The Life and Work of James A. Garfield, Twentieth President of the United States / Embracing an Account of the Scenes and Incidents of His Boyhood; the Struggles of His Youth; the Might of His Early Manhood; His Valor As a Soldier; His Career As a Statesman; His Election to the Presidency; and the Tragic Story of His Death.

by John Clark Ridpath

The learning, the philosophic and advanced views, the masterly grouping of social phenomena throughout this speech are absolutely novel and unique in the wilderness of Congressional oratory. After all the wealth of industry and thought expended on the subject, the bill failed to pass the Senate, so that the ninth census had to be taken under the old law. The body of the bill, however, eventually became the law under which the unequaled census of 1880 was taken.

As we advance through the multitude of General Garfield’s congressional speeches, selecting here and there some typical extract, his report on “Black Friday” attracts attention. Every one remembers the gold panic of September 24, 1869. It was the greatest financial conspiracy known to history. Wall Street, the scene of innumerable frauds, snares, conspiracies, and panics, never saw any thing to compare with the historic “Black Friday.” The House of Representatives appointed the Committee of Banking and Currency of which General Garfield had been made chairman at the opening of the Forty-First Congress, to investigate the causes of that financial convulsion. He went to New York, incog., managed to get into the private room of the Gold Board, where the matter was undergoing a secret investigation. Here General Garfield made notes, and got his clue. When he could stay no longer, he left a clever substitute. Each witness was attached as he left the building and hurried down to Washington before he could be primed. General Garfield’s examination of the witnesses was adroit and successful. The taciturn and self-poised Gould, the wily and exuberant Jim Fisk, alike were compelled to lay open the full details of the scheme. General Garfield’s report, made March 1,1870, goes to the bottom of this the darkest conspiracy ever planned. It reads like a novel, and contains the material for a whole library of fiction. Some idea of the foul plot may be had from the following summary and extracts:

BLACK FRIDAY.

“On the first of September, 1868, the price of gold was one hundred and forty-five. During the autumn and winter it continued to decline, interrupted only by occasional fluctuations, till in March, 1869, it touched one hundred and thirty and one-fourth (its lowest point for three years), and continued near that rate until the middle of April, the earliest period to which the evidence taken by the committee refers. At that time, Mr. Jay Gould, president of the Erie Railroad Company, bought seven millions of gold, and put up the price from one hundred and thirty-two to one hundred and forty. Other brokers followed his example, and by the twentieth of May had put up the price to one hundred and forty-four and seven-eighths, from which point, in spite of speculation, it continued to decline, and on the last day of July stood at one hundred and thirty-six.

“The first indication of a concerted movement on the part of those who were prominent in the panic of September was an effort to secure the appointment of some person who should be subservient to their schemes, as Assistant Treasurer at New York, in place of Mr. H. H. Van Dyck, who resigned in the month of June. In this effort Mr. Gould and Mr. A. R. Corbin, a brother-in-law of President Grant, appear to have been closely and intimately connected. If the testimony of the witnesses is to be believed, Mr. Corbin suggested the name of his stepson-in-law, Robert B. Catherwood, and Mr. Gould joined in the suggestion.

“On what grounds Mr. Catherwood declined to be a candidate does not appear. The parties next turned their attention to General Butterfield, and, both before and after his appointment, claimed to be his supporters. Gould and Catherwood testify that Corbin claimed to have secured the appointment, though Corbin swears that he made no recommendation in the case. General Butterfield was appointed Assistant Treasurer, and entered upon the duties of that office on the first of July. It is, however, proper to state that the committee has no evidence that General Butterfield was in any way cognizant of the corrupt schemes which led the conspirators to desire his appointment, nor that their recommendations had any weight in securing it. In addition to these efforts, the conspirators resolved to discover, if possible, the purposes of the President and the Secretary of the Treasury in regard to the sales of gold. The first attempt in this direction, as exhibited in the evidence, was made on the 15th of June, when the President was on board one of Messrs. Fisk and Gould’s Fall River steamers, on his way to Boston. At nine o’clock in the evening, supper was served on board, and the presence at the table of such men as Cyrus W. Field, with several leading citizens of New York and Boston, was sufficient to prevent any suspicion that this occasion was to be used for the benefit of private speculation; but the testimony of Fisk and Gould indicates clearly the purpose they had in view. Fisk says:

“‘On our passage over to Boston with General Grant, we endeavored to ascertain what his position in regard to finances was. We went down to supper about nine o’clock, intending, while we were there, to have this thing pretty thoroughly talked up, and, if possible, to relieve him from any idea of putting the price of gold down.’”

“Mr. Gould’s account is as follows:

“‘At this supper the question came up about the state of the country, the crops, prospects ahead, etc. The President was a listener; the other gentlemen were discussing; some were in favor of Boutwell’s selling gold, and some opposed to it. After they had all interchanged views, some one asked the President what his view was. He remarked that he thought there was a certain amount of fictitiousness about the prosperity of the country, and that the bubble might as well be tapped in one way as another. We supposed, from that conversation, that the President was a contractionist. His remark struck across us like a wet blanket.’

“It appears that these skillfully-contrived efforts elicited from the President but one remark, and this opened a gloomy prospect for the speculators. Upon their return to New York, Fisk and Gould determined to bring a great pressure upon the administration, to prevent, if possible, a further decline in gold, which would certainly interfere with their purposes of speculation. This was to be effected by facts and arguments presented in the name of the country and its business interests; and a financial theory was agreed upon, which, on its face, would appeal to the business interests of the country, and enlist in its support many patriotic citizens, but would, if adopted, incidentally enable the conspirators to make their speculations eminently successful. That theory was, that the business interests of the country required an advance in the price of gold; that, in order to move the fall crops and secure the foreign market for our grain, it was necessary that gold should be put up to 145. According to Mr. Jay Gould, this theory, for the benefit of American trade and commerce, was suggested by Mr. James McHenry, a prominent English financier, who furnished Mr. Gould the data with which to advocate it.”