Democratic Sentinel, Volume 2, Number 23, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 July 1878 — Slippery Sherman. [ARTICLE]

Slippery Sherman.

We print below the concluding portion of Congressman Potter’s last letter to John Sherman: Ab to the testimony of intimidation in the parishes of East and West Feliciana propo-ed, in neither of these parishes did the election officers make any protests with the returns, and, as received by the Returning Board, the returns of the election of 1876 in those parishes stood absolutely without objection. Afterward Anderson, as Supervisor of East, and Weber as Supervisor of West Feliciana, undertook to furnish protests upon which the Returning Board might reject the vote of these parishes. It is claimed they did this without cause, solely for political purposes, and because of political promises, and it is in evidence that they have themselves confessed this. It is also claimed that the fact that there was not a Republican vote cast in certain sections which had theretofore been largely Republican was the result of a conspiracy to withhold the Republican vote there in order to afford a pretense for claiming that result as obtained by intimidation, and thereby furnish ground for the rejection of those parishes. Tire committee have not considered that the evidence you propose (and which has been taken by former committees) of certain alleged murders, whippings, and raidings net known to Weber or Andei son, not connected with the alleged conspiracy, and upon which neither they nor the parties engaged in the conspiracy acted, could have a bearing upon these questions, nor upon the action of the Returning Board on their protests, and they therefore decided not to take the same. Where, in the course of the examination, the witnesses (T. H. Jenks, Pitkin, and Weber) have referred to , intimidation in these parishes, it has been incidentally, or as bearing upon the conspiracy. Should it later appear that the specific acts to which you refer have any bearing upon the conspiracy, or upon the good faith of Weber or Anderson, or of the Returning Board in respect of their protests, the cornu ttee will then consider the practicability of taking testimony, and that in contradiction of it, or of permitting you to use instead the reports of such testimony taken before the former committees. Respectfully, your obedient servant, Clabkson N. Potter, Chairman. To the Hon. John Sherman.