The New York Herald Newspaper, December 6, 1876, Page 8

6 NEW YORK HERALD BROADWAY AND ANN STREET. JAMES GORDON BENNETT, PROPRIETOR crenihieiiioubiceataaiatie. THE DAILY HERALD, published every day in the year. Three cents per copy (Sun- y exeluded;, ‘Ten dollars per year, or at “one dollar per month tor any period less than six months, or five dollars for six wths, Sunday edition included, free of postaue, Aji business, news letters or telegraphic despatches must be addressed New York Henao. PHILADELPHIA OFFICE—NO.112 SOUTH SIXTH STREET, LONDON OFFICE OF THE NEW YORK HERALD.—NO, 4 eT STREE?, PARIS OFFICE—AVENUE DE L'OPERA, NAPLES OFFICE.—NO. 7 STRADA PACE. Subscriptions and advertisements will be received and forwarded on the same terms ew Y BE THE TWO ORPHA G BARNUM’S CIRCUS Wa THE SHAUGHKA Open daily. how *ESCAPEO FROM UNTO: MISS MULTON, a8 GR. OUSsE. « EIN Vorsicut TH 1 KING RICHARD i Edwin Bocth, TRE, M. Matinee at 2 P.M. BROOKLYN, THEATRE, , ats P.M, S THEATRE, PARISIAN VARIETIES, VARIETY, at SPM I VARIETY, at 8 PL) SAN Fit at8 P.M. KELLY & at8P.M. n PRESTIDIGITATE! COLUMBIA O. VARIETY, ar 8 P.M. ESSIPOFF CONCERT, M CROMWELL’S ILL! BRA PALACE, THE EARTH. SHEET. EMDER 6, 1876, OCH ND THE PUBLID, Owing to the action of a portion of the carriers, newsmen and news companies, who are determined that the public shali not have the Herap at three cents per copy if they can prevent it, we have made arrangements to place the Heratp in the hands of all our readers at the reduced price. Newsboys and deaters can purchase any quantity they may desire at No, 1,265 Broulway and No. 2 Ann street, and All dealers who have been threatened by the news com- also from our wagons on the principal avenues, panies are requested to send in their orders direct to we, at No, 2 Ann street. our reports this morning the probabil- ‘e that the weather to-day will be slightly warmer and clear or partly cloudy. Watt Srreet Yesterpay.—Until near the closing hour stocks were heavy. Suddenly, in response to rumors that Florida had given her electoral vote to Tilden, prices advanced and the market closed strong. Gold de- clined from 108 1-2 to 108 1-8. Government and railway bonds were steady. Money on call loaned at 6, 5, and finally at 3 per cent. ‘Tne Strance Case of the Louisville girl who apparently died, yet seems to live, is still the cause of excited curiosity. Full details of the case appear in to-day’s Henazp. Tue New .German-Amertcan Leaper,— In another column will be found the views of Mr. Pulitzer, Carl Schurz’s rival, on Schurz and the situation. Mr. Pulitzer's standing among his countrymen entitles his opinions to careful consideration. He cer- tainly tells the exact truth when he says that if the independent press existed in this country, upon the model of the Hrrap, the present political muddle could never have been created. ‘Tur Casz or Farmpanks, who as cashier of an Elizabeth (N. J.) bank, allowed a de- positor to overdraw his account $30,000, seems to have excited the sympathies of the prosecution and the Judge himself, the lat- ter having suspended sentence for several weeks, pending the efforts which are being made to secure a pardon tor the unfortunate cashier. The case is a touching one, but the Court is in danger of establishing a prece- dent which business men will rightly regard with extreme disfavor. Positivenx tue Last Arrrsnaxce.--St. Domingo escapes once more from the friendly shelter of gazetteers and atlases, and roams at large through a Presidential message. ‘There remains but three months, however, before it will go back to its de- served obscurity, and after thatno dream of office under the Stars and Stripes will divert the attention of the natives from the luscious Dbananas and fragrant cigars which have heretofore been all that has constituted hap- piness in St. Domingo. Tue Surrentnc Poor.—The details of our report of the number and condition of the poor in our midst are as startling as they are sad. When respectable women apply for lodging at police stations and industrious mechanics ure begging to be sent to the Almshouse it is time tor the benevolent to bestir themselves to individual effort with- out waiting for relief organizations to be perfected; and for those who are well-to-do, but careless, to ask themselves whether there are not times when selt-gratification becomes a crime against society. = | Presidential election. | | 1 1 | | ence. | gress, and safeguards against the recurrence | of remark in which the President indulges ; tion and intercourse should have been able ; The Message. The Inst annual Message of President Grant is the emptiest document of the kind ever sent to Congress, but it has the merit of | being short. The President is a man of sense. | He scorns to make a parade of recommenda- | tions which have no chance of adoption, or to spin out words to no purpose. We commend the brevity and have no particular fault to find with the inanity of his final Message. In the earlier days of his admin- istration, when his political party had large majorities in both houses, he made many recommendations which were ig- or