Volume III Part 30 (1/2)
To the surprise of Tammany, Havermeyer was elected mayor by over 8,000 plurality, although Greeley carried the city by 23,000 majority.[1415]
A comparison of the vote with that cast for Seymour in 1868 showed that a marked percentage of Democrats refused to support Greeley, and that a larger percentage did not vote at all.[1416] Other slights added to his disappointment. ”I was an Abolitionist for years,” he said, ”when to be one was as much as one's life was worth even here in New York, and the negroes have all voted against me. Whatever of talents and energy I have possessed, I have freely contributed all my life long to Protection; to the cause of our manufactures. And the manufacturers have expended millions to defeat me. I even made myself ridiculous in the opinion of many whose good wishes I desired, by showing fair play and giving a fair field in the _Tribune_ to Woman's Rights; and the women have all gone against me.”[1417]
[Footnote 1413: After the North Carolina election would-be Liberals rejoined the Republican party in great numbers.]
[Footnote 1414: Grant, 440,759; Greeley, 387,279; majority, 53,480.
Dix, 447,801; Kernan, 392,350; majority, 55,451. Robinson, 442,297; Depew, 397,754; majority, 44,543. Tremaine, 438,456; c.o.x, 400,697; majority, 37,759.]
[Footnote 1415: Havermeyer, 53,806; Lawrence, 45,398; O'Brien, 31,121.]
[Footnote 1416: Seymour (1868), 429,883. Greeley (1872), 387,279.
Kernan (1872), 392,350. c.o.x (1872), 400,697.]
[Footnote 1417: George W. Julian, _Political Recollections_, p. 348.]
Before the vote of the State was officially canva.s.sed Greeley had gone to his rest.[1418] The campaign had overtaxed his strength, and upon his return from the western speaking tour he watched at the bedside of his wife until her decease on October 30. After the election he resumed editorial charge of the _Tribune_, which he formally relinquished on the 15th of the preceding May, but it was plain that the robust animal spirits which characterised his former days were gone.[1419] The loss of his wife, the mortification of defeat, the financial embarra.s.sment of his paper, and the exhaustion of his physical powers had broken him. The announcement of his death, however, although the public got an early intimation of the cruel work which his troubles were making upon a frame that once seemed to be of iron, came with the shock of sudden calamity. The whole country recognised that in the field of his real conquests the most remarkable man in American history had fallen, and it buried him with the appreciation that attends a conqueror. At the funeral President Grant, Vice-President Colfax, and the Vice-President-elect, Henry Wilson, rode in the same carriage.[1420]
[Footnote 1418: He died November 29, 1872.]
[Footnote 1419: ”In the darkest hour my suffering wife left me, none too soon for she had suffered too deeply and too long. I laid her in the ground with hard dry eyes. Well, I am used up. I cannot see before me. I have slept little for weeks and my eyes are still hard to close, while they soon open again.” Letter to his friend, Mason W. Tappan of New Hamps.h.i.+re.--Hollister's _Life of Colfax_, p. 387, note.]
[Footnote 1420: New York _Tribune_, December 5, 1872.]
CHAPTER XXIV
TILDEN DESTROYS HIS OPPONENTS
1873-4
The Legislature which convened January 6, 1873, re-elected Roscoe Conkling to the United States Senate. There was no delay and no opposition. Cornell was in the watch-tower as speaker of the a.s.sembly and other lieutenants kept guard in the lobbies.[1421] The Republican caucus nominated on the 8th and the election occurred on the 21st.[1422] A few months later (November 8) the President, in complimentary and generous terms, offered Conkling the place made vacant by the death of Chief Justice Chase (May 7). His industry and legal training admirably fitted him for the position, but for reasons not specified he declined the distinguished preferment just as he had refused in December, 1870, the offer of a law partners.h.i.+p with an annual compensation of fifty thousand dollars. Probably the suggestion that he become a presidential candidate influenced his decision, especially as the President favoured his succession.[1423]
[Footnote 1421: Cornell resigned as surveyor of the port and was elected to the a.s.sembly.]
[Footnote 1422: The Democrats voted for Charles Wheaton of Dutchess, distinguished locally as a county judge.]
[Footnote 1423: Alfred R. Conkling, _Life of Conkling_, p. 451.]
At this time Conkling, then forty-four years old, may be said to have reached the height of his power, if not of his fame. His opponents were under his feet. Greeley was dead, Fenton's long and successful career had closed in the gloom of defeat and the permanent eclipse of his influence in public affairs, and others were weakened if not destroyed by their party desertion. Moreover, the re-election of a President whom he had supported and defended with an opulent vocabulary that made his studied addresses models of speech, continued his political control. About half a dozen able lieutenants, holding fat offices in the great patronage centres, revolved with the fidelity of planets, while in every custom-house and federal office in the State trained politicians performed the function of satellites. To harness the party more securely hundreds of young men, selected from the various counties because of their partisan zeal, filled the great departments at Was.h.i.+ngton. ”In obedience to this system,” said George William Curtis, ”the whole machinery of the government is pulled to pieces every four years. Political caucuses, primary meetings, and conventions are controlled by the promise and expectation of patronage. Political candidates for the lowest or highest positions are directly or indirectly pledged. The pledge is the price of the nomination, and when the election is determined, the pledges must be redeemed. The business of the nation, the legislation of Congress, the duties of the departments, are all subordinated to the distribution of what is well called spoils.”[1424]
[Footnote 1424: Report of Civil Service Commission, 1871, p. 18.]
President Grant is quoted as declaring that the Senator never sought an appointment from him.[1425] This statement is probably true, but not on the theory of the Latin maxim, _Qui facit per alium, facit per se_.[1426] No occasion existed for him to make requests since his agents, well known to the President, cabinet, and collectors, could obtain the necessary appointments without the Senator's partic.i.p.ation or even knowledge. Nevertheless, he relied upon public patronage as an instrument of party and factional success, and uniformly employed it throughout his career. The princ.i.p.al objection of the independent press to his appointment as chief justice implied his devotion to practical politics and an absence of the quality of true statesmans.h.i.+p.[1427] Indeed, in spite of his transcendent gifts, his hold upon party and people was never stronger than the machine's, since the influence of his control tended to transform political action into such subserviency that men of spirit, though loving their party, frequently held aloof from its service.
[Footnote 1425: Conkling, _Life of Conkling_, p. 656.]
[Footnote 1426: ”He who does a thing by the agency of another, does it himself.”]
[Footnote 1427: The _Nation_, December 4, 1873.]
But Conkling used only the methods inherited with his leaders.h.i.+p, and to all appearances the grasp of the Republican party in New York in January, 1873, was as firm as the most ardent partisan could desire.