A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3

by De Alva Stanwood Alexander

1880

The defeat of Governor Robinson did not apparently change party sentiment respecting Tilden's renomination for the Presidency. No other candidate was seriously discussed. Indeed, the Democratic press continued to treat it as a matter of course, coupling with it the alleged subversion of an election, transcending in importance all questions of administration, and involving the vital principle of self-government through elections by the people. This new issue, dwarfing all other policies, had been for three years the cornerstone of every Democratic platform in state, county, or congressional convention. No argument seemed to weaken it, no event could destroy it. The Republican claim that the vote of three Southern States, as declared at the polls, was the result of terrorism and did not in any sense represent an honest expression of the popular will, made no impression upon it. The well-known fact that Congress, because of the confusion of the situation, had wisely sought a remedy in the Electoral Commission, which was passed by Democratic rather than Republican votes, in nowise weakened the force of its appeal. Not even did the disclosure that Tilden's house had become the headquarter of confidential agents, who sought to corrupt the electors, produce any change in it. The one declaration, patiently and persistently kept before the people, was that Tilden had been elected by the popular vote and defrauded by a false count of the electoral vote, and that the supreme issue in 1880 must be whether "this shall be a government by the sovereign people through elections, or a government by discarded servants holding over by force and fraud."[945] The reiteration of this proposition made Tilden, it was claimed, the necessary and inevitable candidate of the Cincinnati convention, called to meet on June 22. The party seemed to believe, what Tilden himself had announced from his doorstep three years before, that the country would "never condone fraud," and it did not propose to sacrifice a winning issue.[946]

Nevertheless, many New York Democrats disliked Tilden. Their number, which the cipher disclosures materially increased, grew into threatening proportions after Kelly's dissatisfaction had settled into a relentless feud. This condition made Tilden's chances of carrying the State uncertain if not absolutely nil, and encouraged his critics to magnify his weaknesses until the belief generally obtained that serious, perhaps fatal opposition would array itself at the State convention on April 20. Statements as to Tilden's ill-health likewise found currency. When not displaying evidence of unimpaired mental vigour in the courtroom, he was said to be on the verge of total paralysis.[947] To his burdens the government also added another by pursuing his income tax. This suit, commenced in January, 1877, and destined to drag through five years until dismissed by the prosecution without costs to either party, was fixed for the April term in 1880, although the United States attorney admitted his unpreparedness for trial.[948] "Thus was he persecuted with unrelenting virulence by the Administration," says his biographer, "and by the Republican press, which neglected no opportunity of refreshing the memory of its readers in regard to his imputed capacities for wickedness."[949]

Meanwhile, to escape interruptions to which Gramercy Park exposed him, Tilden settled in the summer of 1879 at Greystone on the Hudson, three miles beyond the northernmost limit of the city, on the highest ground south of the Highlands. Here he brought a portion of his library; here he mingled with his flocks and herds; and here in the seclusion of a noble estate, with the comforts of a palatial stone dwelling, he discoursed with friends, who came from every part of the country to assure him that he alone could keep the party together. Ever silent as to his own intentions Tilden talked of the crime of 1876 until his visitors, imbued with his own spirit, left him thoroughly impressed with the importance of his renomination.

But Tilden did not trust the result to sentiment. Throughout New York Daniel E. Manning and other lieutenants held a tight rein, and when the Syracuse convention assembled an early roll-call, on a resolution to determine the character of the Committee on Credentials, showed 295 votes for Tilden to 80 against him. If this overwhelming majority shocked the dissenters, it was not less a surprise to the regulars. In the convention of 1876 Tilden mustered, including Tammany, only 201 out of 375; now, after his enemies had exhausted their opposition, he proved stronger than in the closing months of his famous career as a reform governor. The result of this vote settled all controversies, leaving the convention free to appoint electors and to select delegates to Cincinnati.[950] It was not to adjourn, however, until it had shown a serene and polite contempt for John Kelly. During the morning John B. Haskin, on behalf of the Tammany convention, had presented a resolution expressing a desire for the union of the party and asking the appointment of a harmony committee. Ignoring the assembly from which he came, the convention treated the resolution as a personal communication from Haskin, whom it assured, after politely reciprocating his desire for the union of the Democratic party, "that the deliberative wisdom of the national convention will result in such action as will secure the triumph of the Democratic party in the ensuing election."[951] This bitter rebuff, coupled with the overwhelming majority for Tilden, indicated a conscious strength which deeply impressed the party in other States, and greatly aided in demoralising opposition in New York.

