Rensselaer Union, Volume 5, Number 22, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 20 February 1873 — Vice-President Colfax’s Statement. [ARTICLE]

Vice-President Colfax’s Statement.

The following is the statement macle hv Mr. Colfax before tbe Poland CreditMobilier Investigating Committee, on the 11th. His account of the receipt of the fI,OOO frotp Mr. Nesbit was corroborated by the evidence of his step-father, Mr. Matthews, and his half-sister, who were present when the letter from Mr. Nesbit was opened: Gentlemen: Last fall I was one of a number of persons in public life charged with having been bribed with gifts of stock in the Oedit-Mobllier, from which enormous dividends had been received and for which certain legislation had been procured. I reSlled to these charges in a speech at South end, September 25,1872, in which, after showing that the most important part of this legislation had been enacted four years before the alleged bribery, I responded to a personal attack as follows, which I read from the Chicago Inter-Ocean of the next day: —“Merer having in my life a dollar of stock of any kind that I did not pay for. T cislm theright to rurchaes stock in the Credit Mobilier or Credltmmobllier. if there Is one. Nor do I know of any law prohibiting It Do I need to add that neither Oakes Ames nor anv other person ever gave or offered to give me one share or twenty shares or 900 shares In the Credit MoNller. or any other railroad stock, and that unfortunately I have never seen or received the valne of a farthing out of the 970 per cent dividends, or the 800 per cent dividends, in cash, stock or bonds you have read abont the past month, nor 100 per cent ~ nor the tenth of one per cent.; I have said that if twenty shares of it conid be purchased at par. without buying into a prospective lawsuit, it wonld be < good investment, if as valuable a stock as represented; but, never having been plaintiff nor defendant in a court of justice, 1 want no stock at any price with a lawsuit on top of it” It will be seen from these extracts that I publicly claimed; last fall, the right to purchase the stock, and avowed frankly that I would have been willing to pay for twenty shares if I did not buy into a prospective law suit, but that no possible profits could induce me to Involve myself in litigation, having, over four years before this speech, voluntarily abandoned a contract to purchase at a rate I had stated, and on the very grounds I had stated. Having no certificate, no ownership of stock in >t, my answer to the charges then made is the exact truth; and then I frankly accepted, also, whatever odium might attach to willingness to purchase and to hold its stock as I then understood it. , I will add that what I said last September, that neither Oakes Ames dor any other person ever gave or ottered to give me any of this stock, has been repeatedly printed during the session, with the essential word give omitted, entirely ehaaging its sense. Ames having sworn, December 17th, in his original statement before Hie committee, which he declared (see page 21 of evidence) embodied the exact facts, that he could not remember having paid me any dividends, now declares that in June, 1868, a check payable to the initials “S. U.” or bearer, for’sl,2oo, but not indorsed by me or uny one else, was paid by him to me as cash dividend of Credit-Mobi’lier. In answer to this charge I repeat again that I have not the slightest knowledge or recollection or belief that I ever saw this check or any other check of-Ames’ till he presented it before this committee, nor that I have ever -been paid or proffered by him, directly or indirectly, in check, stock or bonds, twelve hundred, or one hundred, or one dollar, or any amount whatever. I further state that I have not the slightest knowledge, recollection, or belief that I ever heard there was, or could be, any cash dividends of the Credit-Mobilier till the discussion of last fall, and I am as positive as I can be of any fact _in the past, that Ames never spoke to me of this last dfvidend. and never paid or proffered to me in person, or through any other channel, any check, or money, or bonds, on that or any other account. It seems to me impossible and incredible that I should have received the check without remembering that addition to my income, and especially in a eheck drawn so singularly, as to initials and not containing my'name at all, nor conid I have talked to him when he failed as I did about letting the SSOO go wnich I had paid him on dividend stock if he had paid me an overplus of S7OO. I must add that untllto-davlliave never heard of the certificate for $1,500 of Union Pacific bonds. S6O interest on which Ames says he paid me in January, 1869, and I would not have been more astounded to have been charged by him with the assassination of one of his family than I have been by his charges that he paid me either $1,200 or S6O, or any other amount whatever on stock that I had abandoned. I will add that for Over four yews I have spoken in my family of this transaction exactly as T described it in my testimony of January 7, namely, that I had contracted to purchse; had paid about $500; had heard of threats and acrimonious litigation among its princiS al stock-holders; and had therefore abanoned it without receiving any dividend or certificate, but at loss of' the money I had