SPIRIT OF THE PRESS.
EDITORIAL OPIWIOH8 OF TH LKADINfJ JOURNALS
BPOB COBRKNT ToPIOH COMril,KD RVBRT
PAT FOB TBI EVENING TKLK'JRAPH,
Itrpllhllcau Alma.
From the N. Y. Aation.
TLere can be but little question now of the
way in which the reconstruction process, as
Congress Las arranged it, will end. By hook
or by crook the Southern States will -come into
the Union tinder it, and for the most part they
will be brought in by Radical hands. The
now constitutions will, of course, meet Con
gressional requirements, and then all will be
done for the Southern negro that the Republi
can party at the North has proposed to do by
direct legislation. We put aside the scheme of
establishing each colored head of a family on a
forty-acre farm as one which the party, as a
party, has never Feriously entertained, though
Borne of "its leaders may have talked of it.
Whatever is to be done, if anything is to be
done, towards the better distribution of landed
property at the South, will have to be done by
(state legislation. We are getting further au I
further away every day from the possibility of
Congress undertaking any such job. There
will still remain the task of abolishing the
odious discrimination against negroes at the
North by which the legislation of several
states is still disgraced.
We fear the opportunity of accomplishing
Ibis sieedily has, as we pointed out last week,
passed away for the present, but we are satis
lied, nevertheless, that the abuse will not be
of very long duration. It caunot last under
the battery of a free press and a free platform.
The arguments by which the Ohio llepubli
cans defend their oppoaitiou to it at the late
election show that it cannot last very long,
for they show that it rests simply on ignorauce
or prejudice. If it appeared that there was
any principle of government to which the body
of the peoplo are deeply attached violated by
the admission of the negroes to the polls, we
Should look forward to a long and doubtful
Struggle. 15ut when there is nothing better to
be said against it than that people dislike or
despise 'niggers," or that "this is a white
man's government," we know that its triumph
is not very far distant.
But supposing, then, "equal suffrage" esta
blished all over the country the millennium
would still be to come. There are abundant
indications on all sides of us that many good
people are not of this opinion. The light
against caste and privilege and inequality be
fore the law has been so bitter, the prize on
Which the Republican party is at last setting
its hands seems so splendid and has seemed so
remote, that people have naturally enough
worked themselves up into the belief that,
once it is attained, most of the ills by which
the body politio is affected will soon disappear.
The ballot during the last two years Las been
constantly spoken of as if it were a kind of
panacea, as if we had only to give it to persons
of the male and female sex, not lunatics or
criminals, in order to see the Golden Age
return, to see the thorny path of pro
gress, along which the race has thus
far struggled with bleeding feet, sud
denly converted into a path of flowers, in which
"toil of heart and knees and hands" will be
110 longer necessary. Of course we do not
mean to affirm that if auy individual Re
publican were asked privately whether he
thought impartial suffrage would briug back
the Golden Age, he would not laugh the idea to
scorn. But we do not hesitate to affirm that
there has been widely diffused through the
ranks of the party a vague notion that, the
ballot once secured for all, we should Had our
selves on "the shining table-lands," where
questions of government would give us no
more trouble, where every man would know
bis duty aud do it, and the knaves and op
pressors would fade into nothingness. We go
further, and affirm that this notion, vague
though it has been, has done much towards
creating and fostering the recklessness and
carelessness in the management of the
party, the indifference of good men to the cor
ruption and jobbery and humbug which have
brought on it its recent reverses, and which
render its success iu this State still doubtful.
If the conviction that the ballot is, after all,
but a means to an end; that in the hands of
ignorant men it is but a means of defense aud
of eduoation; that, like any other power, it
may be nesd for good as well as for evil; and
that the cause of all bad government in all
ages and all nations has been the ignorauce of
the mass of the people, had been general, we
should not have witnessed the squandering of
resources, the waste of enthusiasm, of devo
tion, and of numbers during the past two
years which have brought the party into its
present difficulties.
