Speech #460007817

In the elections of 1876 he had under him one thousand and seventy supervisors. twentyfive hundred deputy marshals. and an indefinite number of commissioners. at an expense for them and for himself of $94.587. In 1878 lie employed twelve hundred and twentyfive supervisors. thirteen hundred and fifty deputy marshals. and commissioners in proportion. for all whose pay and expenses he drew upon the money of the people in the Treasury. In June. 1876. as clerk of the United States circuit court. he issued warrants for the arrest of twentysix hundred naturalized voters to be brought before him as United States commissioner and chief supervisor for the purpose of making them surrender their naturalization papers. The Federal courts themselves afterward held that the naturalization papers in question were all legal and valid. but the desired result had been accomplished. The tenor inspired by these arrests intimidated thousands from going to the polls. It became well known that there was no personal security in New York in connection with the elections. and the poor. the timid. and the humble staid away. The same course was pursued in 1878. During the summer of that year nine thousand four hundred citizens were notified that they would be arrested unless they surrendered their naturalization papers to the headoverseer. John I. Davenport. In the mouth of October. 1878. thirtyone hundred persons were actually arrested and a reign of terror inaugurated just in advance of the election. The pretense that these persons held fraudulent naturalization papers had already been shown to be false. but it was necessary to party success that an alarm should be raised and a panic created in the minds of foreignborn citizens and of the poor laboring classes generally. The movement was successful. and it has been estimated that ton thousand legal voters remained away from the polls rather than risk the jails and the prisonpens of the chief supervisor and his subordinates. But it was reserved for the day of election itself to give free scope to the frightful powers with which this band of Federal kuklux is invested.