and operated the roads more honestly than those who have managed them, though with "some stealing;" but if Mr. Rapsher had read either of the reports to which he refers he would have learned, first, that the only influence the "railway ring" exposed by the Credit Mobilier investigation exercised over Congress was to provoke that body to hostile legislation, which it has continued to this day; and second, that the Pacific Railway Commission, in its 6,000 printed pages, discloses nothing that answers the description of "robbery," unless, indeed, the Proudhon maxim be accepted, that "all property is robbery."

66

It must be admitted, of course, that a great deal of powerful invective and stirring eloquence will be lost if the examination of such voluminous authorities be insisted on as an essential qualification for intelligent treatment of the subject. It is easier to catch both information and inspiration from the scare heads " in a newspaper. Still, I venture to suggest that as this rather loose, though eloquent, denunciation of corporations, and especially of the Pacific roads, has gone on uninterruptedly for several years, there should be a rest of a few moments while somebody who has been twirling a nimble pen in the press or getting red in the face on the platform sends out for a fact or two, with which to season his discourse. It will take time, but it will be worth it. ISAAC H. BROMLEY.

NEW FACTS ABOUT MRS. SURRATT.

CORRESPONDENCE OF JUDGE HOLT AND HON. JAMES Speed.

THROUGH the Courtesy of Judge J. Holt, I have been favored with the following correspondence, which throws fresh light upon a dark page in the History of the Civil War. The execution of Mrs. Surratt has provoked and still continues to provoke great diversity of opinion, and these documents, now first given to the public, are important, not only as contributions to the History of the Times, but involve the interesting question of the rights and duties of a cabinet officer in declining to make known certain facts coming to his knowledge in an unofficial

manner.

ALLEN THORNDIKE RICE.

HON. JAMES SPEED:

WASHINGTON, April 18, 1883.

DEAR SIR: In compliance with the promise made in our last conversation, I now enclose you two pamphlets, published by me in 1873, in vindication of myself from the charge of having, when presenting the record of Mrs. Surratt's trial to President Johnson, withheld from him a petition signed by five members of the Court, recommending, in consideration of her age and sex, a commutation of her death sentence to imprisonment for life in the Penitentiary, in consequence of which he was led to approve the proceedings and sentence without any knowledge whatever of the existence of this petition. You were a member of his Cabinet, and I have the strongest reasons for believing that this atrocious accusation is known to you to have been false in its every intendment. It originated with President Johnson, and for years was industriously circulated by his unscrupulous abettors, though he himself did not dare make open proclamation of it until he felt assured through your letter of 30th March,

1873, that no damaging disclosures were to be apprehended from yourself. It will be gratifying to me if you can spare the time to carefully examine the proofs arrayed in my defense in these pamphlets. They will make it apparent to you that nothing but your own testimony is needed to render my vindication so complete as to silence the most malignant of my traducers. This testimony I asked of you in 1873, and now solicit it again, but not wholly as a personal matter. The question whether a President of the United States-as a craven refuge from accountability for official action-did seek to blacken the reputation of a subordinate officer holding a confidential interview with him, is in no just sense a private question; it is essentially a public one, which concerns the whole country, and one to which the country may well expect you to speak, seeing that you were a member of that President's Cabinet, at the time of this disgraceful transaction. Your unwillingness, thus to speak to it in 1873, seemed to have arisen from an exaggerated estimate of a rule which once prevailed in regard to the inviolability of cabinet counsels and secrets. But whatever may have been, in the remote past, the recognized force of this rule, the frequent and conspicuous disregard of it, during the last two decades, by statesmen of the highest probity and rank, leaves the impression that the rule itself has lived its day and is now practically dead and inoperative. Waiving, however, this view, it is clear to me, that were the rule accepted as now binding, in its utmost rigor, it could have no application to this case. I cannot be misled in supposing that the relations between the President and his Cabinet are relations of honor, and that, therefore, they cannot be held to oblige any member of his Cabinet to protect, by his concealment and thus become a moral accomplice in it-any criminal or wrongful act into which the President may be drawn, by a guilty ambition or by any other unworthy passion or purpose. In a word, the rule never has been, and never should be so construed as to become a shelter for perfidy or crime. I trust you will concur in this opinion and will yet believe with me, as a corollary from it, that no custom or usage can possibly impose upon you as a duty an obligation to stand guard over and shield, by your silence, from exposure, a base falsehood, concocted and propagated by a treacherous Executive, in the hope of escaping from the responsibility of his own official conduct, and to this end destroying the reputation of an officer of the government per

