USA > New York > History of the state of New York, political and governmental, Vol. VI > Part 18
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"1. The false issue with which they would enkindle sectarian strife in respect to the public schools, of which the establishment and support belong exclusively to the several States, and which the Democratic party has cherished from their foundation and is resolved to maintain without partiality or preference for any class, sect, or creed, and without contributions from the treasury to any.
"2. The false issue by which they seek to light anew the dying embers of sectional hate between kindred people once estranged, but now reunited in one indivisible republic and a common destiny.
"Reform is necessary in the civil service. Experience proves that efficient, economical conduct of the government is not possible if its civil service be subject to change at every election, be a prize fought for at the ballot-box, be an approved reward of party zeal instead of posts of honor assigned for proved competency and held for fidelity in the public employ; that the dispensing of patronage should
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neither be a tax upon the time of all our public men nor the instru- ment of their ambition. Here again professions falsified in the per- formance attest that the party in power can work out no practical or salutary reform.
"Reform is necessary even more in the higher grades of the public service. President, Vice-President, Judges, Senators, Representa- tives, cabinet officers,-these and all others in authority are the peo- ple's servants. These offices are not a private perquisite; they are a public trust.
"When the annals of this republic show the disgrace and censure of a Vice-President; a late Speaker of the House of Representatives marketing his rulings as a presiding officer; three Senators profiting secretly by their votes as law-makers; five chairmen of the leading committees of the late House of Representatives exposed in jobbery ; a late Secretary of the Treasury forcing balances in the public accounts; a late Attorney-General misappropriating public funds; a Secretary of the Navy enriched and enriching friends by percentages levied off the profits of contractors with his department; an Ambas- sador to England censured in a dishonorable speculation; the Presi- dent's private secretary barely escaping conviction upon trial for guilty complicity in frauds upon the revenue; a Secretary of War impeached for high crimes and misdemeanors-the demonstration, is complete that the first step in reform must be the people's choice of honest men from another party, lest the disease of one political organization infect the body politic, and lest by making no change of men or parties we get no change of measures and no real reform.
"All these abuses, wrongs, and crimes, the product of sixteen years' ascendancy of the Republican party, create a necessity for reform confessed by Republicans themselves; but their reformers are voted down in convention and displaced from the cabinet. The party's mass of honest voters is powerless to resist the 80,000 office- holders, its leaders and guides.
"Reform can only be had by a peaceful civic revolution. We demand a change of system, a change of administration, a change of party, that we may have a change of measures and of men.
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"Resolved, That this convention, representing the Democratic party of the States, do cordially endorse the action of the present House of Representatives in reducing and curtailing the expenses of the Federal government, in cutting down enormous salaries, extrava- gant appropriations, and in abolishing useless offices and places not required by the public necessities; and we shall trust to the firmness of the Democratic members of the House that no committee of conference and no misinterpretation of the rules will be allowed to defeat these wholesome measures of economy demanded by the country.
"Resolved, That the soldiers and sailors of the republic, and the widows and orphans of those who have fallen in battle, have a just claim upon the care, protection, and gratitude of their fellow- citizens."
The platform declaration on the subject of resump- tion of specie payments which, while objecting to the stipulation made in the act of 1875 that resumption should occur on January 1, 1879, favored preparation for resumption, was strongly opposed by the "soft money" delegates under the leadership of General Thomas Ewing, of Ohio. A minority report opposing the whole program of resumption was submitted to the convention ; defeated by 515 to 219.
Other Parties
Independent Party, popularly known as Greenback Party .- Convention held at Indianapolis, May 17-18, 1876. For President, Peter Cooper, of New York; for Vice-President, Samuel F. Cary, of Ohio. The platform demanded repeal of the Resumption act and the issuance of full legal-tender government notes (greenbacks), convertible on demand into "United States obligations" bearing interest at 3.65 per cent.
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Prohibition Party .- Convention held in Cleveland, May 17, 1876. For President, Green Clay Smith, of Kentucky; for Vice-President, Gideon T. Stewart, of Ohio.
American Party, known as the American Alliance. -For President, James B. Walker, of Illinois; for Vice-President, Donald Kirkpatrick, of New York. The platform advocated the observance of religious ideas in government, the Bible in the schools, prohibi- tion, woman suffrage, refusal of charters to secret societies, etc.