paid upon it; and of the fact of those conversations I will produce evidence. I come now to the bank deposit of $1,200 in bills for June 22, 18GS, and the Committee will remember that I really invited the examination of my bank accounts by stating to them, unasked that I kept my accounts at the First National . Bank, where all my checks deposited would be found indorsed by me whether payable to order or bearer. Difficult as it is to recall all the transactions of five years in a public man’s life, I will state to "the Committee where all the money came from deposited from June 22, 1868. and will add that it was thernonth’lmmediately succeeding iny nomination for the office I now hold, and the total deposit was $1,968.63, and there being no previous deposit later than the Ist of June, it shows that the amount was an accumulation of moneys paid to me during the intervening three weeks. This is also proven by the dates of the checks deposited. One check was for $lB 63, dated Jane 13, signed by J. N. Seymour, since deceased; one for $250, dated June 12, signed by E. C. Cardin; and onefpr SSOO, dated June 17, signed by T. Denny & Co., none of them having the slightest connection with the subject of investigation before this Committee. Of the deposit bills for $200,1 am positive they were paid me by my stepfather, Matthews, on account of a debt he owed- me. In December, 1867, I paid $455 for a piano bought for his daughter, the check for which is in the bank, and 1 agreed to wait for the most of it until the summer, when h’ffTxpected to be better able to pay me. After my nomination in May, 1868, I had numberless appeals for contributions for political expenses in various localities, for processions, bands, charity, religious aid, etc., and I had promised to contribute as promptly and largely as possible to liquidate the expenses of the canvass in my sharply contested State of Indiana. I therefore asked Mr. Matthews to pay the indebtedness as soon as he could do so, so as to assist me in meeting the demands Incident to my new position. During the month of June, 1868, and as nearly as I can fix tbe time about the middle of the month, he paid S2OO in. bills on account* And early next month he paid me another installment, completing payments before Congress adjourned, T-«m very confident that this S2OO formed partoT this $1,200 deposit, being part of my cash receipts between deposits of June 1 and 22. About the time of this payment, and, as near as I can fix the date, about the middle of June, and very soon after the payment of Matthews, I was opening my letter mail at the breakfast table, in accordance with my usual custom, and found an envelope within another envelope, postmarked New York. 1 On opening the inner envelope I found it contained a letter-written-by George W. Nesbit, congratulating me most cordially and warmly on my nomination for the VicePresidency, and saying that the writer desired me to accept, confidentially, the remittance Inclosed to aid mein the heavy expense of the canvass, but wished it kept quiet, as neither his family nor any one would ever know unless I told them. Inclosed in this was a greenback or a national bank note for SI,OOO. It was as gratifying as it was liberal, and, holding up the letter and the bill, I asked the attention of all my family to it. I then read them the letter. The fact of sending so large a bill by mail was. commented upon and mygratitude for the gift' was discussed, when Mr. Matthews remarked that It came in good time, referring to the appeal of the Chairman of the Indiana Republican Committee for money to aid,in; arrangements for the canvass, already lu‘ active progress. The bill was passed around, from hand to hand, and examined. I am sure I deposited it with the S2OO I had reeelred from Mr. Matthews, and a draft for tbe exact amount of this remittance, and th exact accordance with the donor’s wish, and exactly as discussed at my table at the time, was sent at once to the Chairman of the Republican Committee at Indianapolis. Fortunately this does not rest on my own testimony alone. Living witnesses will tell

the committee that they rememher 7 the receipt of this hill and the contents of th* letter In which it was Inclosed, and that It was at once dl-cu«*ed how it could he used tocarrvout Nesbit’s desire, and the draft presented and sworn to hv the cashier of the hawk, proven that th* very dav I deposited $1,200 tn hills T bought and remitted out of, my deposit * draft for *1,090 to the Chairman of tbe Indiana State Committee; that draft Inclosed was found In the hank here and laid before vonr committee the next, dav after I testified, promising to connect It with mv evidence. Mv family at the time consisted of'mother (since deceased) mv «tep-f*ther, Mr. Matthews. anti mv h*lf-Bl«ter, Mrs. Hollister, whose residence Is |n a distant town hevond the Rocky Mountains. T said It wait fortunate there were living witnesses to this besides mvaelf. for. hv another thorough examination of the accounts and papers of N»s’>lt, made hv his excenter at mv request (Nesbit having died the nex’ vear) no trace Is there found. H“ had carried out exactly what he wrote: that It was Intended to he confidential—unknown even to his family—and If It w->s revealed It would, have to be bv me. H» evidently sent In a bill the more surelv to accomplish the object. During the last eight or