rejected and very few that were adopted. Why should he continue to make idle recommendations now, when one branch of Congress is democratic ; when no bill can pass without the consent of his po- litical opponents; when he cannot remain in nored office to carry out a new policy, | and when it is a foregone cer- tainty that Congress will be engrossed through the greater part of this session with exciting questions bearing onthe elec- tion of his successor? The expiring months of a feeble administration is no time for the inanguration of great measures. Even if it were certain that Mr. Hayes is to be the next President General Grant would natur- ally recoil from attempts to inaugurate a new policy when the administration is about | to pass into other hands, Delicate consid- eration for his successor would prompt him to leave the future in his hands, so far as the future may depend on executive influ- The reasons for abstinence aro, still stronger if Mr. Tilden is to be the next President. A democratic successor would | disdain to borrow General Grant's ideas, and good measures would have a better | chance if the credit of originating them were left to the new President. It isa mark of | ; Sagacity and good sense to leave future | measures to those who will be responsible for their success. President Grant's unexpected reticence on the great question which so deeply agitates the public mind is also wise, It was sup- posed that he would discuss matters con- nected with the Presidential contest, and to any mind less practical and down- right than that of General Grant this would have been a great temptation. Buta parade of his views on this exciting subject would have been idle, and President Grant evinces the solid qualities of his mind in keeping clear of it. No recommen- dation which he could have made in rela- tion to the counting of the electoral votes would have been adopted by this Con- of similar difficulties had better be left toa calmer period. There will be opportunities for deliberate action on this subject in a less heated political atmosphere before another No precautions for the future can be adopted until after the ex- citement which attends this canvass shall have blown over. The country must get through the present alarming difficulty as best it may, and provisions against its re- currence must be postponed to a time when Congress and the people are in a more judi- ciai temper. President Grant is to be com- mended for not proposing remedies which have no chance of immediate adoption, and which, however sincerely meant, would be attributed to partisan bias. The only striking feature in this trivial Message is the apologetic and defensive tone at its beginning and again near the end. There is a trite French proverb that he who excuses himself becomes his own accuser. To offer excuses is a conces- sion that excuses are necessary, which implies an admission that the person who makes them has fallen short of what might have been expected of him. President Grant pleads in mitigation of sentence that he was ‘‘called to the office of Chief Executive without any previous politi- eal training.” He says that after the age of seventeen he never witnessed but two Presidential elections before he became a candidate himself, and that in only one of the two was he entitled to vote. This pathetic plea of inexperience is of little account. During the six years that he was General-in-Chief of the Army he was brought into constant intercourse with the most conspicuous public men in the country. He spent the four years which intervened between the close of the war and his accession to the Presidency in Washing- ton, the great focus of American politics. ‘That was a period of comparative leisure, which afforded him ample opportunity for political observation and for forming the | acquaintance of all the conspicuous mea | i in public life. Such intercourse did not make General Grant a statesman, but it should have enabled him to torm an intelli- gent judgment of the relative standing of the leading public men of the country. Few Presidents have had such excellent op- portunities for enabling them to make a wise selection of official advisers, ond President Grant has failed in civil life be- cause he did not bring strong men into his Cabinet. Any man of halfhis sense and pene- | tration and halffiis opportunities for observa- to compose a strong administration. When General Grant was in the army he was tinguished by the sureness of his judgme: in selecting capable subordinates. he became President this important faculty seemed to desert him. He préferred mere clerks and passive tools to able and sagacious advisers, and this is the chief reason why he needs to apologize for his administration in his final Message to Con- gress. Queen Victoria, who was a young | woman in her teens when she came into pos- session of the crown, made no such mis- takes in the selection of her advisers. She has never made apologies on the ground of her inexperience. General public opinion is a pretty safe guide as to the character and capacity of states- men, and if President