Rensselaer Union, Volume 11, Number 36, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 May 1879 — SECRET DISTORT OF THE ELECTORAL CANVASS IN 1876. [ARTICLE]

SECRET DISTORT OF THE ELECTORAL CANVASS IN 1876.

The history of the electoral crisis in November and December, 1876, as disclosed by tho cipher dispatches of the Democratic leaders and' their secret agents, covers a period of about twenty-eight days, from the Bth of November, when it first became apparent. that the Presidency depended upon the count of the vote in two or three doubtful States, until the 6th of December, when the electoral ballots ■were duly cast for Hayed and Wheeler. By deciphering these telegrams The Tribune has discovered that agents were at once sent out from No. 15 Gramercv Park, the residence of Mr. Samuel J. Tilden, to South Carolina, Florida and' Louisiana, and that others, at the West, received telegraphic orders to proceed immediately to Oregon, in order to “capture” one or all of those States for the Democratic candidate. They all resorted to bribery, communicating to Mr. Tilden's nephew, Colonel W. T. Peltou, the particulars of the bargains they concluded, and receiving iroui him a distinct and formal approval. 1. In Florida the secret agents were Manton Marblej C. W. Woolley, and John F, Coyle... Marble transmitted to Gramercv Park, first a proposition for the purchase of the Florida Returning Board at the price of #*400,000. T hat was rejected as extravagant, and the figure was reduced to #30,000, at which price Colonel Peltou signified his willingness to close the transaction. It fell through in couBeipience of a delay in the receipt of the message of acceptance. 2. fu South Carolina the purchasing agent was fimth 1L Weed. He telegraphed to Colonel Pel-

ton, on the very day of his arrival at Columbia, a proposal to buy the Canvassing Board fors*o,ooo l to which Pelton appears to have readily assented. This figure was too low, and the negotiation, after lasting six days, was closed fit the price of fiNO,000. It was arranged that Weed should meet, a messenger at Baltimore, who was to carry the money in three packages; and he particularly requested that Colonel Pelton should act as this messenger himself. Weed accordingly arrived in Baltimore from Columbia on the 20th of November, and Pelton arrived there at the same time from NewYork j but again ia little delay upset the scheme. Subsequently a plot was formed to bny four members of the South Carolina Legislature, for •#©*- ©OO, and having thus obtained control of the State Government, to put the Hayes electors in jail, and lock them up in separate cells until the day for casting the electoral votes had passed. The result of this villany would have been to deprive South Carolina of any vote, and to throw the choice of a President into tne House of Representatives, which would have elected Tilden. The plan failed because tho four memberd could not he bought. 8. In Oregon the Democratic Governor withheld a certificate from one of the Hayes electors on the ground of ineligibility, aud, instead of allowing the other electors to fill the vacancy, gave the certificate to a Tilden elector named Cronin, who had clearly been defeated. The secret agent in Oregon was ono J. N. H. Patrick, He telegraphed to Colonel Pelton that it was necessary to “ purchase a Republican elector to recognize and act with ” Cronin, and the price was ©S.O©O. This proposal likewise Was accepted, and tne money was sent to Oregon, where it arrived only on the Oth of December, just too late to be of any use.