"This matter of pardons is the most troublesome to me of anything I yet find connected with my troublesome office. The applications will, I think, average from 3 to 5 per day, from the day I took the oath of office. My predecessor left an enormous legacy of undecided cases, and several with promises of pardons after specific periods, which are occasionally falling in, and this has greatly increased my labor.
"I do not intend to exercise this fearful power carelessly, or loosely, and yet I feel daily that I am in danger of doing it. I find that Courts, and Judges, and Jurors, and District Attorneys, sign with some of the facility which attends applications for office, and that the officers of the prison are also sometimes under the influence of the amiable weakness, so that there is no standard by which I can govern my action, and it is probably impossible to avoid occasional impositions.
"I thank you most sincerely for your friendly care, manifested by your note, and will now leave these cases with you, and Mr. O'Sullivan, with whom I had a hasty verbal conversation about them yesterday.
"Will you do me the favor to read this hasty letter to my friend Judge Vanderpoel, and say to him that I should have written it to him, if I had not preferred to trouble you with it, that I thank him most earnestly for his letter to Mr. Van Buren, and have intended to write him daily, since I saw that letter, but have not been able to find the time; and that, while I will hold this as the necessary answer from me to the part of it touching pardons, I will soon write him a satisfactory reply to the personal portions of it, for which I also thank him, as he is one of the last men I would have intentionally wounded by a careless, and what was intended to be a jocose remark.
"I am Very Truly Y'rs,
"Silas Wright."
TILDEN TO J. L. O'SULLIVAN
"Washington, May 31 (Sat.), 2:30 P.M., 1845.
"My Dear O'S.,—At the levee last evening which I attended for the purpose, I made an appointment with the Pres., and am now waiting in the War for the Cabinet to disperse.
"In the afternoon I had seen Ritchie for a few moments, and made an engagement with him. I had a considerable talk with Seth Barton at the levee and with Tom Green at breakfast. All of them introduced the subject of the Collectorship, and all of them especially warned me against imprudence or menace in the interview which they seem to assume I am to have with the Pres.—all tell me he is very sensitive to the idea of compulsion—and that the greatest obstacle we have is the indiscretion of some of us or of those who favor us. They all are exceedingly afraid that they may be thought to be afraid, which shows, I suppose, that they are only calmly conscious of their own courage. But only think of it—such admonitions to me! the very incarnation of Falstaffian valor!
"I replied to Ritchie's caution—which was the first I received; and which was given when I was talking with some decision, with great dignity. I ought to have thanked him for its good intention while I intimated that it was superfluous—I told him that I did not come here to forget what was due to Mr. Polk or what was due to myself; I had no design to obtrude upon the President; I had no personal interest in the question about Van Ness or any solicitude except as it should affect the party and the administration; my only doubt was whether I should seek an interview on the subject; I was willing to state facts, make explanations, expose the whole truth, if the President desired to hear it, respectfully but frankly; the administration was mainly interested in coming to a right decision. We had no idea of hostility to it if it was faithful to our principles—the only question was whether it was to assail us. All we asked of it was to let us alone. Our politics were now in excellent condition. We could take care of the Whigs and Conservatives together if the administration would not systematically embarrass us, and I rather thought we could if it did. But we thought we were entitled to an amnesty from our friends at least while we were so busy with our enemies. The old gentleman seemed greatly mystified, but I promised to explain hereafter.