Grant had followed this simple guide he might have formed a strong administration. Instead of this he came as near as he could to organizing a | Cabinet of mere clerks, and this is the main reason of the contrast between his brilliant | success as a soldier and his feebleness as a civil ruler, The supreme talent of a man in direction of large affairs is a capac. ity to judge of character and to put the right men in appropriate places, If Gen- | the | eral Grant had brought his sense as | an army officer into his duties as President he would have had as keen an eye to the Shermans and Sheridans of politics as he always possessed in military life. His first mistake was in attempting to orzanize an administration from which trained po- litical capacity was excluded. When the President was forced to recog- nize this mistake he attempted to repair it by taking into his counsels a low order of politicians instead of statesmen—a blunder not less fatal than the one with which he started. His excusatory plea ot inexperience is in singular contrast to the ostentatious self-sufficiency of his first in- augural address, In the whole Message sent in yesterday there is hardly a topic of sufficient dignity or importance to justify comment. So far as the Message is not a mere history or recap- | itnlation of the official transactions of the last year it is weak and pointless. The rec- ommendations relate merely to matters of course or to insignificant details relating to various branches of administration. It is a document which concedes in every line that its author has no longer any in- fluence on public measures, and that | he eagerly accepts his approach- ing release from public cares and re- sponsibilities. No Presidential Message was ever before composed with so small an ex- pense of political thought. We have never had a President to whom political discussion was so uncongenial, and he no longer makes a show of doing what he thoroughly dislikes. We have had military Presidents before— Washington, Jackson, Harrison, Taylor— but never one who thought civil affairs such a bore. ‘No fish swim so well as | those which are bred in the sea,” and Gen- eral Grant in civil’ affairs has been, from first to last, a fish out of water. His lack of taste for politigal life is equalled by his lack of capacity. Had he possessed any talent for civil administration he could not have repeated the stu- pendous blunder he made in Louisi- ana two years ago. It is surprising | that so able a soldier should be | | so wanting in capacity to profit by his ex- perience in civil life. The country will respect and honor his splendid services in the civil war, although it may be unable to accept his apologies for the mistakes of his civil administration. The Extradition Treaty. It is announced by the President in his Message that he will in a few days mako a special communication to Congress on ihe present condition of the ‘‘questions which lately arose with Great Britain regarding the surrender of fugitive criminals.” Coin- cidently with the making of this an- nouncement our despatches from London } inform us that the law officers of the English government have for some time been occu- pied with the preparation of amendments to the treaty of 1842, that they have agreed upon the draft of what would doubtless be anew treaty, and that this treaty has been accepted by our government, the communi- cations having all been made by cable. From the fact that the arrest has been ordered in England of persons who formerly escaped by the failure of the treaty it is assumed that the governments are now in full accord on the subject. There are some reasons for doubting the report from London—at least in the precise form in which it comes. General Grant's reference to extradition might, indeed, be inter- preted in support of the story, as it seems to imply that negotiation is actually in prog- ress and that the government will only in- form Congress when this is concluded. But there are probably other reasons for this course. Nothing is known at Washington, apparently, of the proposition to reconstruct the treaty. It must be supposed, therefore, that Her Majesty's government, better ad- vised now than formerly, has changed its at- titude with regard to extradition, and pro- poses to arrest the criminals, so far as possible, whose surrender has been de- manded, and to act on the treaty as our government has required. We sincerely hope this is the case, It is greatly disad- vantageous to countries situated as England and the United States are that the operation of so important «treaty should be inter- rupted. If it shall prove that England has thus waived her objections, and removes from the case the immediate issue on crim- ! inals actually in custody, it seems improb- able that our government will refuse any fair proposition for the amendment of the treaty in the sense that England desires, The Debate in the Senate. The discussion of the Edmunds resolu- tions in the Senate yesterday was fruitful of repartee, eloquence and surprise. Mr. Thurman pertinently asked why investiga- tion like