n the canal policy of
the States. He bore a prominent part with Mr. Van Buren in the
Barnburners' Revolt of 1848, in which he and some of his associates
departed for a brief period from a lifelong pro-slavery record, and
rode Free-soil as the stalking-horse of personal resentments and
factional designs. He professed devotion to the Wilmot Proviso as
earnestly as one of the old Abolitionists, and turned from it as if
its advocacy had been the amusement of a summer vacation. He
occasionally appeared in National Conventions, and he acted for some
years as chairman of the Democratic State Committee of New York. This
was the total of his public service until he set forth upon what was
the immediate preliminary movement to his Presidential campaign.

But from his earliest manhood he had been a close student of political
affairs. He was a devotee of Jackson in his youth, and became one of
the ardent disciples of Van Buren, whom he adopted as mentor and model.
His earlier political papers are dignified and elevated in tone beyond
his years, and show a strong intellect and careful reflection; but
they are in the stately and turgid style of the period and lack the
decisive and original force of his later productions.

Even when he followed the vigorous Dean Richmond as chairman of the
Democratic State Committee, he did not suggest the creative political
power which he afterwards revealed. He was regarded rather as a
respectable figure-head. It was on this assumption that he escaped
completely in the notorious election frauds of New York in 1868. His
name was appended to the private call for the earliest possible
approximate returns from the interior, a call which meant that the
authors only wanted a clue to determine how large a majority must be
counted in the metropolis to secure the State. Mr. Tilden denied all
knowledge of the letter. Without even consulting him, his authority
had been appropriated by the "Tweed Ring," just then rising to its
colossal power. During the entire period of its profligate ascendency,
Mr. Tilden continued as chairman of the State Committee, but he did
not share its corrupt counsels or sanction its audacious schemes. The
worst reproach which lies against him is that of remaining too long
a passive witness. There was no bond of affiliation between him and
the vulgar adventurers who had taken the Democratic party and the city
of New York by the throat. He had no sympathy with their coars