CARL SCHURZ'S POLITICAL CAREER
‘Free Trade’ would suit you as well as ‘Revenue Reform.’ The former phrase has a definite meaning; the latter seems to me a juggle.
“If I might presume to advise you I would say Wait: Take time for reflection and consultation. I do not see how this course can harm anyone. I am confident that the ‘sober second thought’ will bring us all into proper relations.
“With many thanks for your personal good will and kindness, I remain,
“Yours,
From these initial letters, and with increasing clearness
from others that followed, it was evident that the “frankness”
which characterized them was not likely to promote any
remarkable degree of harmony between the candidate and the
Liberal chief—between the man whose nomination was the
product of “political huckstering” and the man whose
demand for revenue-reform was a “juggle” and whose
associates in the demand were “frauds.” On May 18th, Schurz
wrote that the chances were heavily against Greeley's election,
that another Liberal Republican ticket was soon to be in the
field, and that the acceptance of the Cincinnati nomination
ought to be postponed till the outlook became more clear.
Greeley replied, dissenting entirely from Schurz's view of
things, and declaring: “I shall accept unconditionally.”
Meanwhile friends of Schurz and Greeley took up the task of repairing the breach which the frankness of the correspondence between the two men was steadily widening. The result was told to Schurz in a letter from Horace White dated June 9th. Mr. White after an evening with the candidate at the house of Waldo Hutchins, wrote “Greeley made the im-
[ 351 ]