theone proposed should not be heid upon elections in certain Northern manufacturing districts, where employers determine what tickets their men shall vote, and when the Vermont Senator de- clared he had never heard of but ono such case he was charged with supreme ignorance. Mr, Bayard denied the right of the Senate to investigate upon tho slight cause which existed, and made the point that irregularities occurred in the elections of every State—he might have said in every town. He made an eloquent declaration of the duty of the patriot in the existing state of affairs. The great surprise of day, however, was created by Mr. Edmunds when he asserted that the whole object of his resolution touching the ratio of representation had nothing to do with the Presidential election, but was devised’to correct an evil and fix the basis of representation for the next Con- gress, The Vermont Senator is a man of his word, but all democrats and not a few republicans have supposed that the haste | which has been demanded for these resolu- tions was dictated by the exigencies of the republican party in the Presidential contest, Curenine, w Trve.—The reported move- ment of Southern democrats in favor of a conservative administration party in the event of the election of Hayes is a cheering sign. Such a party would soon attract hundreds of thousands of the best republi- cans, and then nothing could save the partisans of the latter party from dropping into the disgrace and oblivion which they have so industriously earned, IIE The Treasury Report. Mr. Morrill’s report is of uncommon in- terest, inasmuch as it deals plainly with the question of resumption and also with the silver question. Before considering his suggestions fora financial policy we may say that, in spite of the hard times, he esti- mates a surplus revenue for the next fiscal year of over twenty-six millions, without any increase of taxation. He remarks that we have paid off since 1862 six hundred and fifty-six millions of the public debt, which is two hundred and twenty millions more than the sinking fund law required to be paid. These figures would be very impress- ive anywhere except in this country. Surely a nation at peace with all the world, having nothing to fear from any of its neigh- bors, not obliged to maintain expensive armies and navies, which has paid off nearly | seven hundred millions of its public debt in fourteen years, and may count, ina year of unexampled industrial prostration, on a surplus revenue of twenty-six millions, ought, if its affairs were only fairly well managed, to be able to borrow whatever sums it needs at four per cent. Secretary Morrill deserves credit for taking hold of the financial question in a yery sensi- ble manner. He begins by showing, as we urged a few days ago that he should, that the legal tenders or greenbacks are not properly currency, but debt. On so solid a foundation he could hardly fail to build o sound superstructure of policy. If the greenbacks are debt they ought to be paid or funded, which is, for present purposes, the same thing, and this is what the Secre- tary asks Congress to let him do. He points out that the attempt to accumulate gold for their redemption, as the Resumption act authorizes him to do, would be to disorder the exchanges and commerce of the world ; and he might have added that it would be as absurd to pay off the greenback debt in this clumsy way as to pay off three or four hundred millions of the funded debt by hoarding gold against it. He remarks that the Resumption act provides free banking, | and thus prevents any artificial and harm- ful stringency which might grow out of the extinction of greenbacks, and his policy, as now declared, requires that Congress shall authorize the issue of a four and a half per cent bond, for which he shall exchange greenbacks, as these may be offered, and that an amendment to the Resumption act shall command the national banks to lay in astock of gold in which to redeem their notes in 1879. These suggestions are so important and so sensible and practical that we hope the bankers and the mercantile community will combine to urge them upon the attention of Congress. We believe that under Secretary Morrill’s plan the country can return to specie payments with little, or, indeed, no strain, The times are propitious for it. We have, as he remarks, a great amount of sur- plus currency above the needs of trade. Be- tween January 14, of last year, and the pres- ent time there has been, under the opera- tion of the Resumption act, an entirely voluntary contraction of over forty-thzee millions, Wedo not doubt that the Secre- tary could fund fifty millions of greenbacks within the next six months if he were au- thorized to give four and a half per cents in place of them. As to the silver question, Mr. Morrill speaks like an honest man and a practical financier. He owns that the strict letter of the law would allow us to pay in silver as well as gold, but he adds that the public ; creditor was led by all the circumstances which surrounded our borrowing to expect gold; that honor demands we should pay