lfare), than upon the faithful discharge of
their own duties, he succeeded, by the force of his own earnest
personality, by searching investigation into the workings of all the
departments of city affairs, by the ruthless exposure and denunciation
of various corrupt schemes of jobbery and plunder, and by the persistent
recommendation of measures and methods which commended themselves to his
judgment, in accomplishing much in the way of the reform for which his
election had been sought. He used the veto power with a vigor and a
significance which had characterized the action of no predecessor in the
office, and often regardless of the fact that its exercise might be
distorted by designing enemies, personal or political, to insure him at
least the temporary disapprobation of large classes of citizens; but he
used it only when fully satisfied, through patient research and careful
deliberation, that duty and obligation imperatively required it. It is
conceded that in his brief year's administration he saved a million of
dollars to the city treasury, stamped out numerous abuses, and
stimulated the spirit of faithful devotion in various branches of the
municipal service. Men of all parties unite in saying that the city of
Buffalo was never favored with the services of a more faithful,
conscientious, and thoroughly impartial executive head.

But he was not to continue the work of administrative reform in that
particular field of labor. The people had called him "up higher." His
reputation as a true Democrat, an honest reformer, and a faithful public
servant, had spread abroad through the State, and when the Democratic
State Convention assembled in the early autumn of that year it was
clearly apparent that the nomination of Grover Cleveland, the reform
mayor of Buffalo, as the candidate of the party for the supreme
magistracy of the Empire State, was the one certain guaranty of
overwhelming Democratic victory at the polls. That nomination was
promptly made, and the result which followed was without parallel in the
annals of American political history. He was elected governor by a
majority of nearly two hundred thousand, and, although internal
dissensions in the Republican party, then existing, contributed largely
to the general result, the most significant feature of the election is
found in the fact that the largest relative Democratic gain was made in
his own county of Erie, where he received upwards of seven thousand
majorit