Nor did the convention adjourn until its Committee on Resolutions sprung a further surprise. The delegates anticipated and applauded an elaborate statement of the fraud issue, but the presentation of Tilden as a candidate for President came with the suddenness of his unexpected majority. Manning did not intend to go so far. His courage came with his strength. Proof of this, if any were needed, existed in the fact that the endorsement was in manuscript, while the rest of the platform was read from a printed slip. To define the situation more clearly the committee submitted a unit rule, declaring "that in case any attempt is made to dismember or divide the delegation by contesting the seats of a portion of the delegates, or if delegates countenance such an attempt by assuming to act separately from the majority, or fail to coöperate with such majority, the seats of such delegates shall be deemed to be vacated."[952] Never did convention adopt a more drastic rule. The reading of these ball and chain provisions provoked hisses and widened the chasm between Tilden's convention and John Kelly's side-show.

Kelly's bolt in 1879 had proved his power to destroy; yet to his friends, if not to himself, it must have been deeply humiliating to see the fierce light of public interest turned entirely on Tilden. Kelly also realised the more poignant fact that jealousy, distrust, and accumulated resentment lined the way he had marked out for himself. Nevertheless, he walked on apparently heedless of the signs of conflict. Since the regular Democratic convention would not admit him, he threateningly assembled one of his own in Shakespeare Hall, to be used, if the party did not yield, in knocking at the door of the Cincinnati convention. William Dorsheimer acted as its temporary chairman. Dorsheimer had become a political changeling. Within a decade he had been a Republican, a Liberal, and a Democrat, and it was whispered that he was already tired of being a Kellyite. His appeal for Horatio Seymour indicated his restlessness. The feuds of Tilden and Church and Kernan and Kelly and Robinson had left Seymour the one Democrat who received universal homage from his party, and it became the fashion of Tilden's enemies to refer to the Oneidan as the only one who could unite the party and carry the State. It did not matter to Dorsheimer that Seymour, having retired from active politics in 1868, was placidly meditating at Deerfield, devoted to agricultural and historical interests. Nor did his clamour cease after the bucolic statesman had declared that if he must choose between a funeral and a nomination he would take the first,[953] since the mention of Seymour's name always waked an audience into cheers. Later in the day Amasa J. Parker, on taking the chair as president, artfully made use of the same ruse to arouse interest.

It was not an enthusiastic convention. Many delegates had lost heart. Kelly himself left the train unnoticed, and to some the blue badges, exploiting the purpose of their presence, indicated a fool's errand. In the previous September they had refused to support Robinson, and having defeated him they now returned to the same hall to threaten Tilden with similar treatment. This was their only mission. Humiliation did not possess them, however, until John B. Haskin reported that the regulars refused to recognise their existence. Then John Kelly threw off his muzzle, and with the Celtic-English of a Tammany brave exhibited a violent and revolutionary spirit. "Tilden was elected by the votes of the people," said Kelly, "and he had not sufficient courage after he was elected to go forward, as a brave man should have gone forward, and said to the people of the country, 'I have been elected by the votes of the people, and you see to it that I am inaugurated.' Nothing of the like did Mr. Tilden."[954]

In other words, Kelly thought Tilden an unfit candidate because he did not decide for himself that he had been elected and proceed to take his seat at the cost of a tremendous civil convulsion. Perhaps it was this policy more than Kelly's personality which had begun to alienate Dorsheimer. One who had been brought up in the bosom of culture and conservatism could have little confidence in such a man. The platform, though bitter, avoided this revolutionary sentiment. It protested against the total surrender of the party to one man, who has "cunning" and "unknown resources of wealth," and who "attempts to forestall public opinion, to preoccupy the situation, to overrule the majority, and to force himself upon the party to its ruin." It declared that "Tildenism is personalism, which is false to Democracy and dangerous to the Republic," and it pronounced "Tilden unfit for President" because "his political career has been marked with selfishness, treachery, and dishonour, and his name irretrievably connected with the scandals brought to light by the cipher despatches."[955] Haskin proposed a more compact statement, declaring that "the Democratic party does not want any such money-grabber, railroad wrecker, and paralytic hypocrite at the helm of State."[956]