in gold; that “the belief that our bonds were to be thus paid has a practical value in the probable reduction of the debt equal to one-fourth of the amount of its in- terest.” This means that honesty is worth to usin dollars about twenty-five millions a year. Mr. Morrill expects to redcem all the fractional currency in silver within a year, and recommends that the silver currency shall be increased to, eighty millions, and that silver be made a legal tender to the amount of ten dollars, except for the ‘obligations of the government and the cus- toms dues. The steady rise in the price of silver, which stands now at fifty-six pence, perhaps averts the danger that demagogues in Congress would attempt to carry through at this session some such dishonest measure as the Bland bill. We understand, by the way, that Mr. Morrill was shrewd enough to buy a large supply of silver at about fitty- three pence, so that the government loses nothing by the recent rise in price. Secretary Morrill’s financial recommenda- tions are so sound and honest that the pub- lication of his report cannot fail to give hope to all friends of sound currency and to raise our credit abroad; and the adoption of his plan by this Congress would, we believe, enable us to borrow at four per cent without difficulty. He says, rightly, that the present is a most favorable time for the withdrawal and extinction of the greenback debt, be- cause “‘the volume of currency is largely in excess of the real demands of legitimate business.” We hope the Ways and Means Committee will, early in the session, report a bili to carry ont Secretary Morrill’s plan, and that the commercial community will help the Secretary to urge this important matter on Congress. The Louisiana Vote, It will not’ surprise nny one to learn: that the Returning Board of Louisiana have declared the final result of their count to be in favor of the republi- can Presidential electors. By what means the conclusion has been reached cannot be known at present, as the work of the Board was completed in secret session. ‘The deci- sion will not be satisfactory to the public mind. So complete a reversal of the result shown on the face of the returns could only bo justifiable on the clearest proof of such gross frauds in counties giving democratic majorities as to convince all impartial judges that nothing like a fair election had been held in such counties. Certainly the evi- dence brought before the Roard in its open sessions established no such fact, and the time devoted to the investigation was not sufiicient to enable the Board to arive ata fair and honest judgment on so grave an issue, The matter now rests with the Con- gress of the United States, and it will be by which equal justice may be gone. The democratic electors, it is announced, intend to cast their votes for Mr, Tilden, under the authority of commissions received by them from Mr. McEnery. Of course they will have no standing that can be recognized, as Mr. McEnery can now make no claim to be regarded as Governor of the State. Still it is to be hoped that the unsatisfactory work of the Returning Board may be susceptible of some revision, IMeg2l Employment of Troops in the Southern Sta We do not accuse President Grant of a deliberate intention to violate the law. He appears to have no exact knowledge of what the law is in cases where the federal Ex- ecutive is called upon to suppress domestic violence in a State. The constitution re- quires that ‘‘he shall take care that the laws be faithfully executed.” That President Grant has wilfully disobeyed this injunc- tion is a reflection on his character which we should hesitate to make. But the law is, nevertheless, the law. His ignorance or misconception cannot change it. Without impugning his intentions we think it neces- sary to show him and his bad advisers how entirely he has deviated from the rules which the law prescribes for his guidance when he is asked to protect a Slate against domestic violence, We cited yesterday some imperative pro- visions of the statutes. which he has disre- garded. We wish now to recall a conspicu- ous instance of an authoritative official interpretation of the same statutes by a former administration, The Dorr rebellion in Rhode Island was the first and, until since the civil war, the only instance in our history of an application to the President by a State government for protection against domestic violence. At that time Daniel Webster held the chief place in the Cabinet. Mr. Webster’s supremacy as a constitutional lawyer, his residence im an adjoining State, his personal acquaintance with the Rhode Island officials and his deep interest in the question, led President Tyler to accept his advice on all the points of law, and all the points of prudence and discretion which arose on that exciting occasion. The letters and documents signed by the President in connection with that affair were the compo- sition of his Seeretary of State. They are valuable now as showing the view of Execu- tive duty formed after deliberate examina- tion by the great statesman and lawyer, whose chief title to