It is, however, because we do not believe the
mission of the Republican party to be simply
the work of reconstruction, or the establish
ment of universal suffrage; because we do
believe that even if the organization should
under its present name disappear, when these
ends have been accomplished, it will reappear
with but very little change in its elements
under another; that it is now, and must re
main by whatever name it may be known, the
party of progress the party which will seek
to govern men through their reason rather
than through their prejudices, their appetites,
or their selfishness; the party of order, of
education, of peace, and of national honesty ;
the parly through which good and patriotic
men will have to briug their convictious to
bear on publio affairs that we rejoice in its
successes, aud should mourn its recent
reverses more if we did not feel that they will
prove the means of purifying it and increas
ing its efficiency.
imt it must git rid of the notion at once
and for ever that universal suffrage is a cure
all, and that when it has secured this its work
Is over. Us wrk will never be over while
there are such things as knavery or corrup
tion in politics- while there is a single'bit of
Si, J ZT? t0 advauce th e"
Z $ W ?u tUB statute-book which
keeps people irom being as happy or as pros
porous as they might be if it wire not there
It is not the party 0f "equal woW' or of
any other political pill or tonic; it
Of good government, of virtue, knowled"
and understanding. ial,e.e,
The Democratic party will not be hereafter
in any good sense of the word, a "oousorva
tive" party, a party striving to keep things
fixed either through caution or through a sen
timental attachment to the past. Now that
Slavery is gone, there is no time-honored
abuse left for the lovers of old things to rally
round. There is no objection here, as there
is in Uurop", on the pstrt of any class of
the community to frequeut legislative changes,
no love of ancient ways as aucieiit; all
parties are almost equally fond of change and
equally ready to try experiments iu govern
ment. The Democrats are not, therefore, the
equivalents of the European Tories or "Junk
ers." The party which the party of progress
will Lere always find opposed to it will be a
party oomposed of the most Ignorant aud most
THE DAILY
u lunn t:riiieiiiE) 1 II mtf cuniiuuuiLjr, iu i'jt
men loud of power, aud anxious to use the
. : . t i 1 . .. .. i : .. e it t
J .J , i i. i ii.. : . .- l .l i.
Vl(
e and ignorance ami degradation of tlmir
) rr ti -a tti t--,i a.xV 4 attain If ami 1 tti i t-i r
foil
for much government or little govHrninnut,
for inti'rfarfiii or uon-interferentm. for hon-
iul r vjtii (1 a t i (in fnl innvnnuint r v f-v
pose, as may seem most likely to gratify the
passions or the prejudices of the rank and
lile. To call this party "Conservative" is to
degrade a term which some of the purest aul
....... i .. i. . i ii I..
iT.ii. iiit-u in m worm nave, ami'ist many er
rois and many delusion'?, ennobled by tlmir
self-sacrifice, their enthusiasm, ami their
piety.
it this be a true view of the ends for which
the Republican paity exists, it must, in order
to do its duty, discard at once the idea that
it may or must uso the same means that the
Democratic party Las been in the habit of
using. As it rebts on the moral and religious
hentiment of the community, and as it is to
this sentiment that it must always address
itself, it must pive up the idea of copying
Democratic methods, Democratic discipline
and oiganizatiou. Its means must, in a word,
be noble as well as its aims. It must abandon
the Democratic plan of throwing dust iu the
people's eyes, of treating voters as if they
were children, of trying to persuade people,
like Macaulay's Brahmin, that a mangy dog
is a line sheep, fit to sacrifice to the gods; it
must give up all forms of humbug; it must
not, ior instance, try to baruboo.le poor Irish
men by affecting to believe the Feniaus a
belligerent power, aud passing sham
votes of sympathy with "the Irish re
public;" it nrust not affect to believe
that men can work eight hours aul yet bo
entitled to as much wages as if they worked
ten; it must not pretend to believe that every
male voter is a perfect judge of measures aud
men; that it makes no difference what a candi
date's character or antecedents may be, pro
vided be is "sound" ou the suffrage or the
temperance or the Sunday question, or on any
other question; it must not affect to consider a
judge's character and learning to be considera
tions of less importance than his political
opinions; it must not, for instance, solemnly
pretend to believe such a person as Judge
Underwood "an enlightened jurist," simply
because he hates Rebels; it must give up pre
tending to consider the conclusions of human
reason to be no obstacles to the gratification of
anything on which enthusiasm or passion may
have set its heart, and, above all, it must
make the character of publio men the first,
and their knowledge the second, qualification
for cilice. Mr. Stevens is just now abusing it
for its "want of courage." We presume he
means by this its failure to take' some
more "advanced" and less defensible
position; some position whioh would bid louder
defiance to the teachings of experience aud
principles of human nature than any he has
yet been able to urge it into. We, too, think
it is want of courage that has brought it to
grief; but it is not the kind of courage he has
in his mind; it is the courage to discard base
arts and crooked ways and mean compliances;
the courage to trust everything to humanity,
the conscience, the good sense, and the love of
truth and justice of the American people, and
nothing whatever to "management" and chi
cane aud balderdash. Some of the sages who
Lave had charge of it have been all alon
under the delusion that if they only shouted
loud enough for "equal rights" it made no
diflerence how many knaves got office, and
how much humbug they embodied in speeches
and resolutions; but they are gradually
awakening from it. There are already strong
indications that the men of intluence are
finding out what the matter
is. The New York Tribune aud
we re'er to it not because we wish to cast any
special blame ou it for recent reverses, but
because it is the most influential journal of the
party is doin now what, had it been done a
year or two years ago, would, we verily be
lieve, have prevented these reverses warning
t.liA ' Muri ialnriva ililiova" tiY On. nni.
