to Governor Tilden, when they
might serve a useful purpose, he would be glad to do so, and that
that was the special purpose of his inviting this interview.
I said to him that in a contingency not difficult to imagine there
might be two persons claiming a title to the White House on the
4th of March, one by the choice of the Senate, another by the
choice of the House of Representatives, and that it would interest
Governor Tilden very much to know whether General Grant would
think it his duty to solve that problem with the sword, or leave
it to the solution of time and events. Corbin replied that he
would tell me what must not go beyond me and Governor Tilden. Some
time ago, he said, Grant sent a number of boxes to his house at
Elizabeth for safe-keeping, and in stating his intention to do so,
he observed that as the inauguration would occur on Sunday at 12
M. he proposed to vacate the White House Saturday night;
whoever, therefore, said Corbin, gets into it first will have a very
substantial advantage. The President might perhaps stay in until the
following day if sufficient reason were shown for so doing. But,
said I, suppose our candidate gets the White House and the other
gets the Capitol, what then? Corbin paused a little, and then said:
"The keeper of the Capitol is under the control of the Commissioner
of Public Buildings. The Commissioner of Public Buildings is an
engineer officer, under the orders of Chief-Engineer Humphreys.
The present Commissioner of Public Buildings is Babcock; like St.
Paul, he is generally believed to have an eye 'to the recompense of
reward.' Then, those Irish doorkeepers may be worth looking to."
Such was the substance of an interview which occupied about two
hours.
What may have prompted Corbin to take the trouble to come all the
way from Washington to give me this hint, beyond a desire to give
himself importance in the eyes of Mr. Tilden, and how far President
Grant countenanced his mission, if he knew anything about it, are
questions which I never troubled myself to solve. There is no doubt
that President Grant thought Tilden had been elected, and found no
satisfaction in the prospect of having Hayes for his successor; but
if he had wished to convey to Mr. Tilden any intimation that he
would find the White House vacant and ready for his occupation on
the night of the 3d of March, I find it difficult to believe that he
would have selected Corbin for his emissary. However that may be,
neither Mr. Tilden nor myself thought his communication worthy of
serious consideration.
On the second day of March the House of Representatives, by a vote
of 137 to 88, adopted the preamble and resolutions which follow,
declaring that Samuel J. Tilden had been duly elected President,
and Thomas A. Hendricks duly elected Vice-President of the United
States. If these 137 votes in favor of Tilden and Hendricks
represented the requisite constitutional number of States in the
Union, it is not easy to see what more was necessary to make the one
President and the other Vice-President two days later than simply to
take the oaths of office prescribed by the Constitution.
RESOLUTIONS ADOPTED BY THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES DECLARING TILDEN
THE PRESIDENT ELECTED
The following is the text of the declaration of the House of
Representatives that Samuel J. Tilden has been duly elected President
of the United States, and Thos. A. Hendricks Vice-President of the
United States:
"WHEREAS, It is not disputed that the electoral votes
of the following-named States, to wit., Alabama, Arkansas,
Connecticut, Delaware, Georgia, Indiana, Kentucky, Maryland,
Mississippi, Missouri, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina,
Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, and West Virginia, amounting in all
to 184, were in conformity to the Constitution and laws of the
United States cast for Samuel J. Tilden, of the State of New
York, for President, and for Thos. A. Hendricks, of the State
of Indiana, for Vice-President of the United States, by legally
qualified electors appointed by said States, and severally in
the manner directed by the Legislatures of said States, lists of
which said votes were duly signed, certified, and transmitted
sealed by said electors respectively to the seat of government,
directed to the president of the Senate and by him opened in the
presence of the Senate and House of Representatives, as required
by the Constitution of the United States; and
"WHEREAS, The evidence taken and reported to this
House in pursuance of the orders thereof, shows conclusively
that on the 7th day of November, in the year of our Lord 1876,
the following-named persons, to wit., Wilkinson Call, J. E.
Yonge, R. B. Hilton, and Robt. Bullock, each of whom was in
all respects legally eligible and qualified to be appointed
elector for President and Vice-President of the United States,
were duly appointed electors by the State of Florida, in the
manner directed by the Legislature of said State; and, whereas,
the said Wilkinson Call, J. E. Yonge, R. B. Hilton, and Robert
Bullock, after having been so appointed electors for President
and Vice-President of the United States by said State of
Florida, in the manner directed by the Legislature thereof,
did, on the 6th day of December, in the year of our Lord 1876,
meet in the city of Tallahassee, in the said State of Florida,
that being the time and place fixed by the Constitution and
laws of the United States, and of the State of Florida, at
which the electors appointed by said State should meet; and
having so met, as the electors duly appointed by the State of
Florida as aforesaid, did then and there, in pursuance of the
Constitution and laws of the United States, cast by ballot
four votes for Samuel J. Tilden, of the State of New York, for
President of the United States, and in like manner cast four
votes for said Thomas A. Hendricks, of the State of Indiana,
for Vice-President of the United States, naming in separate and
distinct ballots the person voted for by them for President
and the person voted for by them for Vice-President, and then
and there made distinct lists of the persons voted for by them
for President and Vice-President of the United States, and of
the number of votes cast for each, which lists were by said
electors signed, certified, and transmitted by them sealed to
the seat of government, directed to the president of the Senate,
and by him opened in the presence of the Senate and House of
Representatives, as required by the Constitution of the United
States; and
"WHEREAS, The evidence taken and reported to this
House, in pursuance of the order thereof, conclusively shows
that on the 7th day of November, in the year of our Lord 1876,
the following-named persons, to wit., John McEnery, R. C.
