18 



PUBLIC DOCUMENTS. 



of any telegram relating to that subject, nor did I 

 learn the fact that such an offer of the Florida certifi- 

 cates had been made until long after the 6th of De- 

 cember, at which time the certificates were delivered 

 and the electoral votes cast ; and when the informa- 

 tion casually reached me, as of a past event, it was 

 accompanied by the statement that the offer had 

 been ix-jeoted. 



Secondly. As to the publications in the "Tribune" 

 of this morning, purporting to be translations of ci- 

 pher telegrams relating to the canvass of votes in 

 South Carolina in 1876, which I have seen since I 

 wrote the foregoing, I can speak of them no less def- 

 initely and positively. No one of such telegrams, 

 either in cipher or translated, was ever shown to, or 

 its contents made known to me. No offer or negotia- 

 tion in behalf of the State Canvassers of South Caro- 

 lina, or of any of them, or any dealing with any of 

 them in respect to the certificates to the Electors, 

 wus ever authorized or sanctioned in any manner by 

 me, directly or through any other person. 



1 will add that no offer to give the certificates of 

 any returning board or State canvassers of any State 

 to the Democratic Electors in consideration of prom- 

 ises of office, or money, or property no negotiation 

 of that nature in behalf of any member of such board 

 or will) any such member no attempt to influence 

 the action of any such member, or to influence the 

 action of any Elector .of President and Vice-Presi- 

 dent by such motives, was ever entertained, con- 

 sidered, or tolerated by me or by anybody within 

 my influence by my consent, or with my knowl- 

 edge or acquiescence. No such contemplated trans- 

 action could at any time have come within the range 

 of my power, without that power being instantly ex- 

 erted to crusn it out. 



A belief was doubtless current that certificates 

 from the State of Florida, conforming to the actual 

 vote of the people, were in the market. " I have 

 not the slightest doubt in the world," said Mr. Sal- 

 tonstall, who was in Florida at the time, in a recent 

 interview with the "Herald," "that that (Florida) 

 vote could have been boughtj if Mr. Tilden had been 

 dishonorable enough to desire it done, for a great 

 deal less than $50~000 or $20,000." It was known 

 that either one of the two members who composed 

 a maiority of the Florida Board of State Canvassers 

 could control its action and give the certificates to 

 the Democrats. Either one of them could settle the 

 Presidential controversy in favor of the Democratic 

 candidates,who lacked but one vote. 



How accessible to venal inducements they were is 

 shown by the testimony of McLin, the chairman of 

 the Board of State Canvassers, in his examination 

 before the Potter Committee, in June last. He ad- 

 mitted that the true vote or the people of Florida 

 was in favor of the Democratic Electors, and that the 

 fact even appeared on the face of the county returns, 

 including among them the true return from Baker 

 County, notwithstanding the great frauds against the 

 Democrats in some of the county returns. He also 

 confessed that in voting to give the certificates to 

 the Republican Electors he acted under the influence 

 of promises that he should be rewarded in case " Mr. 

 Hayes became President" ; adding that " certainly 

 these promises must have had a strong control over 

 my judgment and action." After the certificates of 

 the Louisiana Returning Board had been repeatedly 

 >!F3rcd to Mr. Hewitt and others for money, they 

 were pwen in favor of the Republican Electors who 

 had been rejected by a large majority of the voters, 

 he members ot this Returning Board now pos- 

 sess the most important Federal offices in that State. 



The pregnant fact always remains that none of the 

 corrupt boards (rave their certificates to the Demo- 



ntic Electors, but they all gave them to the Repub- 

 lican Electors. 



I had a perfectly fixed purpose, from which I never 

 deviated in word or act, a purpose which was known 

 to or assumed by all with whom I was in habitual 

 communication. If the Presidency of the United 

 States was to be disposed of by certificates to be 

 won from corrupt returning boards, by any form of 

 venal inducements, whether of offices or money, I 

 was resolved to take no part in the shameful compe- 

 tition, and 1 took none. 



The main interest of the victory which resulted in 

 my election was the expectation that through the 

 chief magistracy a system of reforms, similar to that 

 which had been accomplished in our metropolis and 

 in our State administration, would be achieved in 

 the Federal Government. For this object it was 

 necessary that I should be untrammeled by any com- 

 mitment in the choice of men to execute the official 

 trusts of the Government, and untrammeled by any 

 obligations to special interests. I had been nom- 

 inated and I was elected without one limitation of 

 my perfect independence. To have surrendered or 

 compromised the advantages of this position by a 

 degrading competition tor returning-board certifi- 

 cates would have been to abandon all that made vic- 

 tory desirable everything which could have sus- 

 tained me in the larger struggle that victory would 

 have imposed upon me. I was resolved to go into 

 the Presidential chair in full command of all my re- 

 sources for usefulness, or not at all. 



While thus abstaining from an ignominious com- 

 petition for such certificates, I saw these certificates 

 obtained for the Republican Electors who had not 

 been chosen by the people, and denied to the Demo- 

 cratic Electors who had been chosen by the people. 

 These false and fraudulent certificates, now con- 

 fessed and proved to have been obtained by corrupt 

 inducements, were afterward made the pretexts for 

 taking from the people their rightful choice for the 

 Presidency and Vice-Presidency. 



These certificates were declared, by the tribunal to 

 which Congress had abdicated the function of decid- 

 ing the count of disputed electoral votes, to be the 

 absolute and indisputable conveyance of title to the 

 chief magistracy of the nation. 



The State of Florida, which had united all her ex- 

 ecutive, legislative, and judicial powers to testify to 

 Congress, long before the count, who were her genu- 

 ine agents, which had, by statute, caused a recan- 

 vass, the issue of new certificates, and a formal sov- 

 ereign authentication of the right of the true Elec- 

 tors to deposit the votes entitled to be counted, was 

 held to be incapable of communicating to Congress 

 a fact which everybody then knew, and which can 

 not now be disputed. 



Congress, though vested by the Constitution with 

 the authority to count the electoral votes, though 

 unrestricted either as to the time when it should re- 

 ceive evidence or as to the nature of that evidence, 

 and though subject to no appeal from its decision, 

 was declared to have no power to guide its own count 

 by any information it could obtain, or by any author- 

 ity which it might accept from the wronged and be- 

 trayed State whose vote was about to be falsified. 

 The monstrous conclusion was thus reached that the 

 act of one man holding the deciding vote in a board 

 of state canvassers (for without his concurrence the 

 frauds ^of the other returning boards would have 

 failed) in giving certificates known at the time, and 

 now by himself confessed, to be false and fraudulent, 

 and confessed to have been obtained by the promise 

 of office certificates whose character was known 

 months before Congress could begin the count must 

 prevail over all the remedial powers of the State of 

 Florida and of the Congress of the United States 

 combined, and must dispose of the chief magistracy 

 of this Republic. S. J. TILDEN. 



NEW YOKE, October 16, 18T8: 