forming a public service in his presence-a service, certainly not sought by that officer, but exacted from him by the requirements of the position he held. And yet, an interpretation of the rule mentioned, which would now close your lips, must assign you precisely this rôle and no other, and must, at the same time, offer to you for immolation the good name of an innocent man, who never wronged you, but who has been throughout your steadfast friend. Which then will you sacrifice-the falsehood or the friend? Pardon the freedom with which I address you. The issue of this discussion is so vastly important for me—and I venture to think that it is not wholly unimportant for yourself-that plainness of speech seems due to us both.

Can I be mistaken in the ground I occupy? Your associates in the Cabinet-Messrs. Seward and Stanton-condemning the rule by which I have been so long victimized, declared the truth fully to Judge Bingham,* as he has so forcibly set forth in his letter-to which you are referred. I repeat, they declared it not only freely, but unhesitatingly, utterly heedless of the brand which it might burn into the Presidential forehead.

Allow me to add, that we are now, each of us, far advanced in years, so that whatever is to be done for my relief should be done quickly. While, however, it is sadly apparent that I can remain. here but a little while longer, I have not been able to bring myself to the belief, that you will suffer the closing hours of my life to be darkened by a consciousness that this cloud, or even shred of it, is still hanging over me-a cloud which can be dissipated at once and forever, by a single word spoken by yourself in defense of the truth and in rebuke of a calumny, the merciless cruelty of which none can better understand than yourself. I make this final appeal to your honor as a man to do me the simple justice which under the same circumstances I would render to you at once promptly and joyfully.

Very sincerely yours,

J. HOLT.

*This praise was certainly due to Mr. Seward, but not, in strictness, to Mr. Stanton, sinc on making the communication to Judge Bingham, he endeavored, and successfully, to prevent him from giving it publicity. The fear of Andrew Johnson's resentment, added to a determination on his part to leave my reputa tion-then under fire from his silence-to its fate, sufficiently explains his otherwise inexplicable conduct.

LAW OFFICE OF JAMES SPEED.

Office of Thomas and John Speed, Attorneys at Law, 511 West Green Street. LOUISVILLE, Ky., April 25, 1883.

GENERAL JOE HOLT, Washington, D. C.:

MY DEAR SIR: I received your letter Saturday last. Soon after the receipt I lost my spectacles, which are peculiar, and did not find them till this morning. I will read the papers at my earliest leisure, being now much absorbed in two cases, and after reading them will write to you. I will preserve them carefully.

GEN. JAMES SPEED:

Most truly your friend,
JAMES SPEED.

WASHINGTON, June 21, 1883.

MY DEAR SIR: It isjust two months to-day-as evidenced by your receipt transmitted to me by the postal authorities-since my letter of the 18th of April reached your hands, and yet I am still without reply. In view of our past relations and of the spirit and purpose of my communication, I could not have supposed this result possible. It would be needless to express, as I feel it, the bitterness of the disappointment which this treatment of my appeal to you has occasioned me. Suffice it to say, that if I know my own heart, under no conceivable circumstances could I be induced to manifest such profound indifference to any declared wish of yours, affecting either your reputation or any other of your cherished interests. As you have doubtless arrived at a conclusion on the question submitted for your consideration, I have to request that, at your earliest convenience, you will be so good as to re-enclose to me in a registered envelope the pamphlets which accompanied my letter, and which were sent by your desire for your examination. Sincerely yours,

J. HOLT.

LOUISVILLE, June 21,* 1883.

HON. JOE HOLT, Washington, D. C. :

DEAR SIR: I found your letter of the 21st on my table Monday morning, and read it with concern and surprise. You say, considering our past relations, that you know of no conceivable

* This date, through an oversight, is evidently incorrect. The Postmark is 27th June, which is no doubt the true date of the letter.