A Political History of the State of New York Volume III Part 37

[Footnote 1576: New York _Tribune_, September 27, 1877.]

Conkling had been waiting for Curtis as the American fleet waited for the Spanish at Santiago. Curtis had adorned the centre of opposition until he seemed most to desire what would most disappoint Conkling.

For months prior to the Cincinnati convention _Harper's Weekly_ bristled with reasons that in its opinion unfitted the Senator for President, and advertised to the country the desire at least of a large minority of the party in New York to be rid of him. With consummate skill he unfolded Conkling's record, and emphasised his defence of the questionable acts that led to a deep distrust of Republican tendencies. To him the question was not whether a National convention could be persuaded to adopt the Senator as its candidate, but whether, "being one of the leaders that had imperilled the party, it was the true policy for those who patriotically desired Republican success." Furthermore, Curtis had a habit of asking questions. "With what great measure of statesmanship is his name conspicuously identified?"[1577] and, as if this admitted of no reply, he followed it with more specific inquiries demanding to know "why the Senator had led a successful opposition to Judge h.o.a.r for the Supreme Bench," and become "the ardent supporter of Caleb Cushing for chief justice, and of Alexander Shepherd for commissioner of the District of Columbia?"

These interrogatories seemed to separate him from statesmen of high degree and to place him among a.s.sociates for whom upright citizens should have little respect.

[Footnote 1577: "He [Conkling] never linked his name with any important principle or policy."--_Political Recollections_, George W. Julian, p.

359.

"Strictly speaking Senator Conkling was not an originator of legislative measures. He introduced few bills which became laws. He was not an originator, but a moulder of legislation.... It may be said that during his last seven years in the Senate, no other member of that body has, since the time of Webster and Clay, exercised so much influence on legislation."--Alfred R. Conkling, _Life of Conkling_, pp. 645-649.]

Nor was this all. The part Greeley took at Chicago to defeat Seward, Curtis played at Cincinnati to defeat Conkling. He declared him the especial representative of methods which the best sentiment of the party repudiated, and a.s.serted that his nomination would chill enthusiasm, convince men of the hopelessness of reform within the party, and lose the vote indispensable for the election of the Republican candidate. If his words were parliamentary, they were not less offensive. Once only did he strike below the belt. In the event of the Senator's nomination he said "a searching light would be turned upon Mr. Conkling's professional relations to causes in which he was opposed to attorneys virtually named by himself, before judges whose selection was due to his favour."[1578]

[Footnote 1578: _Harper's Weekly_, March 11, 1876. For other editorials referred to, see February 5; April 8, 15, 29; May 20; June 3, 17, 1876; March 24; April 21; July 21; August 11; September 22, 1877.]

This thrust penetrated the realm of personal integrity, a characteristic in which Conkling took great pride. Perhaps the hostile insinuation attracted more attention because it prompted the public, already familiar with the occult influences that persuaded Tweed's judges, to ask why men who become United States judges upon the request of a political boss should not be tempted into favourable decisions for the benefactor who practises in their courts? Curtis implied that something of the kind had happened in Conkling's professional career. Disappointment at Cincinnati may have made the presidential candidate sore, but this innuendo rankled, and when he rose to oppose Curtis's resolution his powerful frame seemed in a thrill of delight as he began the speech which had been laboriously wrought out in the stillness of his study.

The contrast in the appearance of the two speakers was most striking.

Curtis, short, compact, punctilious in attire, and exquisitely cultured, with a soft, musical voice, was capable of the n.o.blest tenderness. Conkling, tall, erect, muscular, was the very embodiment of physical vigour, while his large, well-poised head, his strong nose, handsome eyes, well-cut mouth, and prominent chin, were expressive of the utmost resolution. The two men also differed as much in mind as in appearance. Curtis stood for all the force and feeling that make for liberal progressive principles; Conkling, the product of a war age, of masterly audacity and inflexible determination, represented the conservative impulse, with a cynical indifference to criticism and opposition.

The preface to his attack was brief. This was a State convention to nominate candidates, he said in substance, and the National Administration was not a candidate or in question. He repelled the idea that it suggested or sanctioned such a proceeding, and although broad hints had been heard that retribution would follow silence, any one volunteering for such a purpose lacked discretion if not sincerity. "Who are these men who, in newspapers or elsewhere, are cracking their whips over me and playing schoolmaster to the party?

