AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A PENNSYLVANIAN
of the idea that he was sitting as a judge of a court which was a great mistake. You took the sensible view of it. You always recognized that you were not there as a judge at all.” “I was there,” replied the Justice, “as if I were a judge to decide the matter as nearly according to the law as it could be done and to do justice." “There is no use in disguising the fact,” said MacVeagh, “that the Commission was in no sense a court. The Commission decided in favor of Hayes and when I went down to New Orleans at the head of the MacVeagh Commission I overruled them.” “What is your view of the law of the matter, MacVeagh?” inquired the Justice. “When I went down there,” said MacVeagh, “I found that everything in fact was under the control of the Nichols Government. When a child was born he was registered by an officer under Nichols. When he died, probate was granted by an official appointed by the Nichols Government. Marriage certificates were taken out in its name. I established it de jure as well as de facto. With a grim and resolute President like Grant, with a Secretary of War like my brother-in-law, not over scrupulous, with an army officer like Sheridan, with a returning board not over scrupulous, if the Republicans could not get a majority of more than eight thousand, there was not much in their position.”
The Justice said:
“The Constitution of Louisiana provided years before that there should be a returning board empowered to count the votes and determine the result. It seems to have been foreseen that there might come a time when force might be used in an election and this was the means provided for meeting it. We considered that this was a subject within the control of the state. To permit Congress to determine the vote would have resulted in the destruction of the Government. That body never acts judicially. It would be like their determination upon the rights to seats which are invariably decided in favor of those in sympathy with the majority. So it would be in the case of a President. There was no doubt fraud in Louisiana as there was also the use of force. But our view was that the state must regulate the casting and the counting of the vote. It had developed this plan and had the power to do it. We saved the country at that time from anarchy and there has been little recognition of our service. The Democrats abused us and the Republicans have never come to our defense.
“Many Democrats have thanked me since for preserving this right to the states. There is more appreciation of it among the