The Election
Electoral vote for President and Vice-President, as determined by the Electoral commission :
Rutherford B. Hayes and William A. Wheeler, Republicans :- California, 6; Colorado, 3; Florida, 4; Illinois, 21; Iowa, 11; Kan- sas, 5; Louisiana, 8; Maine, 7; Massachusetts, 13; Michigan, 11; Minnesota, 5; Nebraska, 3; Nevada, 3; New Hampshire, 5; Ohio, 22; Oregon, 3; Pennsylvania, 29; Rhode Island, 4; South Carolina, 7 ; Vermont, 5; Wisconsin, 10. Total, 185. Elected.
Samuel J. Tilden and Thomas A. Hendricks, Democrats :- Ala- bama, 10; Arkansas, 6; Connecticut, 6; Delaware, 3; Georgia, 11; Indiana, 15; Kentucky, 12; Maryland, 8; Mississippi, 8; Missouri, 15; New Jersey, 9; New York, 35; North Carolina, 10; Tennessee, 12; Texas, 8; Virginia, 11; West Virginia, 5. Total, 184.
Popular vote :
Tilden, 4,284,757; Hayes, 4,033,950; Cooper, 81,740; Smith, 9,522 ; Walker, 2,636.
1880 Republican Party
Convention held in Chicago, June 2-8, 1880; tem- porary and permanent chairman, George F. Hoar, of Massachusetts. At this convention occurred the cele- brated struggle again to nominate General Grant for the Presidency, the Grant forces being led by Roscoe Conkling, of New York, against the strenuous opposi- tion of the supporters of James G. Blaine, of Maine; John Sherman, of Ohio; George F. Edmunds, of Ver- mont; Elihu B. Washburne, of Illinois; and William Windom, of Minnesota. Four days were consumed in deciding contests for seats, adopting the rules and plat- form, and placing the candidates in nomination. Efforts to enable the State delegations to enforce a unit rule were defeated, and in the balloting every delegate was permitted to vote according to his preference.
First ballot for President :- Grant, 304; Blaine, 284; Sherman, 93; Edmunds, 34; Washburne, 30; Windom, 10. Thirty-six ballots proved necessary for a choice. On every ballot until the last Grant led, his vote never falling below 302 or going above 313. James A. Gar- field, the head of the Ohio delegation and in charge of Sherman's interests, received one vote on the second ballot; and on many of the subsequent ballots until the
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thirty-fourth was called he was voted for, though at no time having more than two supporters. The thirty- fourth ballot showed 17 votes for him (which were recorded against his protest), and the thirty-fifth 50; he was nominated on the thirty-sixth by the following vote: Garfield, 399; Grant, 306; Blaine, 42; Wash- burne, 5; Sherman, 3.
The Vice-Presidential nomination went to Chester A. Arthur, of New York, who on the first ballot had 468 against 283 for eight others.
Platform :
"The Republican party, in national convention assembled, at the end of twenty years since the Federal government was first committed to its charge, submits to the people of the United States this brief report of its administration :
"It suppressed a rebellion which had armed nearly a million of men to subvert the national authority; it reconstructed the Union of the States with freedom instead of slavery as its corner-stone; it transformed 4,000,000 human beings from the likeness of things to the rank of citizens; it relieved Congress from the infamous work of hunting fugitive slaves, and charged it to see that slavery does not exist.
"It has raised the value of our paper currency from 38 per cent. to the par of gold ; it has restored upon a solid basis payment in coin of all national obligations, and has given us a currency absolutely good and equal in every part of our extended country; it has lifted the credit of the nation from the point of where 6 per cent. bonds sold at 86 to that where 4 per cent. bonds are eagerly sought at a premium.
"Under its administration railways have increased from 31,000 miles in 1860 to more than 82,000 miles in 1879.
"Our foreign trade increased from $700,000,000 to $1,115,000,- 000 in the same time, and our exports, which were $20,000,000 less than our imports in 1860, were $265,000,000 more than our imports in 1879.
