The Sun.
London, England, 1863-07-21 00:00:00

sion of the popular heart, nor the frenzy beyond rea-
son which it was in the earlier days of the war, had
settled down into a calculation. under the stern ex-
perience of the last 16 months. People ask themselves
if the Union is worth 20 years of war, or the sacrifice
of liberty,or national bankruptcy and financial chaos,
or the permanent stigma on the fair fame of the Re.
public that would follow the subjugation of the
South—if such a subjugation were possible. They
feel more than half inclined to answer these questions
in the Legislature, and begin to have a glimmering
notion of a fact long palpable to Europeans who have
dispassionately studied the principles on which the
Republic was based, that they have all along been
fighting against logic and against fate. The speech
of Governor Seymour, of New York, uttered with
full knowledge of President Lincoln's announce-
ment of the success that attended the Federal army
at Gettysburg on Friday, was that of a man whose
heart was not moved by any passionate impulse to
sympathise with Gen. Meade's victory. He did not
speak as if he thought the victory would end any-
thing, or settle anything, or do more than protrr ct
a struggle which had already lasted too long.
Through it all there loomed, large aria menacing,
the great question of "State righte," in viedieetion
and assertion of which the South had taken up
ve wellion oa
fs
h arms, and which he held, in common with the Peace
s vat
tthee le%oruarn
tlr)ye,tpacmcriadcyth,
etocboeu)nthtleesosnios
only sal-
al-
aof
opaereielsexthualttatnltireaantdeneatuoomy aukeeiaztohrsaen daivmision otthe
bisec-
tion. He claimed no mereitfor having
the recent alarms of invasion asseirseted the
hour ;
heof
didits agonyaotevdeuhr during
Federal Government in th
cgoeghneirsoesiittyaasshGavoivnegrhaonryof claimsthe upon his justice or
had State of New York,
but he declared that he occupied
teoverrayllyhoouurr
to the point of physical exhuacunsut
(New York) troops to the
,raehscduteo of an adjoining
should
place New York
e which
old a State
hol d.
sister State (Pennsylvania)
in that position of dignity and
that truly respects its own rightio
"To-day," he added, "the great massesu oevfer
Conser-
vatives who still battle for time-honoured principles
of Government, amid denunciation and contumely
e
e
and abuse, are the only barriers that stand between
the Federal Government and its own destruction."'
All other parties who urged it to the commission of
acts of despotism, to the suspension of the habeas
corpus, to the seizure of citizens at midnight in their
beds for the expression of their opinions, to for-
cible suppresdion of newspapers, to the incitement
of seivhe war, and to the laying waste by fire and
sword of States that merely claimed the right of
governing themselves within their own limits,
according to the enactments and the principles of
their own Constitution, the Governor held up to the
scorn and reprobation of his hearers. He had no
sympathy with, or toleration for, the President in
his assumption of the arbitrary powers with which
Congress, acting in excess of its duty, had endea-
voured to clothe him. "This doctrine," he said,
" of the suspension of the Constitution is unsound,
it is unjust, it is treasonable ;" and at the words the
immense assemblage that filled the Academy of
Music, from floor to roof, rose to its feet like one
man, and cheered him, with waving of hats and
handkerchiefs and uproar of voices, that bespoke the
intensity of its feeling. Governor Seymour affirmed
that he would uphold what he called the "just
power" of the Federal Government; but he would
also maintain the " just rights" of the States. He
argued that liberty in America was impossible un-
less the people came back to the faith and the prin-
ciples of their fathers—faith and principles which
consecrated a jealous opposition to the central Go-
vernment, lest it should absorb too much into its
own hands and end in a despotism ; and an equally
jealous support of the local Government of the
States, the only safeguard and bulwark of Republi-
can liberty. Governor Seymour, of Connecticut,
was equally decided. "If I knew anything of the
nature of this Government," he said, " its true
greatness consists in the ability it may possess, not
to destroy, but to restore and bring together, and,
by compromise and e. new order of things, to re-
build the Temple of Freedom. For this end war is
unavailing. The States of the South may be
wrong; but that is not the question. As they
came voluntarily into the Union you cannot
compel them to remain in it by the force of
arms. You may devastate their fields and.
reduce them to beggary ; but you cannot by
these mears have the Union which your fathers
founded." It was by speeches like these that on
the anniversary of American independence the two
most eminent citizens of New York and Connec-
ticut expressed themselves opposed to the principle
on which the war was based and the habit on which
it was conducted, and found themselves supported
by the unanimous support of an auditory that had
finally lost the relish for blood. It is true that there
was one embryo citizen, at a meeting of the Young
Men's Catholic Association, held in another place,
who declared that it was utterly impossible for the
North to listen to any proposition for peace so long
as one Southern soldier remained in arms ; but, as he
was only an Englishman, newly imported here,
seeking in this country the social and political posi-
tion which he had forfeited in his own, it is just
possible that Americans may not consider him the
best authority in support of a principle of conduct
which, had it been too long acted upon by King
Gorge 111., would either have broeght that
monarch to calamity, or consigned George Wash-
ington to a place in history less splendid than that
which he now occupies. The Irish and Germans
have ceased to hope in the prosecution of the war.