. u jw.ti.i? vi bun VUUIO, ailLl
advising voters not simply to "seratch" but
to "bolt," not simply to strike bad names off
ll A A 1 X 1 A. A 1
iue pan uckci oui xo put gooo. ones on it;
in other words, to make iha irutt;
t J v. irilA
men into ollice the first of party aims; and
mis it eviuentiy uoes in tne belief, which is
and always has been ours, that in no way
can the Republican party secure so lon
t . . ... .p.
icuuio ui power, so morouguiy root itselt in
tLe confidence of the people, as by showing
that it considers victory at the polls not a
blessing but a curse if it has been won through
processes which harden the popular heart,
blunt the popular conscience, or provide
knaves with the reward of their hypocrisy.
We sincerely trust that now that they are
shaking, off the delusion that they must swal
low nominations whole, the Republicans of
this State and elsewhere will show that they
have clearer views of what the functions aud
value of the party are than many of their
leaders, and that they will, while saving their
consciences, give it their hearty support.
The Pretldeutlnl Question -The Coali
tion Afc'aluat Ucutitl Uraut.
R om the N. Y. Herald.
There seems to be a common understanding
and a sort of coalition among radicals and
Copperheads, Chase Republicans, and Seymour
and Pendleton Democrats, to kill off General
Grant as a Presidential candidate. Nor is
there any mystery in this strange alliance.
With the nomination of General Grant as the
Republican candidate, the issue of the Presi
dential election is a foregone conclusion. Kx
cepting, perhaps, Delaware, Maryland, and
Kentucky, Grant would sweep the whole
country, North, South, Kast, and West. The
result would be the same with one opposition
candidate or a dozen such candidates in the
light. There would not be the ghost of a
chance tor Seymour, Pendleton, or McClellau
running singly or all together. This is well
understood by the Democratic leaders. Hence
they are doing, aud will do, all they can to put
Grant on the shelf and put Chase into the
foreground as the Republican candidate. With
Chafe in the field, and Grant set aside, the
campaign will be fought, not upon the grand
achievements and high claims of the man upon
the gratitude of a grateful people, but upon the
principle which he represents. Thus, aaiust
the universal negro suffrage aud Southern
negro supremacy schemes, and against the
financial policy and principles of Mr. Chae
the Democrats, with Chase's nomination, will
make their fight in the nomination of Seymour
or Pendleton, and the Republicans will hive
to meet them on these issues. The glories of
uie war will be thrown out of the canvass, aud
nt,VrUO,r,tLeirlotika of Sauwon, the Re-
3 ffi'S.Xfi " only that
leSls toPIatnf,the "?xiety of the Erratic
andto bringfM eTialUi:ant Ut f the wa'
Republican6 lCrV
learned, not only from n r ,lhujr have
Jackson, but from Xt of P,lU,ari1ty,Iof Veu'
and General Taylor UBral 1Iarrili(n
glory; and they know"," .f "J"1"'
tlenry Clay, that the mort dlat&i-V'i f
man, of whom everything
LEG 11 API! PHIL ADEL PII A, SATURDAY f
defeated by a second-rate obscure politician if
put on a popular platform. The Chase faction.
however, believe in the discipline of the Re
publican party, and that, with bis neirro po
litical pystem in the South, ami with his finan
cial system, including his legion of national
uaiiKS in tne iNortli and liis bondholders, he
has the machinery for holding the Republican
elements together. And so the Chase Republi
cans are as anxious as the Seymour Demo,
crats of New York, or the Pendleton Demo
crats of Ohio, to shelve General Grant.
