"SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES,
"WASHINGTON, D. C., _February 2, 1894_.
"HON. JOHN BIGELOW.
"DEAR SIR,--Your letter of the 31st of January was received
yesterday. You state that the son of the late Judge Josiah Gordon
Abbott, of Massachusetts, had handed to you a few days before, in
Boston, a copy of 'The proposed address of the minority of the
electoral commission of 1877, protesting against the decision of
the majority of that commission,' and add that at the close of the
address, or somewhere in it, was the following endorsement: 'This
address was drawn up at the request of some of the minority members
of the electoral commission, to whom it was submitted and approved
by them; but some doubted the wisdom of publishing the address at
the time, and so it was not signed. (Signed) J. G. ABBOTT.'
"You express a wish to know if the Democratic minority concurred in
this protest, and the reasons which decided them, or any of them,
against its publication. In answer to your inquiry, I would state
that I remember very well the preparation of the address undertaken
by Mr. Abbott, the draft of which was submitted to me and approved,
and I supposed then that it would receive the signatures of all the
members of the Democratic minority and be published. Soon afterwards
Mr. Abbott informed me that some of the members of the minority had
expressed a doubt of the wisdom of publishing the address at that
time. It was not, therefore, signed. I know of no other reason.
None was given that I can recall except the existence of the doubt
mentioned.
"Perhaps Mr. Bayard could give you more definite information
upon this point. I know that it was a disappointment to me that
the address, either as prepared, or as it might be amended by
suggestions of members of the Democratic minority, was not published.
"I think that when the members of the commission separated it was
Mr. Abbott's intention to prepare some document with reference to
the action of the commission for publication, with the consent of
other members of the minority, but that intention was subsequently
abandoned by him for reasons which I cannot state.
"You also state that you would like to know if I could tell you why
Judge Abbott refused to allow of the publication in his lifetime.
I know of none except the fact that the document was never signed.
Some years afterwards, when Mr. Abbott was at Washington, he
expressed to me a regret that the document which he had prepared had
not been signed and published.[19]
"I am very respectfully yours,
"STEPHEN J. FIELD."
[19] For a copy of the protest referred to in the preceding letter,
see Bigelow's _Life of Tilden_, Vol. II., Appendix A.
The following letter, received in reply to one addressed to its
writer by Mr. George W. Smith, one of the executors and trustees
of Mr. Tilden's estate, gives the substance of a very important
statement bearing upon the election for President in Louisiana in
'76, the authorship of which statement, however, is suppressed in
compliance with the request and for the reasons assigned by the
one who heard it. As the gentleman, whose name is here left blank,
has long been dead, it is permissible to say that he was quite the
most prominent Republican politician in Louisiana at the time the
statement purports to have been made.