pre-eminence was ‘‘the expounder of the constitution.” Governor King of Rhode Island became alarmed at the formidable dimensions of the Dorr movement, and applied to the Presi- dent for aid. Instead of granting the re- quest and sending soldiers at once, as Presi- dent Grant has done in recent cases, Presi- dent Tyler sent a letter (drafted by Mr. Webster) to Governor King, stating the law on that subject and showing that the Presi- dent had no authority to interpose at so early a stage of the difficulty. The letter began by copying at length the United States statutes bearing on the subject, and proceeded as follows :—‘‘By a careful con- sideration of the above recited acts of Con- gress Your Excellency will not fail to see that no power is vested in the Executive of the United States to anticipate insurrection- ary movements against the government of Rhode Island, so as to sanction the interposition of the military author- ity, but that there must be an actual insurrection, manifested by lawless as- semblages of people or otherwise, to whom a proclamation may be addressed, and who may be required to betake them- selves to their respective abodes.” Would that the same caution and wisdom, the same careful obedience to law, had been exhibited by President Grant! There was another sen- tence in that letter which is worth quoting. The President expressed a reluctance to meddle in a local dispute as to what is the real government of a State, and proceeded to say, “To throw the executive power of this government into any such controversy would be to make the President the armed arbitrator between the people of the differ- ent States and their constituted authorities, and might lead to a usurped power, dan- gerous alike to the stability of the State governments and the liberties of the people.” Having failed in his own application for immediate help Governor King cailed the Legislature of Rhode Island together in special session in order that they might ask military aid of the President. The Legisla- ture placed its application on the ground that ‘‘a strong military force was called out and did array themselves to protect the said unlawful organization.” But the President, still acting under Mr. Webster's advice, deferred action even then, hoping that the dispute might be peacefully settled. Another letter was sent to Governor King, in which the President said, “I have with difficulty brought myself at any time to be- lieve that an exigency would arise which the unaided power of the State conld not meet, especially as I have felt persuaded that Your Excellency would exhibit a temper of con- ciliation as well as of energy and decision,” We wish President Grant had been wiso enough to give a similar hint to Governor Chamberlain and to put him off in the same way. We desire to emphasize the point so dis- tinctly made by Mr. Webster and. Mr. Tyler that the President has no authority to inter- fero except in an “actual insurrection” against the State ‘government,” and that even then he cannot employ military force until he has first issued a proclamation commanding the insurgents to disperse and giving them a reasonable time to de- part to their homes. ‘This part of the law is founded on reason and humanity. Even in England it is necessary to read the Riot act before the troops can fire upon the mob, and this rute has never been disre- garded, even in the height of tae Fenian ex- citements. It is fairto give misguided indi- | viduals an opportunity to reflect and retreat before shooting them down, If a monarchi- eal government is thus tender of the lives of its subjects a republican government should practise equal humanity toward its own citi- zens. But if the President is deaf to the voice of humanity we confront him with the law which he is sworn to obey. The law explicitly commands him to issue a procla- mation before using troops agninst citizens, deplorable if some means cannot be found | and he is bound to keep his oath, Horatio Seymour's Speech. Horatio Seymour is one of the few men of the present day whose opinions on great public questions are looked for with interest and exercise a positive influence over the public mind. He is so well trasted by his party friends that his words are accepted by them as doctrinal utterances, He is so much respected by his political oppo- nents that his reasoning commands their attention. The specch delivered by the ex-Governor before the State elec- tors yesterday, when called to preside over their body, will be read with avidity both by republicans and democrats; by republicans, because they will find in il the most emphatic expression of democratic feeling that has yet found utterance during the existing crisis; by democrats, because they will seek in it a standard by which to govern their future action. As a strong party man Governor Seymour, of course, states his party case strongly. He seems to lay too much stress on the popular ma- | jority secured by Mr. Tilden—an advantage which counts for nothing under our present electoral system. But, as a statesman, he argues his case with ability, and it will be