The Chase managers and bankers of tin
New York Republican camp are working lilce
weavers to reverse, in our November election.
the tremendous October verdict of Ohio
against Chase and bis universal panacea of
universal ana immediate negro sufirage. Thy
hold that Mr. Chase is not responsible for
their Ohio disaster, and that Mr. Pendleton's
convenient proposition for paying off the na
tional bondholders in greenbacks had much to
do with the increase of the Democratic vote iu
Ohio. But the approaching election in New
lork will .be conclusive one wav or the other.
on this Chase platform of universal n'";ro
sullrage and Southern negro supremacy. The
conservative Grant Republicans, therefore, can
settle the question on Tuesday next in favor
of their candidate, by simply letting the
inase men ligbt out the battle ior themselves;
tor, while the loss of New lork to the Repab
licaiis, after all their other losses this fall, will
leave them no alternative but General Grant.
it is altogether probable that if they save New
Yoik, the result will turn the scale in favor of
Chase.
Give them New York, and then, as Mr
("base and his engineers have possession of the
Republican machinery, we apprehend that
ucnerai irrant will be shelved; we gues3 that,
satisfied with his present desirable position.
be will consent to stand aside in favor of
Chase; and if so, we may, between Chase an 1
Seymour, or Chase and Pendleton, prepare for
one oi tne most exciting, sharply contested.
and uncertain Presidential campaigns since
mat oi ini between tlay and I'olk.
Repudiating Dodge.
From the JV. Y, 7Yibune.
The Herald says:
"No sensible person proposes, we suppose, to
issue two thousand millions of Government
money and pay oil the debt at once with that.'
Y'es; George II. Pendleton does propose
lust mat. neury ciay JJean proposes it
Vallandigham proposes it. livery Western
coppeiiiead ot auy account proposes it. Aud
you are deceiving your readers when you
assert mat tliey do not.
The Jlcrald continues:
"What is mennt by paying In (rreonb tcks
Is to kef pas much of tuat, currency all lat as
toe country run re:isnably bear, and by no
means to contract the present amount till jll
or a large portion oi the (loot De liquidated.
1'hat Is the proposition, aud that, we think, Is
what the country will come lo. And what in
justice would bo done? Who would ba in
jured ? Nearly nil of the bondholders would bo
paid mere than llicy gave for the bonds.'
Here i3 the old game of scaling the debt,
which Hamilton put his foot on in 17!'0. A
man walks up to the Treasury and says, "Mr,
Treasurer, here is the promise of the United
States to pay tfHw to bearer on demand;
want the money." "Well, here is $4'i"," re
sponds the Treasurer; "it is all that the bond
cost you." If this isn't the answer of a scoun
drel, then there never was a scoundrel.
To determine how much greenback cur
rency "the country can reasonably bear," wa
should resume and thereafter maintain specie
payment, 'ihen, it the country wants
141)0,000,(100, or $800,000,000, or 1, 200,(100,000
of greenbacks, it will float that amount; all
that are not needed in business will be sent in
for redemption.
Ood'a Dialing! with Nations.
From the JV. 1". Jntlepcmlcnt.
That penalty waits upon crime, and that
punishment sooner or later overtakes the
guilty, was no revelation of Moses or of Christ.
The experience of mankind had taught them
this truth long before the thunders of Sinai
or the milder effulgence of the Mount of
Olives. The heathen typified the truth and
evoked divinities out of their imaginations,
whom they invested with this office of chas
tisement. Horace, in his sweetest and saddest
strains, tells how Terror and Vengeance em
bark in the beaked trireme with their vio
tims, and how gloomy Carl mounts behind
the swiftest horseman. But the ancients did
not fully apply this philosophy to men col
lected into nations, nor understand that the
eame law of penalty governs the fate of em
pires as well as of individuals. And the
moderns, with all the light of a purer religion,
and all the experience of the elder world,
have not more than half discerned this preg
nant truth.
