LII.

THE National Democratic Convention of 1876 selected to nominate candidates for the Presidency and Vice-Presidency met in the great hall of the Board of Trade in St. Louis at noon on the 27th of June, 1876. General John A. McClernand was selected as the permanent chairman of the Convention. When in the call of the States for the presentation of candidates the State of New York was reached, Francis Kernan, one of the United States senators from the State of New York, and chairman of the New York delegation, arose and said:

"The great issue upon which this election will be lost or won is that question of needed administrative reform; and in selecting our candidates, if we had a man that had been so fortunate as to be placed in a public position, who had laid his hand on dishonest officials, no matter to what party they belonged, or had rooted out abuses in the discharge of his duty, who had shown himself willing and able to bring down taxation and inaugurate reform, if we are wise men and have such a man, it is no disparagement to any other candidate to say that this is the man that will command the confidence of men who have not been always with the Democracy, and make our claim strong, so that it will sweep all over this Union a triumphant party vote.

"Governor Tilden was selected as governor of our State; he came into office Jan. 1, 1875. The direct taxes collected from our tax-ridden people in the tax levy of 1874 were over fifteen millions of dollars. He has been in office eighteen months, and the tax levy for the State treasury in this year, 1876, is only eight millions of dollars. If you go among our farming people, among our men who find business coming down and their produce bringing low prices, you will find that they have faith in the man who has reduced taxation in the State of New York one half in eighteen months; and you will hear the honest men throughout the

country say that they want the man who will do at Washington what has been done in the State of New York.

"Now do not misunderstand me. We have other worthy men and good in the State of New York who, if they had had the chance to be elected, and had had a chance to discover the frauds in our State administration, among our canals, which were thus depleting our people, would have done the work faithfully. But it so happened that Samuel J. Tilden reaped this great benefit for our people and this great honor for our party.

Governor Tilden was nominated on the second ballot by the following vote:

The Convention appointed a committee, of which the Chairman of the Convention was a member, to wait upon Governor Tilden at his residence in New York city and apprise him of his nomination. The committee called upon the Governor on the 11th of July, when General McClernand read to him the following address:

Governor Samuel J. Tilden.

SIR,The undersigned, a committee of the National Democratic Convention which met at the city of St. Louis, Mo., on the 27th ultimo, consisting of its president and of one delegate from each State of the Federal Union, have been intrusted with the pleasant duty of waiting upon and informing you of your nomination by that body as the candidate of the Democratic party for the Presidency of the United States at the ensuing election.

It is a source of great satisfaction to us, who but reflect the opinions of the members of the Convention, that a gentleman entertaining and boldly advancing, as you do, and have done, those great measures of national and State reform which are an absolute necessity for the restoration of the national honor, prosperity, and

credit, should have been selected as our standard-bearer in the approaching contest. Your name is identified with the all-absorbing question of reform, reduction of taxes, and the maintenance of the rights of the laboring masses. The Democracy, in designating you as their chosen leader, do not feel that they are relying merely upon your pledges or promises of what you will do in the event of your election; your record of the past is our guaranty of your future course. Having been faithful over a few things, we will make you a ruler over many things.

Accompanying this letter of notification, we also present you with the declaration of principles adopted by the Convention. We have no doubt that you will recognize in this declaration measures of political policy which immediately concern the happiness and welfare of the entire people of this country; and we feel that your election to the Presidency will be a guaranty of their success, and it will be as much your pleasure to enforce and maintain them, if elected, as it is ours to give them the stamp of national representative approbation and approval in their adoption. Entertaining the hope that you will signify to us your acceptance of the nomination which we have tendered you, and that you concur with the Convention in their declaration of principle, we are, dear sir, your very obedient servants,

JOHN A. McCLERNAND, Chairman,

And all the members of the National Committee.

Governor Tilden replied, first in a brief speech, and subsequently in a letter, which are here given in their order of time.

REPLY

TO

ADVISING

GENERAL MCCLERNAND'S ADDRESS
MR. TILDEN OF HIS NOMINATION

FOR THE PRESIDENCY, JULY 11, 1876.

GENERAL MCCLERNAND AND GENTLEMEN OF THE COMMITTEE,I shall at my earliest convenience prepare and transmit to you a formal acceptance of the nomination which you now tender to me in behalf of the Democratic National Convention, and I do not desire on this occasion to anticipate any topic which might be appropriate to that communication. It may, however, be permitted to me to say that my nomination was not a mere personal preference between citizens and statesmen of this Republic who might very well have been chosen for so distinguished an honor and for so august a duty. It was rather a declaration of that illustrious body, in whose behalf you speak, in favor of administrative reform, with which events had associated me in the public mind. The strength, the universality, and the efficiency of the demand for administrative reform, especially in the administration of the Federal Government, with which the Democratic masses everywhere are instinct, has led to a series of surprises in the popular assemblages, and perhaps in the Convention itself. It would be unnatural, gentlemen, if a popular movement so genuine and so powerful should stop with three and a half millions of Democrats; that it should not extend by contagion to that large mass of independent voters who stand between parties in our country, and even to the moderate portion of the party under whose administration the evils to be corrected

have grown up. And perhaps in what we have witnessed there may be an augury in respect to what we may witness in the election about to take place throughout our country; at least, let us hope so and believe so.

I am not without experience of the difficulty, of the labor of effecting administrative reform when it requires a revolution in policies and in measures long established in government. If I were to judge by the year and a half during which I have been in the State government, I should say that the routine duties of the trust I have had imposed upon me are a small burden compared with that created by the attempt to change the practice of the government of which I have been the executive head. Especially is this so where the reform is to be worked out with more or less of co-operation of public officers who either have been tainted with the evils to be redressed, or who have been incapacitated by the habit of tolerating the wrongs to be corrected, and to which they have been consenting witnesses. I therefore, if your choice should be ratified by the people at the election, should enter upon the great duties which would be assigned to me, not as a holiday recreation, but very much in that spirit of consecration in which a soldier enters battle.

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But let us believe, as I do believe, that we now see the dawn of a better day for our country, that difficult as is the work to which the Democratic party, with many allies and former members of other parties, has addressed itself the Republic is surely to be renovated, and that it is to live in all the future, to be transmitted to succeeding generations as Jefferson contributed to form it in his day, and as it has been ever since, until a recent period, - a blessing to the whole people and a hope to all mankind.

Gentlemen, I thank you for the very kind terms in which you have made your communication, and I extend to you, collectively and individually, a cordial greeting.