Part 30

To my mind it was a joke. "Senator," said I, "the terms are as cheap as dirt. I don't happen to have the amount about me at the moment, but I will communicate with my principal and see you later."

Having no thought of entertaining the proposal, I had forgotten the incident, when two or three days later my man met me in the lobby of the hotel and pressed for a definite reply. I then told him I had found that I possessed no authority to act and advised him to go elsewhere.

It is asserted that Wells and Anderson did agree to sell and were turned down by Mr. Hewitt; and, being refused their demands for cash by the Democrats, took their final pay, at least in patronage, from their own party.

VIII

I passed the Christmas week of 1876 in New York with Mr. Tilden. On Christmas day we dined alone. The outlook, on the whole, was cheering. With John Bigelow and Manton Marble, Mr. Tilden had been busily engaged compiling the data for a constitutional battle to be fought by the Democrats in Congress, maintaining the right of the House of Representatives to concurrent jurisdiction with the Senate in the counting of the electoral vote, pursuant to an unbroken line of precedents established by that method of proceeding in every presidential election between 1793 and 1872.

There was very great perplexity in the public mind. Both parties appeared to be at sea. The dispute between the Democratic House and the Republican Senate made for thick weather. Contests of the vote of three States--Louisiana, South Carolina and Florida, not to mention single votes in Oregon and Vermont--which presently began to blow a gale, had already spread menacing clouds across the political sky. Except Mr. Tilden, the wisest among the leaders knew not precisely what to do.

From New Orleans, on the Saturday night succeeding the presidential election, I had telegraphed to Mr. Tilden detailing the exact conditions there and urging active and immediate agitation. The chance had been lost. I thought then and I still think that the conspiracy of a few men to use the corrupt returning boards of Louisiana, South Carolina and Florida to upset the election and make confusion in Congress might by prompt exposure and popular appeal have been thwarted. Be this as it may, my spirit was depressed and my confidence discouraged by the intense quietude on our side, for I was sure that beneath the surface the Republicans, with resolute determination and multiplied resources, were as busy as bees.

Mr. Robert M. McLane, later Governor of Maryland and later still Minister to France--a man of rare ability and large experience, who had served in Congress and in diplomacy, and was an old friend of Mr. Tilden--had been at a Gramercy Park conference when my New Orleans report arrived, and had then and there urged the agitation recommended by me. He was now again in New York. When a lad he had been in England with his father, Lewis McLane, then American Minister to the Court of St. James, during the excitement over the Reform Bill of 1832. He had witnessed the popular demonstrations and had been impressed by the direct force of public opinion upon law-making and law-makers. An analogous situation had arrived in America. The Republican Senate was as the Tory House of Lords. We must organize a movement such as had been so effectual in England. Obviously something was going amiss with us and something had to be done.

It was agreed that I should return to Washington and make a speech "feeling the pulse" of the country, with the suggestion that in the National Capital should assemble "a mass convention of at least 100,000 peaceful citizens," exercising "the freeman's right of petition."

The idea was one of many proposals of a more drastic kind and was the merest venture. I myself had no great faith in it. But I prepared the speech, and after much reading and revising, it was held by Mr. Tilden and Mr. McLane to cover the case and meet the purpose, Mr. Tilden writing Mr. Randall, Speaker of the House of Representatives, a letter, carried to Washington by Mr. McLane, instructing him what to do in the event that the popular response should prove favorable.

Alack the day! The Democrats were equal to nothing affirmative. The Republicans were united and resolute. I delivered the speech, not in the House, as had been intended, but at a public meeting which seemed opportune. The Democrats at once set about denying the sinister and violent purpose ascribed to it by the Republicans, who, fully advised that it had emanated from Gramercy Park and came by authority, started a counter agitation of their own.

I became the target for every kind of ridicule and abuse. Nast drew a grotesque cartoon of me, distorting my suggestion for the assembling of 100,000 citizens, which was both offensive and libellous.

Being on friendly terms with the Harpers, I made my displeasure so resonant in Franklin Square--Nast himself having no personal ill will toward me--that a curious and pleasing opportunity which came to pass was taken to make amends. A son having been born to me, Harper's Weekly contained an atoning cartoon representing the child in its father's arms, and, above, the legend "10,000 sons from Kentucky alone." Some wag said that the son in question was "the only one of the 100,000 in arms who came when he was called."

