But it is a duty and a pleasure to say that I am sure both Mr. Bayard and Mr. Thurman voted with perfect honesty and sincerity. Thus it will be seen that the fundamental and controlling question in the three disputed elections before mentioned was not new.
That these decisions of the majority of the commission, recognizing the conclusive authority of the several States in holding elections and determining the result of their choice of Presidential electors, were fully in accordance with the Electoral Act and with the Constitution, is absolutely confirmed by the non-partizan action of Congress itself—at a time when there was no possible party bias or emotion upon the subject—in the passage of the act of February 3, 1887, wherein the very principles controlling the decisions of the majority of the commission were recognized and adopted, and whereby the very substance and almost the very form of the Electoral Act was enacted into law so far as it respected the rights of the States and the proceedings of the two Houses, without the intervention of an Electoral Commission. (See Supplement to the “Revised Statutes of the United States,” 1874–91, page 525.) If the Republican members of the Electoral Commission needed any vindication of their action, I feel sure (though the “Journals” of 1887 are not available in the city where I write) that this act of Congress, passed without party division, gives it completely.
The case of Florida having been thus disposed of, that of Louisiana was sent to the commission on February 12, and was decided upon the same principle governing the Florida case; but it was not finally determined and the vote counted until February 20. From that time until the second day of March, at four o’clock in the afternoon, when the final declaration of the election of Hayes and Wheeler was made, there was a continual and successful effort, growing more and more intense and violent, by the Democratic majority of the House of Representatives to delay final action by the two Houses in counting the whole electoral vote; and in the last case but one the House of Representatives rejected the vote of one of the Vermont electors by a party vote including, I think, that of Mr. Watterson; while the Senate, by a unanimous vote on the yeas and nays, declared that the vote should be counted, which under the law validated the disputed vote. (See “Journal of the House,” and the “Congressional Record.”)
This illustrates the extremities to which the majority of the Democrats in the House went to prevent any final conclusion of the electoral proceedings under the very law that they themselves had almost unanimously voted for. What would have followed had this effort to prevent a regular conclusion of the proceedings been successful it was and is impossible to know. What might have followed was a declaration of a majority of the House that there had been no election at all, after which Mr. Tilden (according to the law in case of failure to elect) could have been elected by the House,—as against the inevitable claim of Mr. Hayes that the returns as made to the president of the Senate in accordance with the requirements of the Constitution, showed that he had been elected President of the United States.
In the then state of public feeling I think there can be little, if any, doubt that an armed collision of the supporters of the respective claimants would have taken place.
Mr. Watterson states that when the election by the people in the various States “ ... came to an end, the result showed on the face of the returns 196” votes for Mr. Tilden “in the Electoral College, 11 more than a majority.” The returns he speaks of must have been the newspaper returns, for, of course, on November 8, 1876, the day after the election, there could have been no official returns of any character in existence excepting, possibly, precinct and district returns of the local votes in some sections. He states that on the evening of the eighth of November Senator Barnum, the financial head of the Democratic National Committee, sent a telegram to “The New York Times” asking for the latest news from Oregon, Louisiana, Florida, and South Carolina, and that from that unlucky telegram sprang all the woes of the Democratic party! The next day, after some telegraphic correspondence with Mr. Tilden—of the contents of which the public never has been informed—Mr. Watterson left Louisville for New Orleans, being joined en route by Mr. Lamar of Mississippi; and they were soon followed by the body of Democrats chosen by Mr. Tilden to go to the “seat of war.” President Grant, having been informed of the Pelton enterprise, appointed a body of Republicans to go there also to ascertain the truth and support a lawful and peaceable course. The names of some or all of these Republicans visiting New Orleans are given in Mr. Watterson’s article and have been already mentioned. His recital of what happened I have already referred to, though the object and purpose is not stated. But he does say, “There was corruption in the air,” and “It was my own belief that the Returning Board was playing for the best price it could get from the Republicans, and that the only effect of any offer to buy on our part would be to assist this scheme of blackmail.”
The last scene in this eventful history mentioned by Mr. Watterson was “the Wormley conference,” as the consequence of what he correctly calls the Democratic “bluff” “filibuster” intended merely to induce the Hayes people to make certain concessions touching some of the Southern States; and he says that “It had the desired effect,” and that, satisfactory assurances having been given, the count proceeded to the end.
I have no personal knowledge whatever of the doings of the so-called conference, and had then no information even of its existence, and have therefore no comment to make upon it except that the filibuster was a “bluff” and would have died in time without issue from very shame of its bluffing actors.
I am glad that Mr. Watterson’s article has appeared at this time, before all the gentlemen, who in one form or another were personally connected with public affairs during the years 1876–77, have passed to the future life. Such as survive may now have an opportunity, if they think it worth while to take it, to defend themselves from accusations stated or implied in his article.