They are of various sorts and conditions. Some of them are the man-milliners, the dilettante and carpet knights of politics, whose efforts have been expended in denouncing and ridiculing and accusing honest men.... Some of them are men who, when they could work themselves into conventions, have attempted to belittle and befoul Republican administrations and to parade their own thin veneering of superior purity. Some of them are men who, by insisting that it is corrupt and bad for men in office to take part in politics, are striving now to prove that the Republican party has been unclean and vicious all its life.... Some of these worthies masquerade as reformers. Their vocation and ministry is to lament the sins of other people. Their stock in trade is rancid, canting self-righteousness.

They are wolves in sheep's clothing. Their real object is office and plunder. When Dr. Johnson defined patriotism as the last refuge of a scoundrel, he was unconscious of the then undeveloped capabilities and uses of the word reform.... Some of these new-found party overseers who are at this moment laying down new and strange tenets for Republicans, have deemed it their duty heretofore, upon no provocation, to make conventions and all else the vehicle of disparaging Republican administrations. Some of them sat but yesterday in Democratic conventions, some have sought nominations at the hands of Democrats in recent years, and some, with the zeal of neophytes and bitterness of apostates, have done more than self-respecting Democrats would do to vilify and slander their government and their countrymen.... They forget that parties are not built up by deportment, or by ladies' magazines, or gush.... The gra.s.shoppers in the corner of a fence, even without a newspaper to be heard in, sometimes make more noise than the flocks and herds that graze upon a thousand hills.... For extreme license in criticism of administrations and of everybody connected with them, broad arguments can no doubt be found in the files of the journal made famous by the pencil of Nast.

But a convention may not deem itself a chartered libertine of oracular and pedantic conceits."

Conkling could not comprehend why Republicans of New York should be thought predisposed to find fault with Hayes. Without their votes he could not have become the candidate. "Even the member from Richmond was, I believe, in the end prevailed upon, after much difficulty, to confer his unique and delicate vote also." New York congressmen, with few exceptions, heartily supported the measure without which Hayes would never have been effectually inaugurated. No opposition had come from New York. What, then, is the meaning and purpose of constantly accusing Republicans of this State of unfriendly bias? Wanton a.s.saults had been made upon Republicans, supposed to be inspired by the champions and advisers of the President. For not doing more in the campaign of 1876, he, an office-holder, had been denounced by the same men who now insist that an office-holder may not sign even a notice for a convention. No utterance hostile to men or measures had proceeded from him. Not a straw had been laid in the way of any man.

Still he had been persistently a.s.saulted and misrepresented by those claiming to speak specially for the Administration. A word of greeting to his neighbours had drawn down bitter and scornful denunciations because it did not endorse the Administration.

"These anxious and super-serviceable charioteers seem determined to know nothing but the President and his policy and them crucified....

The meaning of all this is not obscured by the fact that the new President has been surrounded and courted by men who have long purred about every new Administration.... Some of these disinterested patriots and reformers have been since the days of Pierce the friends and suitors of all Administrations and betrayers of all. The a.s.saults they incite are somewhat annoying. It would have been a luxury to unfrock some of them, but it has seemed to me the duty of every sincere Republican to endure a great deal rather than say anything to introduce division or controversy into party ranks.... I am for peace.... I am for everything tending to that end.... I am for one thing more--the success of the Administration in everything that is just and wise and real."

The Senator thought Hayes deserved the same support other Republican administrations had received. Whenever he is right he should be sustained; whenever misled by unwise or sinister advice, dissent should be expressed. This right of judgment is the right of every citizen. He exercised it in Congress under Lincoln and Grant, who never deemed an honest difference of opinion cause for war or quarrel, "nor were they afflicted by having men long around them engaged in setting on newspapers to hound every man who was not officious or abject in fulsomely bepraising them. The matters suggested by the pending amendment," he continued, "are not pertinent to this day's duties, and obviously they are matters of difference. They may promote personal and selfish aims, but they are hostile to concord and good understanding between Republicans at a time when they should all be united everywhere, in purpose and action. Let us agree to put contentions aside and complete our task. Let us declare the purposes and methods which should guide the government of our great State."

After this plea for harmony, the Senator commented briefly upon the remarks of other delegates, complimented Platt, and then turned again upon Curtis. Being a.s.sured that the latter did not refer to him as the Senator for whom Lincoln looked under the bed, he concluded: "Then I withhold a statement I intended to make, and I subst.i.tute for it a remark which I hope will not transgress the proprieties or liberties of this occasion. It is this: If a doubt arose in my mind whether the member from Richmond intended a covert shot at me, that doubt sprang from the fact that that member has published, in a newspaper, touching me, not matters political--political a.s.saults fairly conducted no man ever heard me complain of--but imputations upon my personal integrity so injurious and groundless, that as I think of them now, nothing but the proprieties of the occasion restrain me from denouncing them and their author as I feel at liberty to do in the walks of private life.