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"Without resorting to loans, it has since the war closed defrayed the ordinary expenses of government besides the accruing interest of the public debt, and has disbursed annually more than $30,000,000 for soldiers' and sailors' pensions. It has paid $880,000,000 of the public debt, and, by refunding the balance at lower rates, has reduced the annual interest charge from nearly $150,000,000 to less than $89,000,000.
"All the industries of the country have revived, labor is in demand, wages have increased, and throughout the entire country there is evi- dence of a coming prosperity greater than we have ever enjoyed.
"Upon this record the Republican party asks for the continued confidence and support of the people, and this convention submits for their approval the following statement of the principles and purposes which will continue to guide and inspire its efforts :
"1. We affirm that the work of the Republican party for the last twenty-one years has been such as to commend it to the favor of the nation; that the fruits of the costly victories which we have achieved through immense difficulties should be preserved; that the peace re- gained should be cherished; that the Union should be perpetuated, and that the liberty secured to this generation should be transmitted undiminished to other generations; that the order established and the credit acquired should never be impaired ; that the pensions promised should be paid; that the debt, so much reduced, should be extin- guished by the full payment of every dollar thereof; that the reviv- ing industries should be further promoted, and that the commerce already increasing should be steadily encouraged.
"2. The Constitution of the United States is a supreme law, and not a mere contract. Out of confederated States it made a sovereign nation. Some powers are denied to the nation, while others are denied to the States; but the boundary between the powers delegated and those reserved is to be determined by the national and not by the State tribunal.
"3. The work of popular education is one left to the care of the several States, but it is the duty of the national government to aid that work to the extent of its constitutional power. The intelligence of the nation is but the aggregate of the intelligence in the several
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States, and the destiny of the nation must be guided not by the genius of any one State but by the aggregated genius of all.
"4. The Constitution wisely forbids Congress to make any law respecting the establishment of religion, but it is idle to hope that the nation can be protected against the influence of secret sectarianism while each State is exposed to its domination. We therefore recom- mend that the Constitution be so amended as to lay the same prohi- bition upon the Legislature of each State, and to forbid the appro- priation of public funds to the support of sectarian schools.
"5. We affirm the belief avowed in 1876, that the duties levied for the purpose of revenue should so discriminate as to favor Ameri- can labor; that no further grants of the public domain should be made to any railway or other corporation; that, slavery having per- ished in the States, its twin barbarity, polygamy, must die in the Territories; that everywhere the protection accorded to a citizen of American birth must be secured to citizens by American adoption ; that we deem it the duty of Congress to develop and improve our seacoast and harbors, but insist that further subsidies to private per- sons or corporations must cease; that the obligations of the republic to the men who preserved its integrity in the day of battle are undi- minished by the lapse of the fifteen years since their final victory-to do them honor is and shall forever be the grateful privilege and sacred duty of the American people.
"6. Since the authority to regulate immigration and intercourse between the United States and foreign nations rests with the Con- gress of the United States and the treaty-making power, the Republi- can party, regarding the unrestricted immigration of the Chinese as a matter of grave concernment, under the exercise of both these pow- ers would limit and restrict that immigration by the enactment of such just, humane, and reasonable laws and treaties as will produce that result.
"7. That the purity and patriotism which characterized the earlier career of Rutherford B. Hayes in peace and war, and which guided the thoughts of our immediate predecessors to him for a Presi- dential candidate, have continued to inspire him in his career as Chief- Executive; and that history will accord to his administration the
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honors which are due to an efficient, just, and courteous discharge of the public business, and will honor his vetoes interposed between the people and attempted partisan laws.
"8. We charge upon the Democratic party the habitual sacrifice of patriotism and justice to a supreme and insatiable lust for office and patronage; that to obtain possession of the national government and control of place, they have obstructed all efforts to promote the purity and to conserve the freedom of the suffrage, and have devised fraudulent ballots and invented fraudulent certifications of returns ; have labored to unseat lawfully elected members of Congress to secure at all hazards the vote of a majority of the States in the House of Representatives; have endeavored to occupy by force and fraud the places of trust given to others by the people of Maine, rescued by the courage and actions of Maine's patriotic sons; have, by methods vicious in principle and tyrannical in practice, attached partisan legislation to appropriation bills upon whose passage the very movement of the government depended; have crushed the rights of the individual ; have advocated the principles and sought the favor of the rebellion against the nation, and have endeavored to obliterate the sacred memories of the war and to overcome its inestimably valuable results of nationality, personal freedom, and individual equality.