ten years the accumulation of my letters has been so extraordinary that It has been my regular habit to destroy fully •nine-tenths of them; those, that are not destroyed are not filed, hn* kept In their envel opes until they crowd my drawers and tables, and are then tied up, hut not chronicled, to he stowed away wherever room for them can be found; Indeed, Mr. Chauncev, of the House, employed after T had left that wl"g of the Capitol, for the Senate wing. In 1869; happened to find a box full of old lette-a thus tied up, the loss of which I had entirely overlooked ; I have cone three times overall the letters I have preserved, and have not found this letter nor my political letters for June; the acknowlcogment of this draft for SI,OOO sent to Indiana cannot" be found, though fortunately the bink was able to findthe draft Itself; the letter accompanying the three checks deposited June 22 has also been destroyed, so that I am unable to produce either of the five letters relating to transactions of that day. I remember distinctly that, after mv nomination my mails increased enormously, amounting to fifty, if not sometimes one hundred letters per day, and their preservation seemed so Impossible, I remember, as others do, more than once almost filling a waste basket with fragments of destroyed letter s . But, as I said, there are living witnesses here to prove that I received at that time this *I,OOO bill—one of them having made a three thousand mile ride alone to tell this committee her recollection of it. When mv bank account was examlned here CTFeaskler waß asked what the $46.000 foot ing m eant. an d he repl led to the question that it was the amount of debts and credits when the accounts were finally balanced. It was telegraphed to the New York Tribune that night that the books showed that I deposited $45,000 in one year! and the inference, of course, was that I could, therefore, easily have forgotten $1,200. As my general accounts have thus been made the subject of discussion, and as I have no secrets in regard to themrTYeeldtmv right now to correct this misstatement. This total was fordhree-yeawi. not one year, namely, from December,’ 1865, to October, 1868, inclusive, and embraced besides other cash accounts, changes made in my investmentq, the avails of a laborious life, and which changes were mainly on advice of valued friends in New York and the West. On the debtor side are purchases of $5,000 seven-thirties of the bank, between December, 1865, and April. 1866, mainly front' receipts for lecturing; one share of New York Tribune stock. $6,000, in January, 1857; a present of SI,OOO in the early part of 1867, to my mother, then an Inmate of my family; an investment of $5,000 in bonds of the Pennsylvania Steel Company; a house and lot in South Bend, near the’posl-offlce, which I am glad to state iw worth now- nearly double, the $2,200 I paid for it; a’loan of $455 to Mr. Matthews, as stated; an investment of $5,000 in the Wesler Rolling Mills, and the payment of $1,750 to Mr.’ Rickston Burroughs for money borrowed of him; this amounts to $-K)(000 out of s4s.ooo~transacti6ns three years; the deposits on the credit side that enabled me to pay these amounts were as follows: During these years I was lecturing on my stage-coach ride of 1865 across the continent during November, in the holiday recess, receiving from SIOO to S2OO per lecture; I received in all over $12,000 from this source, of which I estimate about SIO,OOO was deposited here; I sold the $5,000 in 7-80». and also sold the Tribune share for $6,100, and Matthews returned $455 he owed me; beside these items I sold sixty-two shares of Adams Express stock at 72,V. and a lot of second mortgage bonds of the Alton Jt Terre Haute Railroad for $4,950, making about s3l,ooo’ln all, which offsets the $30,000 in inyestnqents charged against them. Of course the'Committee understand that in the bank accounts where changes of investments are made the same money alters the figures three or four times over. Thus I deposited my lecturing money; bought seven-thirties, sold them at an advance, and used the proceeds for another investment. I bought a Tribune share mainly out of similar receipts, sold it at an advance, and again used the proceeds. A large part of the money I drew from the Sergeant-at-Arms for my salary was deposited lu the bank, as I paid my housekeeping expenses there. It has taken all my dividends, besides my salary to pay my expenses for the past half dozen years, and hence my willingness to follow the counsel of better financiers than myself in investments and changes of investments. Ip answer to questions by Judge Poland, Mr. Colfax testified that he thought he received the SI,OOO the day after he received the money from Matthews. When the witness told Ames that he (Colfax) must be Out of it, Ames put his hand in his pocket, took out a small coin, and, offering it to the witness, said: “Consider that I have bought it back.” The witness always had great repugnance to lawsuits, and drew out of the Cred-it-Mobilier for that reason. He would have been glad to get out of tbe CreditMobiligr at the cost of twice the sum he paid Ames. He received the SI,OOO from Nesbit aboig, the middle of the month succeeding the nomination. If he had received the SI,OOO from New York and $1,200 from Ames also, he would have deposited both of them. Sir j _ ‘ ‘ ’ ———