Mr. President, according to that Christian code which I have been taught, there is no atonement in the thin lacquer of public courtesy, or of private ceremonial observance, for the offence one man does another when he violates that provision of the Decalogue, which, speaking to him, says, 'Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour,' and which means thou shalt not do it, whatever thy personal or political pique or animosity may be. The member from Richmond did me honour overmuch in an individual if not personal exhortation wherein he was pleased to run some parallel between himself and me.... Let me supplement the parallel by recalling a remark of a great Crusader when Richard of England and Leopold of Austria had held dispute over the preliminaries of battle: 'Let the future decide between you, and let it declare for him who carries furthest into the ranks of the enemy the sword of the cross.'"[1579]

[Footnote 1579: Conkling, _Life of Conkling_, pp. 538-549; New York _Tribune_, October 1, 1877.]

From a mere reading of this speech it is difficult, if not impossible, to realise its effect upon those who heard it.[1580] As an oratorical exhibition the testimony of friends and of foes is alike offered in its unqualified praise. He spoke distinctly and with characteristic deliberation, his stateliness of manner and captivating audacity investing each sentence with an importance that only attaches to the utterances of a great orator. The withering sneer and the look of contempt gave character to the sarcasms and bitter invectives which he scattered with the prodigality of a seed-sower. When he declared Curtis a "man-milliner," his long, flexible index finger and eyes ablaze with resentment pointed out the editor as distinctly as if he had transfixed him with an arrow, while the slowly p.r.o.nounced syllables, voiced in a sliding, descending key, gave the t.i.tle a cartoon effect. Referring to the parallel in Curtis's peroration, he laid his hand on his heart, bowed toward his antagonist with mock reverence, and distorted his face with an expression of ludicrous scorn. In repelling the innuendo as to his "personal integrity," the suppressed anger and slowly spoken words seemed to preface a challenge to mortal combat, and men held their breath until his purpose cleared.

The striking delivery of several keen thrusts fixed them in the memory. Given in his deep, sonorous tones, one of these ran much as follows: "When Doc-tor-r-r Ja-a-awnson said that patr-r-riotism-m was the l-a-w-s-t r-r-refuge of a scoundr-r-rel he ignor-r-red the enor-r-rmous possibilities of the word r-refa-awr-rm."[1581] Other sentences, now historic, pleased opponents not less than friends. That parties are not upheld by "deportment, ladies' magazines, or gush"

instantly caught the audience, as did "the journal made famous by the pencil of Nast," and the comparison suggested by Edmund Burke of the noise of "gra.s.shoppers in the corner of a fence even without a newspaper to be heard in."[1582]

[Footnote 1580: After the death of Thomas B. Reed of Maine, this speech was found in his sc.r.a.p-book among the masterpieces of sarcasm and invective.]

[Footnote 1581: White, _Autobiography_, Vol. 1, p. 171.]

[Footnote 1582: "Because half-a-dozen gra.s.shoppers under a fern make the field ring with their importunate c.h.i.n.k, while thousands of great cattle beneath the shadow of the British oak chew the cud and are silent, pray do not imagine that those who make the noise are the only inhabitants of the field, that of course they are many in number, or that, after all, they are other than the little, shrivelled, meagre, hopping, though loud and troublesome, insects of the hour."--Edmund Burke. George H. Jennings, _Anecdotal History of the British Parliament_, p. 159.]

Nevertheless, these moments of accord between speaker and hearers deepened by contrast the depth of bitterness existing between him and the friends of the President. His denunciation of Curtis had included Evarts if not other members of the Administration, and during the recital of the rhythmical sentences of arraignment dissent mingled with applause. "He was hissed," said a reporter of long experience, "as I have never heard any speaker hissed at a convention before."[1583] A friend to whom Conkling read the speech on the preceding Sunday p.r.o.nounced it "too severe," and the nephew excluded the epithet "man-milliner" from the address as published in his uncle's biography.[1584] The contemporary press, reflecting the injury which Conkling's exuberance of denunciation did his cause, told how its effect withered as soon as oratory and acting had ceased. Within an hour after its delivery Charles E. Fitch of the Rochester _Democrat-Chronicle_, voicing the sentiment of the Senator's best friends, deprecated the attack. Reading the article at the breakfast table on the following morning, Conkling exclaimed, "the man who wrote it is a traitor!" It was "the man" not less than the criticism that staggered him. Fitch was a sincere friend and a writer with a purpose.