Nations have always deemed themselves
wiser than Omniscience and mightier than
Omnipotence, and have endeavored to build
thetaselves on injustioe and wrong. And,
though they may have seemed to flourish for
a season, the divine justice has always over
taken them at last. Passing by the ancient
nations, though they are most signal examples
of this order of Providence, let us glance at
the modern world. Two centuries ago Spain
was the terror of Europe, the leading power of
tne worw; and now where is she r Abject,
degraded, the pest of her own people aud the
scorn of all other nations. The Inquisition
and her colonial policy account for it all for
these were injustice and cruelty orgauieliuto
institutions. Two hundred years ago what
seemed more established forever thau the
Bourbons in France.' A despotism, the
most absolute and perfect that the world
had ever seen, had been consolidating itself
for two centuries and more, and it loukl as
if it must endure forever. But the breath of a
handful of encyclopedists, aud play-writers,
and pamphleteers blew the mighty fabric
down their strength proceeding Imin the
contempt of humau rights on which that
fabric rested. And what saved England,
whose mediieval institutions were even less
free than those of France, excepting that the
wisdom of F.liot, and Vane, aud Sydney dis
cerned the true rule of liberty aud justico, for
the supremacy of which they labored aud
died 1 And in the exact proportions that that
rule was adhered to has England been great
and prosperous. And it is to her devia'ions
from it that she owes most of her wars aud all
her iutes iue distresses, from Jacobitisui down
to 1'enianism.
The present Bonaparte, too, is fast learn
ing how vain it is to attempt to erect au
imperial pyramid by placing it on its apex
and propping it up with bayonets. Having
waded through slaughter to his throne, and
endeavored to strengthen and perpetuate it
by iujustio, and violence and fraud, at home
and abroad, it seems now as if he would re
ceive the punishment of his crimes iu his own
day and generation. His interference in the
affairs of other natiens, from those of Turkey
to those of Mexico, have come to naught. His
apparent sucoeHseshave built up a rival nation
iu Italy, and embittered the nation he unin
tentionally oreated through his attempt to
maintain the Pope as a peaoe-offerlmr to the
priests and peatautry France. Aud now
tl e Eldest Son of the Church has had to choose
between lighting with Italy to uphold the
temporal power, with Prussia watching to
make her opportunity of his extremity, or for
feiting the superstitious support of the imio
rant masses of France led by the priests. Ex.
cessive taxation and a grinding conscription
alone can keep him on his throne, and it will
take but a slight turn of affairs to make them
the histrumeuts of his fall. The condition of
the I ope and of Victor Emanuel himself might
be easily shown to be but inevitable complica
tions arising from the eudeavor to set aside
the laws of God in their dealings with their
subjects and other nations.
We are ourselves no obscure example of the
truth of this doctrine. We, too, endeavored
to build up our own prosperity aud secure our
own peace on the sacrifice of the rights and
happiness of men as good as ourselves. We
thought by consenting with tyrants to be per
mitted to enjoy a part of their plunder of the
poor. And for a while we seemed to succeed.
But at last He who said "Vengeance is mine"
bared his arm and avenged His poor. We
paid dearly in the blood of our first-born and
in the spoiling of our goods for our refusing to
let this people go. And we have reasou to
hope that our chastisemenfhas had the effect,
in some good measure, which the divine chas
tisements are designed to produce. We
have, under the sternest compulsion of
Providence, retraced our steps, aud begun
doing the justice to our fellows which we
6hould have done ninety years ago. Had
our fathers laid the chains of their captives
on the corner-stone of their new edifice, in
stead of offering human sacrifices upon it,
what a mighty and prosperous people wo
should have been 1 The chain of our brethreu
which we consented to hold is what has held
us back and kept us down in the careor of
greatness and glory. And now our future is
to be shaped and colored by the wisdom with
which we make absolute justice the new head
of the corner of our reconstructed temple of
liberty. Thi3 is the struggle in which we are
now engaged, and through which we must
labor to the crowning victory. When we
learn that it is in righteousness aud justice
only that a nation can be established, and so
live as a nation, we shall enter on a great
career of prosperity and true glory beyond
the warmest dreams of imagination. It is
this that consecrates politics, and niake3 it a
religious duty to take part in them until our
laws become one with the divine laws of
liberty, justice, and righteousness.
