"_Centralism_ in _government_ and _corruption_ in _administration_ are the twin evils of our times. They threaten with swift destruction not only civil liberty, but the whole fabric of our free institutions. "The Democratic party was organized by Jefferson to oppose these identical evils. It conducted the national government for fifty of the seventy years of the present century, and gave the people safety, prosperity, and happiness. "The present demoralization has happened under the ascendency of the Republican party; and though the mass of them, like the mass of all parties, are honest in their intentions, and some allowance ought to be made for the demoralizing influence of a great civil war, more of these results are to be ascribed to the utterly false and corrupting system of finance unnecessarily adopted by these Republican administrations; and there is no doubt the tendency of the principles and measures of the Republican party is unfavorable to purity in government. "In the State, the Democracy ruled for twenty-five years--from 1821 to 1846--under Van Buren, Wright, Marcy, and Flagg; and corruption, always condemned and punished by them, was almost unknown. "In the 24 years from 1847 to 1870 the Democracy never had a majority in the Senate. Twice only did it have a slender majority in the Assembly. "The Republicans had the legislative power of the State, and that is now the government both at Washington and at Albany. "The Republicans made the morals of the legislative bodies what they have recently been. When Seward and Weed took the place of Wright, Marcy, and Flagg, public and official morality fell in the twinkling of an eye. "Even as to the city government of New York, until 1870, it was exactly what the Republican legislatures made it. The Republican party was born in 1855. In 1856 it swept the State by 80,000. In the Senate of 1857 the Democrats had but 4 out of 32 members; in the Assembly, but 37 out of 128. "Then the Republicans made the city charter under which we have lived until 1870. At the same session the same hand which created the Republican party created also the supervisor's board, which has been the source of all the corruptions in our city government. "The league between corrupt Republicans and corrupt Democrats which was formed during Republican ascendency was too strong for honest men in 1870. The charter of that year had the votes of nearly all the Republicans. I denounced it in a public speech. "Wherever the gangrene of corruption has reached the Democratic party we must take a knife and cut it out by the roots. "S. J. TILDEN." W. F. HAVEMEYER TO R. B. CONNOLLY "NEW YORK, _September 16, 1871_. "RICHARD B. CONNOLLY, ESQ. "SIR,--I have considered the question which you have submitted to me; and, to prevent the possibility of misapprehension, reduce my advice to writing.