entatives in Congress upon all the
public questions at issue during the years immediately preceding the
Convention.

The report which committed the Democracy to so radical a revolution in
its platform of principles met with protest from only an inconsiderable
number of the delegates, and was adopted by a vote of 670 to 62. The
Convention was now ready for the nominations. It had been plain for
some weeks that the Cincinnati ticket would be accepted. The only
question was whether the Democratic Convention should formally nominate
Greeley and Brown, or whether it should simply indorse them without
making them the regular Democratic candidates. It was urged on the one
hand that to put the formal seal of Democracy on them might repel some
Republican votes which would otherwise be secured. It was answered on
the other hand that the passive policy would lose Democratic votes,
which were reluctant at the best and could only be held by party
claims. There was more danger from the latter source than from the
former, and the general sentiment recognized the necessity of stamping
the ticket with the highest Democratic authority. There was but one
ballot. Mr. Greeley received 686 votes; while 15 from Delaware and
New Jersey were cast for James A. Bayard, 21 from Pennsylvania for
Jeremiah S. Black, 2 for William S. Groesbeck. For Vice-President
Gratz Brown received 713, John W. Stevenson of Kentucky 6, with 13
blank votes.

Mr. Greeley's letter accepting the Democratic nomination appeared a few
days later. He frankly stated that the Democrats had expected and
would have preferred a different nomination at Cincinnati, and that
they accepted him only because the matter was beyond their control.
He expressed his personal satisfaction at the endorsement of the
Cincinnati platform, and affected to regard this act as the
obliteration of all differences. The only other point of the letter
was an argument for universal amnesty. This was the one doctrine upon
which the parties to the alliance could most readily coalesce, and
Mr. Greeley gave it singular prominence, as if confident that it was
the surest way of winning Democratic support. He emphasized his
position by referring to the case of Mr. Vance, who had just been
denied his seat as Senator from North Carolina. Mr. Greeley made this
case the chief theme of his letter, and insisted that the policy which
excluded the chosen representative from a State, whoever he might be