Wickliffe, L. St. Martin, E. P. Poche, A. De Blanc, W. Seay, R.
G. Cobb, K. A. Cross, each of whom was in all respects legally
eligible and qualified to be appointed electors for President
and Vice-President of the United States, were duly appointed
electors by the State of Louisiana, in the manner provided by
the Legislature of said State; and
"WHEREAS, The said John McEnery, R. C. Wickliffe,
L. St. Martin, E. P. Poche, A. De Blanc, W. A. Seay, R. G.
Cobb, K. A. Cross, after having been so appointed electors for
President and Vice-President of the United States for the State
of Louisiana, in the manner directed by the Legislature thereof,
did, on the 6th day of December, in the year of our Lord 1876,
meet in the city of New Orleans, in the said State of Louisiana,
it being the time and place fixed by the Constitution and laws
of the United States, and of the said State of Louisiana, at
which the electors appointed by the said State should meet,
and having so met, did, then and there, as the electors duly
appointed for the State of Louisiana, as aforesaid, in pursuance
of the laws and Constitution of the United States, cast by
ballot eight votes for Samuel J. Tilden, of New York, for
President of the United States, and in like manner cast eight
votes for Thomas A. Hendricks, of the State of Indiana, for
Vice-President of the United States, naming in separate and
distinct ballots the persons voted for by them for President,
and the person voted for by them for Vice-President of the
United States, and then and there made distinct lists of the
persons voted for by them for President and Vice-President of
the United States, and the number of votes cast for each, which
lists were by said electors signed, certified, and transmitted
by said electors sealed to the seat of government, directed to
the president of the Senate, and by him opened in the presence
of the Senate and House of Representatives, as required by the
Constitution of the United States; and
"WHEREAS, The evidence taken and reported to the House
in pursuance of the orders thereof, shows conclusively that
certain persons who pretended to have been appointed electors
by the State of Florida, and who pretended as such to cast four
votes for Rutherford B. Hayes, of Ohio, for President of the
United States, and four votes for William A. Wheeler, of New
York, for Vice-President of the United States, to wit., F. C.
Humphreys, C. H. Pearce, W. H. Holden, and T. W. Long, who were
not appointed by the State of Florida, but were falsely and
fraudulently declared elected, when in truth they had each and
every one of them been defeated by a clear majority, as was well
known by the then Governor of Florida and the other canvassing
officers of that State, who falsely and fraudulently made such
declaration; and
"WHEREAS, The evidence taken and reported to this House
in pursuance of the orders, further shows conclusively that
certain persons, namely, William Pitt Kellogg, J. H. Burch,
Peter Joseph, Lionel A. Sheldon, Morris Marks, A. B. Levisee,
O. H. Brewster, and Oscar Joffrion, were falsely, fraudulently,
and corruptly declared to have been appointed electors by
the State of Louisiana, and did falsely, fraudulently, and
corruptly pretend to cast eight votes for Rutherford B.
Hayes for President, and eight votes for William A. Wheeler
for Vice-President of the United States, when in truth and
in fact they had never been appointed electors by the said
State of Louisiana, but had been defeated by a majority of
several thousands of the legally qualified voters of said
State, at a fair, peaceful, and legally conducted election,
held in pursuance of the law of said State, all of which was
well known to the Board of Returning Officers, who made the
false, fraudulent, and corrupt declaration of their pretended
appointment as electors, and who, under the Constitution and
laws of the said State of Louisiana, had no jurisdiction or
authority to make any such declaration or statement; and
"WHEREAS, The pretended votes were given by F. C.
Humphreys, Charles H. Pearce, William H. Holden, T. W. Long,
William Pitt Kellogg, J. H. Burch, Peter Joseph, Lionel A.
Sheldon, Morris Marks, Aaron B. Levisee, O. H. Brewster,
and Oscar Joffrion, electors, now, therefore, in view of
the foregoing facts, the truth of which is attested by an
overwhelming array of sworn testimony, as well as by the
intelligence of the American people,
"_Resolved_, By the House of Representatives of the United
States of America, that it is the duty of the House to declare,
and this House does hereby solemnly declare, that Samuel J.
Tilden, of the State of New York, received 196 electoral votes
for the office of President of the United States, all of which
votes were cast and lists thereof signed, certified, and
transmitted to the seat of government, directed to the president
of the Senate, in conformity with the Constitution and laws of
the United States, by electors legally eligible and qualified as
such electors, each of whom had been duly appointed and elected,
in the manner directed by the Legislature of the State in and
for which he cast his vote as aforesaid; and that said Samuel
J. Tilden, having thus received the votes of a majority of the
electors appointed as aforesaid, he was thereby duly elected
President of the United States of America for the term of four
years, commencing on the 4th day of March, A.D. 1877.
"And this House further declares that Thomas A. Hendricks,
having received the same number of the electoral votes for the
office of Vice-President of the United States that were cast for
Samuel J. Tilden for President, as aforesaid, the said votes
having been cast for him by the same persons who voted for the
said Tilden for President, as aforesaid, and at the same time
and in the same manner, it is the opinion of this House that
said Thomas A. Hendricks, of the State of Indiana, was duly
elected Vice-President of the United States for a term of four
years, commencing on the 4th day of March, A.D. 1877."