Tliaildeue Steven ou the Nature of Our
Government Hie Sullrage Uueatlou.
From the N. Y. Times.
An aged statesman in retirement sometimes
wields even more influence than when actively
engaged in the contents of public life. The
weioht and authority due to his ability and
patriotic services are enhanced by the pre
sumption which age affords, that his opinions
are no longer affected by his passions, and
that selfishness and ambition have ceased to
bo among the motives which control hi3 judg
ment. When Jefferson at Monticello, and
Madison at Montpelier, and John Adams at
Quincy, were called on, after they had with
drawn nom political life, to give their views
as to the true interpretation of the Constitu
tion, and the real intent of its framers on tho
question of State rights, or the tariff, or the
limitations of Executive power, their replies
carried great authority to fair-minded men of
all parties, because they themselves had been
foremost among the founders of the Govern
ment and the authors of the Constitution by
which its powers and purposes were defined.
Thaddeus Stevens, at Lancaster, is trying to
follow in their footsteps. Though still involved
in the sharpest political struggles of the day,
Ilia Wanilll? litM nrwl failinrr imnltii 'n.titu 1.;..-.
C ) UVUIVU ."V'lLI! 11 1 111
to new modes of making his influence felt ou
the current of events; aud lest he may not be
able to impress his opinions upon the nation
from his seat in Congress at its nnminir aaa.-inn
he has sent them forth in the form of a letter
to a Uerman neighbor and professedly in reply
to his reouest. We doubt whether it will m m L-ii
as profound an impression on the publio miud
as us autnor anticipates, it lacks nearly all
iue qualities wnicn gave to Kindred papers
issued by the early statesmen to whom we
have relerred, their great authority. Inco
herent in its style, loose and inconclusive in
its artmment. and nnsnnt.iina'l 1
the Constitution or history of the country, it
una uoimngto command ior it any overshadow
ing luuuence on puuno opinion, liven those
who have leen accustomed to regard Mr.
Stevens as a great authority in affairs of gov
ernment, will scarcely find iu this paper any
thing to augment thier admiration. The very
object it is intended to serve is not calculated
to win for it the respect which so pretentious
a document should command. The German
admirer, who applies to Mr. Stevens for his
"opinion of the present prospects of our couu
try," does not ask whether we are comiog
back more or less slowly, but surely, to the
sure foundations of our old freedom aud pros
perity whether we are restoring the Constitu
tion to its old supremacy aud the Union to its
old integrity, and are again rearing the struc
ture of our Government on the principles aud
purposes of the fathers of the Republic; what
he wants to know is "whether we now are
likely to approach any nearer to the true prinri.
pies ofUUrti) than our lathers did, under their
old and constrained Constitution." Without
regard just now to the opiniou of Mr. Stevens
ou this point, tec do not think we are ! We
shall consider the country very fortunate if it
ever again approaches .. near to the "true
principles of liberty" as did those who achieved
our national independence and gave us the
wisest, best, aud most perlc-ot constitution of
government the world has ever seen !
Mr. Stevens has no hesitation iu giving his
correspondent and the country to understand,
that he thinks we cm do much bettor than
our fathers did. Ho thinks we can now es
tablish a government which will embody and
protect the "true principles of liberty," much
more Verfectlv than did (lint nn tvhinli tr.
isted, and which still exists, under the Consti
tution of 17M). And the one thing to be done
for the attainment of that mul lliu m. nt
by which this more perfect form of liberty can
1. ci,.i-ii Iu l.uli-l L.. M Uinn 1... .1...
no pctuicu lis iioiu ttj mi. uvcrrua iu uc, ma
assertion and exorcise by Congress of absolute
finrl r'niniiltp! Aiithoritv nvr tliu ivliril mira
tion of suffrage in all the States so that no
State finau nave, uere.uter, auy rigut or power
,i unv Tclin cliH.ll. and who k1i:iI1 lint, vnta (nr
any ollicer, legislative or executive, in the
- .lnflm. That rrcia f t ... 1 ,i I
right that power which lies at the basis
vf nil rmvurimient. Anil nf All AiiOmritir ia
11 11 fcjv.v.- J .a
to be denied to the Status, aud to be ab
sorbed heM absolutely and exclusively
by the central authority of the nation.