His clear, incisive English, often forcible and at times eloquent, had won him a distinct place in New York journalism, not more by his editorials than by his work in various fields of literature, and his thought usually reflected the opinion of the better element of the party. To Conkling it conveyed the first intimation that many Republican papers were to p.r.o.nounce his address unfortunate, since it exhorted to peace and fomented bitter strife.

[Footnote 1583: New York _Tribune_ (correspondence), September 28.]

[Footnote 1584: Alfred R. Conkling, _Life of Conkling_, p. 540.]

Curtis refused to make public comment, but to Charles Eliot Norton, his intimate friend, he wrote: "It was the saddest sight I ever knew, that man glaring at me in a fury of hate, and storming out his foolish blackguardism. I was all pity. I had not thought him great, but I had not suspected how small he was. His friends, the best, were confounded. One of them said to me the next day, 'It was not amazement that I felt, but consternation.' I spoke offhand and the report is horrible. Conkling's speech was carefully written out, and therefore you do not get all the venom, and no one can imagine the Mephistophelean leer and spite."[1585]

[Footnote 1585: Edward Cary, _Life of Curtis_, p. 258.]

Conkling closed his speech too late at night for other business,[1586]

and in the morning one-half of the delegates had disappeared. Those remaining occupied less than an hour in the nomination of candidates.[1587]

[Footnote 1586: Curtis's amendment was defeated by 311 to 110.]

[Footnote 1587: The candidates were: Secretary of State, John C.

Churchill, Oswego; Comptroller, Francis Sylvester, Columbia; Treasurer, William L. Bostwick, Ithaca; Attorney-General, Grenville Tremaine, Albany; Engineer, Howard Soule, Onondaga.]

CHAPTER XXIX

THE TILDEN ReGIME ROUTED

1877

The result at Rochester, so unsatisfactory to a large body of influential men to whom the President represented the most patriotic Republicanism, was followed at Albany by a movement no less disappointing to a large element of the Democratic party.[1588] In their zeal to punish crime Secretary of State Bigelow and Attorney-General Fairchild had made themselves excessively obnoxious to the predatory statesmen of the ca.n.a.l ring, who now proposed to destroy the Tilden regime. Back of them stood John Kelly, eager to become the master, and determined to accomplish what he had failed to do at St. Louis.

[Footnote 1588: The Democratic State convention met at Albany on October 3, 1877.]

As if indifferent to the contest Bigelow had remained in Europe with Tilden, and Fairchild, weary of the nervous strain of office-holding, refused to make an open canva.s.s for the extension of his official life. Nevertheless, the friends of reform understood the importance of renominating the old ticket. It had stood for the interest of the people. Whatever doubt might have clouded the public mind as to Tilden's sincerity as an ardent, unselfish reformer, Republicans as well as Democrats knew that Bigelow and Fairchild represented an uncompromising hostility to public plunderers, and that their work, if then discontinued, must be shorn of much of its utility. Their friends understood, also, the importance of controlling the temporary organisation of the convention, otherwise all would be lost.

The result of the Presidential struggle had seriously weakened Tilden.

In the larger field of action he had displayed a timid, vacillating character, and the boldest leaders of his party felt that in the final test as a candidate he lost because he hesitated. Besides, the immediate prospect of power had disappeared. Although Democrats talked of "the great Presidential crime," and seemed to have their eyes and minds fastened on offices and other evidences of victory, they realised deep in their hearts that Hayes was President for four years, and that new conditions and new men might be existent in 1880.

Moreover, many Democratic leaders who could not be cla.s.sed as selfish, felt that Tilden, in securing the advantageous position of a reformer, had misrepresented the real Democratic spirit and purpose in the State. They deeply resented his course in calling about him, to the exclusion of recognised and experienced party advisers, men whom he could influence, who owed their distinction to his favour, and who were consequently devoted to his fortunes. Upon some of these he relied to secure Republican sympathy, while he depended upon Democratic discipline to gain the full support of his party. If events favoured his designs and the exigencies of an exciting Presidential election concealed hostility, these conditions did not placate his opponents, who began plotting his downfall the moment the great historic contest ended. This opposition could be approximately measured by the fact that the entire party press of the State, with three exceptions, disclosed a distinct dislike of his methods.[1589]

[Footnote 1589: New York _Tribune_, September 1, 1877.]

