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قراءة كتاب Letters and Literary Memorials of Samuel J. Tilden, v. 2

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Letters and Literary Memorials of Samuel J. Tilden, v. 2

Letters and Literary Memorials of Samuel J. Tilden, v. 2

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دار النشر: Project Gutenberg
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LETTERS
AND
LITERARY MEMORIALS
OF
SAMUEL J. TILDEN

EDITED BY
JOHN BIGELOW, LL.D.

VOL. 2

NEW YORK AND LONDON
HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS
1908

Copyright, 1908, by Harper & Brothers.
——
All rights reserved.
Published February, 1908.


LETTERS AND LITERARY MEMORIALS
OF SAMUEL J. TILDEN

DAVID A. WELLS TO TILDEN

"Norwich, Conn, Jan'y 6th, 1876.

"My dear Governor,—I do not know as I can testify of my admiration of your message better than by saying that I want you to send me an early copy in pamphlet form for more careful reading and preservation.

"When the novel which Mr. Sherman and I have been writing (now in press) comes out, in a week or two, please see how curiously prices worked on our imaginary island, where the people used something for currency which had no value as a commodity.

"Very truly yours,
"David A. Wells."

Answered January 10, 1876, by the Governor, that he desired to submit some of the messages to Mr. Wells, but it was a race against time. The tables were not completed until the discussion was in the proof-reading. "Even I was surprised at the surplus of currency which they evince."

CHARLES O'CONOR TO TILDEN

"Fort Washington, Jan'y 12, 1876.

"My dear Governor Tilden,—In this form I will say nothing of the proceedings, surprising to me, as they must have been to you, which have marked the movements toward trying the Tweed civil cases. I have neither seen nor heard from the present chief of the 'bureau of municipal correction' since the newspapers began to regale us with its recent fortunes.

"My object in addressing you is to submit certain suggestions for consideration.

"When the present leading counsel for Tweed fell into a line of practice which, steadily pursued for years as it has been, might well have led to his being dubbed Attorney-General for Rascals, it was my lot to be much in professional antagonism to him. I found him to be neither wise, learned, nor, properly speaking, able, but essentially a trickster. He seems capable of being very troublesome, and to a negligent or unskilful adversary he may be regarded as dangerous.

"In dealing with his class, one will generally find a central device around which all their series of tricks revolve, and from which all their force and effectiveness are drawn. This man's course and career furnish an admirable illustration of this fact.

"Our multitude of judges, with equal powers, were perceived by him to furnish a hopeful quarry. One wicked, weak, or manageable could be found somewhere. The next item in his scheme for making judicial proceedings do the work which a bolder thief might seek to accomplish by piracy, highway robbery, or counterfeiting was to engage himself in quarrels where an unlimited number of separate suits by separate plaintiffs might be brought before different judges—all aimed at the same substantial object. This enabled him to make almost at random all sorts of harassing movements against the same parties. Slap-dash, hit or miss, he poured his shot upon the selected victims, the loss of a suit or failure of a movement troubling him not, the number of strings to his bow making this of no more consequence to him than the loss of a single soldier to the general of an army.

"You are aware that any single stockholder in a private or trading corporation may file a bill in equity against the corporation itself, its managing officers, and any one else suggesting malversation, and, of course, such a suit has all the usual incidents of receivership, injunctions, etc., etc. With a desperate Wall Street swindler for plaintiff, an utterly unscrupulous legal practitioner to direct it, and an unprincipled or manageable judge, the blackmailing capabilities of such a suit are not slight. And when you consider that the stock is always in the market, and that five shares, or, indeed, a single share, may be sufficient to qualify a plaintiff, you see the readiness with which a lot of these suits, like a swarm of insects in summer, may harass. It was with this single scrap of technical knowledge that the Attorney-General for Scoundrels qualified himself for his office. In a very large degree he has lived upon it ever since.

"It was in analogy to this right of the stockholder of a private corporation that some well-intentioned persons devised the scheme of judicially restraining municipal and other public officers from improper action. I believe the history of the rise and fall of this idea may be found in a long argument of mine reported in 'Wetmore v. Story,' 22 or 23 Barbour. You have read it and spoken of it to me. There is no analogy between the cases, and no basis in our common-law or customary jurisprudence for the pretended right of a taxpayer thus to intervene. The inconveniences of such a practice would be enormous. It should not be permitted.

"Using a noted and life-long corruptionist, Charles Devlin, one of Tweed's bail, the Scoundrel's Attorney-General has brought a suit of this kind intended to perplex the Ring prosecutions and aid in misleading the thoughtless readers of their partisan journals.

"I have said that such a suit is wholly without warrant in the common law, and the claim to sustain it thereby has been by the highest authority, in every form, judicially exploded; but in two statutes it may find some color at least of support, and I write in the hope that these may be at once repealed.

"The first of these is S. 3 of the city tax levy of 1864, ch. 405, p. 945. It was obtained by Nathaniel Sands, the then leader of reform, as actuary or general agent of Peter Cooper's Citizens' Association. His subsequent history is known to you. The other is ch. 161 of the laws of 1872, p. 467. You were then in the Legislature, and may have favored its passage; it is not impossible that I may have failed to condemn it when spoken to, but I never believed in the utility of such a remedy. A reluctance to throw cold water on the efforts of our friends sometimes dictates a prudent silence. But whatever might be said at that time, the law of 1875, establishing the right of the State, has superseded the use of any such private taxpayer's action, and this inexpressibly impudent suit of Devlin shows that the privilege tends to mischief. I hope you will get some real and earnest reformer belonging to the Republican party to bring in and push through a bill for the repeal of both these enactments.

"Another subject may seem to demand attention, and that speedily. In Polly Bodine's case, some years ago, it was found that the public journals had so thoroughly imbued the minds of the people with information or reports and ideas concerning the facts of the case that under the existing common law touching challenges to the favor it was hardly possible to get a jury. This must be so in Tweed's cases. The Legislature then altered the law, but I am told that the change is confined in its terms to criminal cases. It ought, by supplemental legislation, to be extended to all cases.

Yours faithfully,
"Ch. O'Conor."

BONAMY PRICE TO TILDEN

"

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