The Americans are fast following in the path where
their foreign born friends and fellow-citizens have
led ; and, if it be left to renegade Englishmen and
native contractors, placemen, and functionaries
alone to cry " War to the bitter end !" the end draws
near, and will neither be retarded nor expedited by
anything that such persons can urge against it.
Notwithstanding all the warlike excitement and
fresh recurring hopes and fears of the last ten does,
Mr. Lincoln has found time to indite a long and.
elaborate reply to the memorial of 19 citizens
of Ohio, appointed as a committee by a State
Convention held at Columbus, to lay respectfully,
before him their reasons for demanding the revoca-
tion of the illegal sentence of banishment passed
upon Mr.
Vallandigham.
had placed;
The reply is eminently
characteristic of the President. lie
plead beconsents to
as
sif
tdhidey, and fies
himoetrfoiarle the committee,
trial,
whiechvimttrtiaaelely,
they justi
an action which he admits to be extraordinary and
unconstitutional on the sole plea of a necessity
of
which he is the sole judge. He declines to annul
the sentence on account of its illegality ; but is
willing, as a matter of favour, to grant Mr. Vallan-
digham liberty to go home upon conditions which
moral, nor personal right to propose.
gentlemen will confess to certain
are wholly irrelevant to the case, and which he had
nhe recapitulates, Mr. Vallandigham
legal,vviriheitee he
return. If they will not, Mr. Vallandi '
may Vallandigham 's
! truisms, neitherit shme s
sentence shall remain in force. They are to admit
in writing, and sign the admission with their names,
that there is a rebellion in the United States ; that
an army and a navy are
constitutional means of
suppressing that rebellion ; that no one of them
will do anything which in his own judgment will
favour the decrease or hinder
said army and navy ; and
that each of them will in
to
his sphere do all he can have the said army and
navy, while engaged
paid, fed, clay;, and in suppressing the rebellion,
otherwise well provided for;
Mr. Vallandigham shall go forth free to do as he
pleases, and be only liable to punishment for such
may hereafter new offence as he commit. No one
can say that such a proposal is sagacious, but most
people will admit it to be cunning. It says in
effect to the committee :—" I believe
you to be all
traitors ; but if you will pledge yourselves in writ-
ing to loyalty and support of my Government
your traitorous friend shell go free; not be-
cause he ought to go free, but because I
reckon that I gain a balance of eighteen pledged
supporters out of this clever little transaction.
In fact, it was the village attorney who spoke, and
not the statesman. The committee saw through
the President's meaning at a glance, and in an able,
temperate, but severely cutting rejoinder placed
him in a light that, were he not the President,
would be fatal to all hie future chances of success
as a politician and a publicist. They informed him
that it was not for the sake of Mr. Vallandigham
personally that they had ventured to remonstrate
with the Executive; but for the sake of the prin-
ciples f.nvolved in Mr. Vallandigham's arrest, ee hich
affected every citizen of their State; that the Pre-
sident had no right to exact any pledge from them,
implying thereby that they were disloyal or rebel-
lious, or that Mr. Vallandigham could be released
upon conditions, as if he had been rightfully pun-
ished. They wound up by declining his proposi-
tions, and throwing upon him the responsibility
which they declare to be aggravated by an intima-
tion in his extraordinary letter that he will, if ever
he sees fit,
in the public interests, repeat the illegal
acts of which the committee complained. The whole
proceeding° in the case, as far as the President is
concerned, have been one stupendous and wholly
unnecessary blunder. Perhaps the worst part of
the blunder is that Mr. Lincoln has been unwise
enough to offer reasons for his conduct. If he had
annulled Mr. Valiandigham's sentence he would
have done well. If he had refused to disannul it
without stating why or wherefore he would not have
done quite so well, but he would have done thi;
nitely better than by an elaborate statement, full of
false reasoning and quirks and quiddities of petti-
fogging law, to have drawn upon himself the digni-
fied rebuke of the Ohio Committee. As the case
now stands he has exhibited himself before Europe
and his own countrymen in the light of a tyrant,
without any of t..;e mental and moral qualities that
may serve to make tyranny respectable if they cen
not make it agreeable.