singular if his reasoning does not reach and affect some honest republican minds. Governor Seymour replies to the charges of wholesale democratic frauds in the eleo- tion, upon which alone the democratic ma- jerities could be expunged with even the thinnest pretence at justification. He main- tains that laws made by republicans, enforced under republican authority and by republi- can officials, prevailed in the machinery of the election all over the Union, and he argues from this fact that any great and systematized democratic frauds must have been impossible. He arraigns the administration for having openly allied itself with a political -party, and, by placing a Cabinet officer at the head of that party’s Executive Committee, given it the power of coercion over the govern- ment office-holders. He insists that an ad- ministration, taking power from unclean hands, can never check or lay bare the frauds of those to whom it owes its ex- istence, He regards it os ao shame and degradation to allow such a body as the Louisiana Returning Board to subvert the will of millions of voters. The republican party, he says, cannot do- cide its own case in its own favor against the majority of the American people, upon the certificateof branded men, without mak- ing the body of our citizens and the world at large feel that it is a corrupt and partisan decision. All this is democratic argument, of course, but there is enough of truth in some of it to claim the serious attention of othors than democrats. To the republicans Governor Seymour makes an earnest appeal for justice, and to his own party friends he wisely counsels prudence and forbearance, To both he says, ‘‘ Let ua not fail to be alike self-sacrificing in our efforts to uphold the honor and the virtue of the Republic.” Who Shall It Bet The refusal of Mr. James 8. Thayer to accept the office of Comptroller, to which he was nominated sevéral days ago by Mayor Wickham, is very much to be regretted. Mr. Thayer possesses unusual qualifications for the position, and has the rare advantage of a thorough knowledge of political affairs ana local politicians without being, in a party sense, a politician himself. At this time his services at the head of the Finance Depart- ment would have been valuable, and it is unfortunate for the property owners and business men of the city that his health and private affairs have prevented his accept- ance of the office. The question of interest now is, Who will be nominated in place of Mr. Thayer as Mr. Green’s successor? Tho gossip of the politicians pictures intrigues and combinations on the part of Mayor Wickham and Comptroller Green which may or may not exist. It is alleged that the nomination of Mr. Thayer was mado in the-expectation, amounting almost to certainty, that he would decline, and for the purpose of gaining time. The Mayor is said to have desired delay, so that he might secure the confirmation of his Corporation Counsel as the condition of the nomination of a Comptroller more acceptable to the politicians. Mr. Green is alleged to have been elso anxious for a ‘‘bridging over” process, so that his proposed contest over the office might be postponed until the Legislature shall be in session, by which time he hopes to make a bargain that may transfer him from a Comptrollership litigant to his old position in the Park Department. However much we may sympathize with Mr. Green's earnest desire to serve the city, in conformity with the wishes of a multitude of delegations, we are disposed to brush aside these reports and to give Mayor Wick- ham all the credit that is his due tor making so excellent a selection as that of Mr. Thayer for Mr. Green's successor, Having thus indicated what sort of a Comptroller he believes the city needs he cannot now afford to put in nomination a mere politician for that important office, unless he is willing to destroy his reputation and make the selfish motive of his act notorious. Mr. John Kelly has been named for the position and his appointment has been urged by democratic politicians. The democratic Aldermen are 80 anxious that Mr. Keily should have the place that it is said they will refnse to confirm any other nominee... All this shows that Mr. Kelly should not be nomi- nated, and that he cannot afford to allow his name to be sent to the Board of Aldermen, He is an honest man, and no doubt a capa- ble business man; but the belief that the nomination would be given him solely ag a political leader and for the purpose of controlling in the interests of his Tammany followers the large patronage of the depart. ment could not be shaken, and would de stroy public confidence in his administra tion, To be consistent and to deserve ree spect Mayor Wickham cannot afford to bar- gain away the Comptrollership to any poli tician after his first excellent nomination, Neither can Mr, John Kelly afford to accept the office of Comptrolier under existing cits cumstances without forteiting that character for independence which he seems so de sirous to establish. | Ovr Sprcie.—The report of the Director of the Mint shows that our coinuge during