Rensselaer Union, Volume 11, Number 6, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 October 1878 — Mr. Marble’s Denial. [ARTICLE]

Mr. Marble’s Denial.

After more than a week’s delay, which we may readily infer has been passed in anxious consultation, one of the accused parties to the Democratic frauds in Florida—Mr. Manton Marble —has made a statement. It is a general denial of personal complicity in the scandal. It is not in the nature of an explanation or elucidation, butsuch a denial as Mr. Marble might have made with considerable more force on the very day the cipher telegrams were exposed. The. accused is evidently conscious of the weakness in his plea that has been occasioned by the delay, for he attempts to explain it by saying that he finally read the New York Tribune's exposuie at the request o; the editor of the Herald. This is puerile in the extreme, and is further calculated to damage Mr. Marble, for he will never be able to convince anyone that he remained ignorant for several days of the serious charges against him in an affair that had riveted the attention of the entire country. Perhaps Mr. Marble could not have done better than make this general denial, if he did anything at all, but it would have received more credit if it had been made promptly, and not after hesitation and consultation. A man of Manton Marble’s standing, charged with an infamous offense of which he was not only innocent but absolutely ignorant, would scarcely have waited eight days to say so. We have intimated that Mr. Marble, if he said anything, could not well put in any other plea than the one he has made. It would not do to denounce the cipher telegrams as forgeries that were never sent; the Tribune was evidently too well fortified to meet such a charge. Nor. would it do to set up that the dispatches had not been correctly translated, because the application of the different keys had been thoroughly verified, and any charge of inaccuracy in this respect would nave made it necessary for the Tilden faction to produce the correct keys and furnish the genuine meaning. Th "denying in broad terms, though unnecessarily diffusive, that he ever knew of any such dispatches being sent or received, Mr. Marble relieves himself of the necessity of construing their meaning or intent, and, for the time being, he occupies a. defiant attitude by challenging the production of positive proof of his alleged connection with the cipher mess'ages. It may be inferred from what the Tribune has said on this subject that it will be able to produce such proof. In the meantime it is clear that Mr. Marble, having consented to write out an elaborate statement where a brief denial would have served the same purpose, should have taken cognizance of some of , the suspicious circumstances, already made public, which tend to confirm the Tribune's charge that he was the author of some of the most damning "dispatches that have been published. First, it is a curious coincidence that the signature to many of these dispatches, " Moses,” is the first name of Mr. Marble, though he long since dropped it from use; in the next place it appears from the dispatches themselves that answers to the "Moses” dispatches were addressed to Man ton Marble, and that " Moses” replied to dispatches that were sent to Marble. This connecting link was brought opt by the interference of an indiscreet friend, Mr. Saltonstall, who was one bf Tilden’s lawyers in Florida. This gentleman could not whit for Mr. Marble's denial in nis own behalf, but rushed into print with the assertion that the Tribune had merely guessed” that Mr. Marble was the author of certain dispatches. This naturally brought out a statement from the Tribune, from Which we make the following extract: When '• Moses” in Tallahassee addresses a telenam to Gramercy Park rejuiring ah immediate answer, th® answer is promptly sent from New , York addieased to “ Manton Marble, Tallahasree:” when p, li ton Manton • Marble agarnsttrnstinr B—, rt nr Mosee-who replies that he has not trusted Barlow or anybody , else; and finally Paris, telegraphing in a differ- . ent key about one of the’ ” Moses” dispatolies, 1 speaks of it as '* Marble's,” The identity of *• Mones" Jind Mjifble‘tw absolutely proved; and so u the identity of “ Fox ’ and Woolley, and of •• Max ’ and Ooyle. Bat si r. Saltonstall says that names have lie. n signed in tne translations to dispatches which* are marked " No signature" fit

the cipher. If he had read the doeamenta bp watalking about he would have seen why. “ iKe?* oounted his signature as a part of the diapat. h and when the message was transpose,! the name was thus shifted into the body of it and buruxl there. The telegraph operator did not recognise it, and consequently marked the manuscript ‘No signature.” But, when the key is applied, 1 “ Mores” always falls at the end. Of these circumstances, one is a particularly strong confirmation of the charge that Mr. Marble sent the dispatch making the proposition about "50.00 G best United States documents” (950,000 in greenbacks). There was a Dictionary cipher used between two persons only—W. T. Pelton, in New York, aud E. L. Paris, in Florida. The translation of one of these dispatches ; (addressed to Havemeyer, as usual) is as follows: Tai.lahahhkb, Dec. i.-Htnry Haremeytr: Saturday secured several dispatches rent yon addressed to house. Have advised with friend. Bituaiton same; everything uncertain. Marble •ayh plan sent you Saturday must De acted upon immediately, otherwise unavailing. Plan unknown to undersigned; sixteen, twenty-one, twenty-three. J ust presented your letter. From this it appears that, if Mr. Marble insists upon denying that he ever signed or dictated the "Moses” dispatches, then he must follow up the denial by charging Paris with lying. Paris did not know what the plan was, and was not familiar with the "Moses” cipher; yet it was Mr. Marble who told him to insert "sixteen, twenty-one, twenty-three,” which refers to the dispatch to the New York paymaster in regard to the amount necessary to purchase the Returning Board. If Mr. Marble was and is entirely ignorant of all these dispatches and propositions, how comes it that the dispatches in reply to “ Moses” were addressed to him? How comes it that "Moses” replied to dispatches that had been sent to Manton Marble? How comes it that Manton Marble instructed Paris to urge action on the "Moses” proposition? The “general denial” is very far from satisfactory in the light of these circumstances. We have but one more comment to make on Mr. Marble’s denial pending the production of still more convincing proof of his connection with the bribery scheme, with which he will probably be overwhelmed, viz.: Marble does not undertake (as he has always before been eager to do) to defend Mr. Tilden, or to deny that gentleman’s knowledge and sanction of what was going on. This omission on the part of Mr. Marble to come to the defense of his chief is significant because it is exceptional. We take it to mean that Marble feels the situation to be perilous, and that he has acted upon the principle of sauve qui peut. He will be content, If he can escape from the trap himself, to let Tilden take care of himself. Of course Marbb might drop out of this scandal altogether as a comparatively insignificant person, and Mr. Tilden’s situation would be as desperate as ever, especially since the exposure of the South Carolina scheme; but we are inclined to think thakveven Mr. Marble will be obliged to make other statements, and stronger ones, before he clear his skirts. — Chicago Tribune.