Nevertheless, Tilden's friends held control. Governor Robinson, an executive of remarkable force, sensitively obedient to principles of honest government and bold in his utterances, remained at the head of a devoted band which had hitherto found its career marked by triumph after triumph, and whose influence was still powerful enough to rally to its standard new men of strength as well as old leaders flushed with recent victories. Robinson's courageous words especially engaged the attention of thoughtful Democrats. He did not need to give reasons for the opposition to John Bigelow, or the grievance against Charles S. Fairchild, whose court docket sufficiently exposed the antagonism between ca.n.a.l contractors and the faithful prosecutor. But in his fascinating manner he told the story of the Attorney-General's heroic firmness in refusing to release Tweed.[1590] In Robinson's opinion the vicious cla.s.ses, whose purposes discovered themselves in the depredations of rings and weakness for plunder, were arrayed against the better element of the party which had temporarily deprived the wrong-doers of power, and he appealed to his friends to rescue administrative reform from threatened defeat.

[Footnote 1590: "The man who has been the most effective organiser of corruption strikes boldly for release. He is arrayed as an element in the combination which attacks the Governor and Democratic State officers, and which seeks to reverse their policy."--Albany _Argus_, October 4, 1877.]

The Governor was not unmindful of his weakness. Besides Tilden's loss of prestige, the renomination of the old ticket encountered the objection of a third term, aroused the personal antagonism of hundreds of men who had suffered because of its zeal, and arrayed against it all other influences that had become hostile to Tilden through envy or otherwise during his active management of the party. Moreover, he understood the cunning of John Kelly and the intrigue of his lieutenants. Knowing that contesting delegations excluded precincts from taking part in the temporary organisation, these men had sought to weaken Tilden by creating fict.i.tious contests in counties loyal to him, thus offsetting John Morrissey's contest against Tammany. It was a desperate struggle, and the only gleam of light that opened a way to Tilden's continued success came from the action of the State Committee, which gave David B. Hill of Chemung 19 votes for temporary chairman to 14 for Clarkson N. Potter of New York. The victory, ordinarily meaning the control of the Committee on Credentials, restored hope if not confidence.

Hill was the friend of Robinson. Although his name had not then become a household word, he was by no means unknown throughout the State. He had come into public life as city attorney in 1864 at the age of twenty-one, and had shown political instincts for the most part admirable. Of those to go to the a.s.sembly in 1871 to aid in the work of judicial purification, Hill was suggested by O'Conor and Tilden as one of the trustworthy lawyers, and in February, 1872, when the legislative committee began its investigation into the charges presented by the Bar a.s.sociation against Judges Barnard, Cardozo, Ingraham, and McCunn with a view to their impeachment, Hill sat by the side of Tilden. It was recognised that he belonged to the coterie of able men who stood at the front of the reform movement.

His personal habits, too, commended him. He seems to have been absolved from the love of wine, and if the love of a good woman did not win him, he created a substantial home among his books, and worked while others feasted. He talked easily, he learned readily, and with the earnestness of one who inherited an ambition for public life he carefully equipped himself for a political as well as a professional career. He had a robust, straightforward nature. Men liked his courage, his earnestness, his effectiveness as a debater, and his declared purposes which were thoroughly in unison with the spirit of his party. But it was his boldness, tempered with firmness, which justified Robinson in singling him out for chairman. Still, the courage exhibited as a presiding officer in one of the stormiest conventions that ever a.s.sembled in the Empire State did not win him distinction.

The Kelly opposition raised no question of principle. The platform denounced the defeat of Tilden as due to fraud, applauded Hayes for his Southern policy, declared for reapportionment of the State, and bitterly a.s.sailed railroad subsidies. But it had no words of unkindness for Tilden and Robinson. Indeed, with a most sublime display of hypocrisy, Kelly pointed with pride to the fruits of their administrations, made ill.u.s.trious by ca.n.a.l reforms, economy, and the relentless prosecution of profligate boards and swindling contractors, and vied with the apostles of administrative reform in calling them "fearless" and "honest," and in repudiating the suggestion of desiring other directing spirits. His only issue involved candidates. Should it be the old ticket or a new one? Should it be Bigelow for a third term, or Beach, the choice of the ring? In opposing the old ticket several delegates extended their hostility only to Bigelow; others included the attorney-general. Only a few demanded an entire change. But Tammany and the Ca.n.a.l ring tactfully combined these various elements with a skill never before excelled in a State convention. Their programme, sugar-coated with an alleged affection for Tilden, was arranged to satisfy the whim of each delegate, while Robinson's policy, heavily freighted with well doing, encountered the odium of a third-term ticket.