And itf and thus we shall "approach much
nearer to the true principles of liberty"
ll.n.i nro usnr could do llllilur Ilia "ni l an.l
constrained Constitution" of cur fathers 1
1.1 . J . . r. ... I 1 11.1 1 1 1
flir. Dieveiin uuoo uuii pinicuu luav vue uiu
Constitution ever permitted any such couceu-
i..i!i.ti a! nnlitical TlOWftr. k ennnrit liiinv
and In effect he admits, that it prohibited its
exercise by the Federal authority. But be
maintains that the fathers of the Republio
intended to establish just Such a government
NOV EM HER 2, 18G7.
Old Bye '
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CARPETING S,
OIL CLOTHS AND DKUGGliJTy.
I1EEVE L.
V12thstu2ui
as he describes that this was their ideal of gov
ernment as well as his and that while they
could not carry it out, we can and must. Aud
to sustain this most extraordinary and pre
posterous pretense, Mr. Stevens pretends ,to
appeal to the Declaration of Independence.
AVe copy from his letter the following
passage in which his argument, if argument
it can be called, is set forth:
"The Constitution of 1783 did cot carrv out tho
rlnclplesof government wliich were Intended
y the fathprs. when In 1778 they lal-l the foun
dation of the Government on which this na
tion was to be built. Then they had been iu
spired with sucli a light from ou high as never
man was inspired with before, in the groat
work of providing freedom for tha human race,
through a Government In which no oppression
could Mud a resting place.
"They contemplated the ereotlon of a vast
empire over this whole continent, which in Us
national character should be governed by laws
of a supreme, unvarying character. While
municipal Institutions might be grautod with
fcolf control, for convenience, it w .8 novor la
tended that one-half of tuls nation should bo
governed by one set of laws, aud the other half
by another and conflicting set, on the same
subject. Tho law, the principle, whloh was to
apply to the dwellers ou the l'enobscot, was to
apply to those on the savannah aud Susque
hanna, else the declaration would have pro
claimed the eue the people on the l'enobscot
or Kuhquehanna were born free and equal,
and those ou the Savannah with a modified
equality; that the oue had Inalienable rights,
among which was liberty; that the other had
Inalienable rights, but perfect liberty was not
among them.
"The grand Idea of those immortal mon was
that there were certain rights, privileges and
Immunities which belonged to every being who
had an Immortal soul, none of which should
be taken lrom him, nor could he surrender
them in any arrangement with society. Ho es
sential to the repose of the whole community
was It that every man should possess eao a of
these right, privileges aud Immunities, that he
was loroiuun oy ins creator lo pare with them
lie could not sell himself, he conld not sell hid
children into slavery, lie could not sell his
life for a price. He oould not surrender the
right to pursue his own happiness. Every at
tempt to do so was nugatory. Every instru
ment fo.iudeJ on suoh a contract, no matter
how solemn, no matter how hedged about by
broad seals, no matter how stamped by Htate
legislation and executive approval, none of
these things gave It life. It was null aud void;
iii nua a tui pne mcupHuie oi animation.
"I am (ineakini now of thn nriuiiml dualcrn nt
the framers of the Declaration of Independ
ence, who had determined that there were cer
tain principles wnioh, to give perfect liberty,
ouuuiu tij'ij nuiLo iu every mortal ueing.
nititR? Without excluding otherx. th ren art
w uav ur mose ni'niH.nn Vinson mi immn.
specifically enumerated; Life, liberty, and the
mtmun oi mippiuess. xuese are universal and
inalienable. It follows that evnrvMilmr nnnuo.
sary for their establishment and defense is
within thosd rights.
' Yon grant a lot or easement in the midst of
your estate, you inereoy grant the right of way
lo it by Ingress and egress.
"Disarm a community, and you rob them of
iue means or cieiendtng nie. Take away their
weapons or ueense, aud you take away the lu
alienable right of defending liberty. This brings
us now directly to the argument bv which w
prove that the elective franchise is a right of
"ib ueoiuraiioD. anu not merely a privilege,
and is oue of the rights and lminuuitias uro
nounced by thai lustrumeutto be 'Inalienable.'