For many years afterward I was pursued by this unlucky speech, or rather by the misinterpretation given to it alike by friend and foe. Nast's first cartoon was accepted as a faithful portrait, and I was accordingly satirized and stigmatized, though no thought of violence ever had entered my mind, and in the final proceedings I had voted for the Electoral Commission Bill and faithfully stood by its decisions. Joseph Pulitzer, who immediately followed me on the occasion named, declared that he wanted my "one hundred thousand" to come fully armed and ready for business; yet he never was taken to task or reminded of his temerity.

The Electoral Commission Bill was considered with great secrecy by the joint committees of the House and Senate. Its terms were in direct contravention of Mr. Tilden's plan. This was simplicity itself. He was for asserting by formal resolution the conclusive right of the two Houses acting concurrently to count the electoral vote and determine what should be counted as electoral votes; and for denying, also by formal resolution, the pretension set up by the Republicans that the President of the Senate had lawful right to assume that function. He was for urging that issue in debate in both Houses and before the country. He thought that if the attempt should be made to usurp for the president of the Senate a power to make the count, and thus practically to control the Presidential election, the scheme would break down in process of execution.

Strange to say, Mr. Tilden was not consulted by the party leaders in Congress until the fourteenth of January, and then only by Mr. Hewitt, the extra constitutional features of the electoral-tribunal measure having already received the assent of Mr. Bayard and Mr. Thurman, the Democratic members of the Senate committee.

Standing by his original plan and answering Mr. Hewitt's statement that Mr. Bayard and Mr. Thurman were fully committed, Mr. Tilden said: "Is it not, then, rather late to consult me?"

To which Mr. Hewitt replied: "They do not consult you. They are public men, and have their own duties and responsibilities. I consult you."

In the course of the discussion with Mr. Hewitt which followed Mr. Tilden said: "If you go into conference with your adversary, and can't break off because you feel you must agree to something, you cannot negotiate--you are not fit to negotiate. You will be beaten upon every detail."

Replying to the apprehension of a collision of force between the parties Mr. Tilden thought it exaggerated, but said: "Why surrender now? You can always surrender. Why surrender before the battle for fear you may have to surrender after the battle?"

In short, Mr. Tilden condemned the proceeding as precipitate. It was a month before the time for the count, and he saw no reason why opportunity should not be given for consideration and consultation by all the representatives of the people. He treated the state of mind of Bayard and Thurman as a panic in which they were liable to act in haste and repent at leisure. He stood for publicity and wider discussion, distrusting a scheme to submit such vast interests to a small body sitting in the Capitol as likely to become the sport of intrigue and fraud.

Mr. Hewitt returned to Washington and without communicating to Mr. Tilden's immediate friends in the House his attitude and objection, united with Mr. Thurman and Mr. Bayard in completing the bill and reporting it to the Democratic Advisory Committee, as, by a caucus rule, had to be done with all measures relating to the great issue then before us. No intimation had preceded it. It fell like a bombshell upon the members of the committee.

In the debate that followed Mr. Bayard was very insistent, answering the objections at once offered by me, first aggressively and then angrily, going the length of saying, "If you do not accept this plan I shall wash my hands of the whole business, and you can go ahead and seat your President in your own way."

Mr. Randall, the Speaker, said nothing, but he was with me, as were a majority of my colleagues. It was Mr. Hunton, of Virginia, who poured oil on the troubled waters, and somewhat in doubt as to whether the changed situation had changed Mr. Tilden I yielded my better judgment, declaring it as my opinion that the plan would seat Hayes; and there being no other protestant the committee finally gave a reluctant assent.

In open session a majority of Democrats favored the bill. Many of them made it their own. They passed it. There was belief that Justice David Davis, who was expected to become a member of the commission, was sure for Tilden. If, under this surmise, he had been, the political complexion of "8 to 7" would have been reversed.

Elected to the United States Senate from Illinois, Judge Davis declined to serve, and Mr. Justice Bradley was chosen for the commission in his place.

The day after the inauguration of Hayes my kinsman, Stanley Matthews, said to me: "You people wanted Judge Davis. So did we. I tell you what I know, that Judge Davis was as safe for us as Judge Bradley. We preferred him because he carried more weight."

The subsequent career of Judge Davis in the Senate gave conclusive proof that this was true.