"The equal, steady, and complete enforcement of laws and the protection of all our citizens in the enjoyment of all the privileges and immunities guaranteed by the Constitution, are the first duties of the nation.
"The dangers of a 'Solid South' can only be averted by a faithful performance of every promise which the nation has made to the citizen. The execution of the laws, and the punishment of all those who violate them, are the only safe methods by which an enduring peace can be secured and genuine prosperity established throughout the south. Whatever promises the nation makes the nation must perform. A nation cannot safely relegate this duty to the States. The 'Solid South' must be divided by the peaceful agencies of the ballot, and all honest opinions must there find free expression. To
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this end the honest voter must be protected against terrorism, vio- lence, or fraud.
"And we affirm it to be the duty and the purpose of the Repub- lican party to use all legitimate means to restore all the States of this Union to the most perfect harmony that may be possible; and we submit to the practical, sensible people of these United States to say whether it would not be dangerous to the dearest interests of our country at this time to surrender the administration of the national government to a party which seeks to overthrow the existing policy under which we are so prosperous, and thus bring distrust and con- fusion where there is now order, confidence, and hope.
"9. The Republican party, adhering to the principle affirmed by its last national convention of respect for the constitutional rules governing appointments to office, adopts the declaration of President Hayes that the reform of the civil service should be thorough, radi- cal, and complete. To that end it demands the cooperation of the legislative with the executive departments of the government, and that Congress shall so legislate that fitness, ascertained by proper practical tests, shall admit to the public service."
Democratic Party
Convention held in Cincinnati, June 22-24, 1880; temporary chairman, George Hoadly, of Ohio; perma- nent chairman, John W. Stevenson, of Kentucky.
The leading candidates for the Presidential nomina- tion were General Winfield S. Hancock, of Pennsylva- nia, and Thomas F. Bayard, of Delaware. On the first ballot General Hancock received 171 votes and Bayard 1531/2. Hancock was nominated on the second ballot, which, after changes had been made in his favor, showed 705 for him and 33 for three others. Other candidates voted for on the two ballots were Henry B. Payne and Allen G. Thurman, of Ohio; Stephen J.
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Field, of California; William R. Morrison, of Illinois ; Thomas A. Hendricks, of Indiana; Samuel J. Tilden and Horatio Seymour, of New York; and Samuel J. Randall, of Pennsylvania.
For Vice-President William H. English, of Indiana, was nominated by acclamation.
Platform :
"The Democrats of the United States, in convention assembled, declare :-
"1. We pledge ourselves anew to the constitutional doctrines and traditions of the Democratic party, as illustrated by the teach- ings and example of a long line of Democratic statesmen and patriots, and embodied in the platform of the last national convention of the party.
"2. Opposition to centralization and to that dangerous spirit of encroachment which tends to consolidate the powers of all the de- partments in one, and thus to create, whatever be the form of gov- ernment, a real despotism. No sumptuary laws; separation of church and state, for the good of each; common schools fostered and protected.
"3. Home rule; honest money-consisting of gold and silver, and paper convertible into coin on demand; the strict maintenance of the public faith, State and national ; and a tariff for revenue only.
"4. The subordination of the military to the civil power, and a genuine and thorough reform of the civil service.
"5. The right to a free ballot is a right preservative of all rights, and must and shall be maintained in every part of the United States.
"6. The existing administration is the representative of conspir- acy only, and its claim of right to surround the ballot-boxes with troops and Deputy Marshals to intimidate and obstruct the electors, and the unprecedented use of the veto to maintain its corrupt and despotic power, insult the people and imperil their institutions.
"7. We execrate the course of this administration in making places in the civil service a reward for political crime, and demand
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a reform by statute which shall make it forever impossible for the defeated candidate to bribe his way to the seat of a usurper by billeting villains upon the people.
"8. The great fraud of 1876-77, by which, upon a false count of the Electoral votes of two States, the candidate defeated at the polls was declared to be President, and, for the first time in Ameri- can history, the will of the people was set aside under a threat of military violence, struck a deadly blow at our system of representa- tive government; the Democratic party, to preserve the country from the horrors of a civil war, submitted for the time in firm and patri- otic faith that the people would punish this crime in 1880. This issue precedes and dwarfs every other : it imposes a more sacred duty upon the people of the Union than ever addressed the conscience of a nation of freemen.