'11.' as our lathers declared, 'all Just govern
ment is derived from the usaout of the go v-
erneu,' ii in leuerat republics that assent can
be ascertained and established oulv through
the ballot, it follows that to take away that
menu oi commuaicaiiou is to raue away from
the citizen his great weapon of dofense, and re
duce him to helpless bondage, It doprives him
of an Inalienable right. This cleurly provos
that the elective franchise ranks with 'life' and
-uueriy in its sacred inalienable character."
Mr. Stevens thus assarts that the elective
franchise is one of the inherent "inalienable
rights" with which every human being is eu
dowed by his Creator; that any law, consti
tution, or compact, no matter how solemn it
may be, which deprives any human being of
11 .1 - 1 4 .1 1 il . . .
mai rigut, me elective irancuise is "null
and void;" aud that our fathers, who framed
tne ueeiaration ot independence and esta
blished our Government held precisely that
view of the case, and intended "the erection
of a vast empire over this whole continent
which in its national character should be
governed by laws of a supreme, unvarying
character," recognizing these principles and
making them the rule of its conduct aud the
ioundation of its authority 1
And now we say in reply that all this is
utterly untrue. It is purely aud wholly a
iigmeut ot Mr. htovens' imagination. Ue may
entertain all these crude aud absurd ideas of
government, but the fathers of this republio
never did. lie cannot find, in anything they
ever did, or ever said, anything to justify or
excuse him for imputing to them any suoh
opinions or ideas. We defy him to the in
quiry, lie cannot support his assertions, as
to what they intended, aud as to what they
believed, by any evidence whatever. In point
of historical fact, they never had any suoh
ideas, either of abstract right or of the future
destiny of this nation. The idea that votine
was a right absolute and universal, or even a
right at all, was iu that day entertained no
where, outside of a restricted circle of specula
tive, closet theorists. Not a single statesman
of that age not a single one of the men who
asserted, vindicated, aud established our inde
pendence, ever dreamed of regarding aud
treating the suffrage as an inherent, universal
right, and of making that theory the basis of
our form of government.
Equally unfounded is the assertion that
they or any of them "contemplated the ereo
tiou of a vast empire over this whole conti
nent to be governed by supreme unvarying
laws." It would be difficult for Mr. Steveus
or" anybody else to invent a statement more
directly opposite to facts than this. The his
tory of the country the record of their acts
and opinions provos its falsity. They did
not dieam of a continental empire of any sort
the most hopeful aud prophetlo of them all
Scarcely dreamed of a untloa whluU should
Wltislciei
tJ u
KNIGHT &. EON,
KO. SOT OII SXIT fcTKEET.
even oarry its sway across the Mississippi;
and as for a nation wirldmg a concentrated.'
central power over all its parts, exercising
unrestrained and absolute authority over all
the States which treated aud were to maiutaia
its existeuce the idea, if it had been sug
gested even as a possibility, would have been
scouted as absurd, or would have utterly
thwarted all hope of forming a Federal Uuioa
at all.
It seems incredible that a man so familiar
with the faotB of our history as Mr. Steveus
ought to be, should venture to put such asser
tions as these before the world. Ue cannot
believe them to be true in any historio sense.
Ue may think that the fathers of the republic
ought to have held these opinions to be con
sistent, and that, therefore, they probably did.
But this gives him no show of warrant for as
serting that these were their views, and for
thus pressing the authority of their great
names into their support. Suoh a course of
argument is not merely unfair, it is dishomst.
Mr. Stevens might as well falsify the dates
and events of history, to suit his purpose, as
to falsify the opinions and principles of its
publio men.
Mr. Stevens thus finds no shadow of support,
in the opinions and views of the fathers, for
his doctrine that the elective frauohise ranks
among the "inalienable, rights" whioh were
proclaimed by the Declaration of Independence
as belonging to every human being, and of
which no human being could be deprived by
any law, compact, or constitution whatever.
Such a doctrine would have been scouted with
contempt by every one of the men to whom we
are indebted for our independence and our
frame of government. That it is also at
variance with every principle of the Constitu
tion, and at war with any form whatever of
safe and si able government, it will be very
easy to show; but we have already exhausted
our space.
Mr. Stevens proceeds in his letter to urge
that this "inalienable right" of universal suf
frage was suspended by the Constitution of the
United States, but that this suspension has
been now removed by the fourteenth amend
ment to that instrument, and that now the
whole framework of the Government must be
reconstructed on that basis. We shall refer
to this branch of the subject hereafter.
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