Page:American Historical Review, Volume 12.djvu/421

 Hazvorth : Hayes-Tilden Presidential Election 411 ing of the doubtful votes for Hayes was not a " plot " ; the Democratic leaders, including Mr. Tilden, are proved by the " Cipher dispatches " to have attempted bribery ; the bargain by which Hayes ceased to support the carpet-bag governments in Florida, South Carolina, and Louisiana, after securing their electoral votes, was proper and did not involve anv real inconsistency. The foregoing conclusions might of course be reached by a rigidly impartial judge through the weighing of evidence, but unfortunately it is the absence of impartiality which stands out prominently in Mr. Haworth's language and temper. They seem worthier indeed of 1866 than of 1906. All his praise is reserved for Republican leaders, all his sarcasm for their opponents. Tilden is mentioned only with a sneer. The speech of Jeremiah S. Black before the Electoral Commission is termed (p. 264) " a bitter invective, hardly to have been expected from the man who, in the greatest crisis of our history, had rendered to a weak President one of the . . . most unfortunate opinions ever given by a public officer." The Southern motive for attacking and terrifying negroes is said (pp. 82-83) to be the fact that "as the negro was now 'the nation's ward,' he was a convenient object on which the unthinking could vent their impotent hatred for the North ". Mr. Haworth fairly gloats over the humiliation of South Carolina, even styling the carpet- bag abominations in that state "poetic justice" (p. 123), and picturing with evident satisfaction the situation of South Carolinians obliged to listen to " the strains of a song relating to a certain Brown late of Osawatomie " (p. 122). Wherever Mr. Haworth admits any Republican error, he almost invariably offsets it by an allusion to an equivalent Democratic misde- meanor. The Florida returning board, for instance, " did its work in an unpardonably partisan manner, though in so doing ... it merely fol- lowed examples recently set by the Democratic majority in the national House of Representatives" (p. 67). Further, while admitting that all the returning boards altered returns to secure Republican majorities, Mr. Haworth considers that this was merely a recognition of the fact that in equity the states were Republican, owing to the existence of negro intimidation. " Had there been a fair and free election . . . there can be little if any doubt that the result . . . would have been favorable to Hayes " (p. 340). In short, the monograph is thoroughly scientific in method and sound in its criticism of fact, but is equally unscientific in spirit and temper. The style occasionally descends perilously near flippancy and vulgarity at the expense of Southern Democrats. What prevents this partizanship from damaging the work is the author's admirable clearness and comprehensiveness of research and his recogni- tion that, for all his preferences, there were two sides to each question. Mr. Haworth's decisions are those of an " eight to seven " Republican, every time, but the evidence is fully given. REV., VOL.