"9. The resolution of Samuel J. Tilden not again to be a candi- date for the exalted place to which he was elected by a majority of his countrymen, and from which he was excluded by the leaders of the Republican party, is received by the Democrats of the United States with deep sensibility, and they declare their confidence in his wisdom, patriotism, and integrity, unshaken by the assaults of the common enemy; and they further assure him that he is followed into the retirement he has chosen for himself by the sympathy and respect of his fellow-citizens, who regard him as one who, by elevat- ing the standard of public morality and adorning and purifying the public service, merits the lasting gratitude of his country and his party.
"10. Free ships and a living chance for American commerce on the seas and on the land. No discrimination in favor of transpor- tation lines, corporations, or monopolies.
"11. Amendment of the Burlingame treaty. No more Chinese immigration, except for travel, education, and foreign commerce, and even that carefully guarded.
"12. Public money and public credit for public purposes solely, and public land for actual settlers.
"13. The Democratic party is the friend of labor and the labor-
JAMES BUCHANAN
James Buchanan, 15th president; born at Cove Gap, Pa., April 23, 1791; lawyer; member of state legislature, 1814-15; of congress, March 4, 1821 to March 3, 1831; minister to Russia, 1832-34; United States senator, 1834-45; secretary of state under Polk, 1845-49; minister to Great Britain, 1853-56; president of United States, 1857-61; died at Lancaster, Pa., June 1, 1868.
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ing man, and pledges itself to protect him alike against the cormor- ants and the commune.
"14. We congratulate the country upon the honesty and thrift of a Democratic Congress which has reduced the public expenditure $40,000,000 a year; upon the continuation of prosperity at home and the national honor abroad; and, above all, upon the promise of such a change in the administration of the government as shall insure us genuine and lasting reform in every department of the public service."
Other Parties
Greenback Party .- Convention held in Chicago, June 9-11, 1880. For President, James B. Weaver, of Iowa; for Vice-President, B. J. Chambers, of Texas.
Prohibition Party .- Convention held in Cleveland, June 17, 1880. For President, Neal Dow, of Maine; for Vice-President, A. M. Thompson, of Ohio.
The Election
Electoral votes for President and Vice-President :
James A. Garfield and Chester A. Arthur, Republicans :- Cali- fornia, 1; Colorado, 3; Connecticut, 6; Illinois, 21; Indiana, 15; Iowa, 11; Kansas, 5; Maine, 7; Massachusetts, 13; Michigan, 11; Minnesota, 5; Nebraska, 3; New Hampshire, 5; New York, 35; Ohio, 22; Oregon, 3; Pennsylvania, 29; Rhode Island, 4; Vermont, 5; Wisconsin, 10. Total, 214. Elected.
Winfield S. Hancock and William H. English, Democrats :- Alabama, 10; Arkansas, 6; California, 5; Delaware, 3; Florida, 4; Georgia, 11; Kentucky, 12; Louisiana, 8; Maryland, 8; Mississippi, 8; Missouri, 15; Nevada, 3; New Jersey, 9; North Carolina, 10; South Carolina, 7; Tennessee, 12; Texas, 8; Virginia, 11; West Virginia, 5. Total, 155.
Popular vote :
Garfield, 4,449,053; Hancock, 4,442,035; Weaver, 307,426; Dow, 12,576.
1884 Republican Party
Convention held in Chicago, June 3-6. The na- tional committee designated Powell Clayton, of Arkan- sas, as temporary chairman, but the convention chose in his stead John R. Lynch (colored), of Mississippi. Permanent chairman, John B. Henderson, of Missouri. An animated discussion arose on the question of estab- lishing for future national conventions a new basis of Congressional district representation, the following rule being proposed: "Each Congressional district shall be entitled to one delegate, and an additional dele- gate for every 10,000 votes, or majority fraction thereof, cast for the Republican ticket at the last pre- ceding Presidential election." This was intended to reduce the representation from the south. Owing to the united opposition of the southern delegates to the resolution on the subject, it was withdrawn without a vote being taken.
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