The Sun.
London, England, 1863-01-05 00:00:00

THE WAR IN AMERICA,

(From Use 2iines' Correspondent.)
NEW YORK, DEC. 23.
From Saturday morning until last night the town
has been in a state of unusual political excitement
in consequence of the resignation of Mr. Seward
and Mr. Chase. The disruption of the Cabinet
from any action of either of those important mem-
bers was not expected, though the public was quite
prepared to learn that Mr. Lincoln had " put his
foot down" on General Halleck and Mr. Stanton,
and replaced those very unpopular officials by
new men. To-day the excitement has subsided ;
the difficulty in the Cabinet has been temporarily
smoothed over; Messrs. Seward and Chase have
consented to resume office upon conditions, which
conditions are surmised but not publicly stated.
Gen. Halleck and Mr. Stanton have been relieved
of responsibility for the failure and butchery of
Fredericksburg by the valorous avowal of General
Burnside—that no one prompted him, no one coun-
selled him, no one interfered with him, and that he,
and ho only, is to blame for the disaster. Good,
easy Mr. Lincoln, has thus made things pleasant
again, though only for a little while. His inhar-
monious Cabinet will support and adhere to him
until his Abolitionist drivers shall become obstre-
perous, or until some new disgrace or calamity to
the Federal arms shall arouse the slumbering anger
of the pUient and sorely abused people of the North.
There will be then a second crisis, and a far severer
ono than that which has just terminated.
It was not so much the announcement of Mr,
Seward's resignation as of the underhand agencies
by which it was effected that excited people's alarm
and wonder, and caused reflective men to shudder
at the chaotic state cf public affairs, and the all but
hopeless anarchy into which the Government is
drifting. While people, according to their reason
or their passion, were calling for peace, an
armistice, or a vigorous prosecution of the war,
and while both parties were indignant and dis-
gusted at the flagrant incompetency popularly
attributed to the whole Cabinet, but more espe-
cially to General Halleck and Mr. Stanton, a se-
cret caucus of the ultra-Republican and Abolitionist
members of the Senate was held, at which it was
resolved to make Mr. Seward the scapegoat of the
disaster at Fredericksburg, and to urge upon the
President the dismissal of that Minister. Mr.
Seward heard of the proceedings in spite of all the
care that was taken to prevent tt.eir coming to his
knowledge, and, being apparently as much dis-
gusted with his colleagues, with the Republican
senators, and with the state of the nation as the
outer public is with the conduct of the war and the
general aspect of affairs, he prevented the further
action of the conclave by sending in his resigna-
tion. The results were of a nature that the sena-
tors did not anticipate, and placed the President in
a dilemma from which it was not easy either for
his friends or his opponents to discover how he
could extricate himself without damage or danger.
Mr. Chase alleged, perhaps unjustly, to be playing
a game of his own, in which Mr. Seward was his
opponent, unexpectedly followed Mr. Seward's
example, and placed his resignation in Mr. Lin-
coln's hands. But neither Mr. Stanton nor General
Halleck thought it necessary or expedient to ease
the President of the load of opprobrium which they,
and they principally, had contrived to cast upon
the Administration by retiring, and leaving him
free to appoint more popular if not more efficient
Ministers. Had they done so, the President by se-
lecting Gen. M'Clellan to succeed Gen. Halleck,
and Gen. Banks or Gen. Dix to succeed Mr. Stan-
ton, might have satisfied the country for a time,
persuaded Mr. Seward and Mr. Chase to recall
their resignations, and patched up a truce in his
Cabinet, by which it might have been held to-
gether until the spring, or until General M'Clellan
had either achieved a great victory or suffered a
great defeat. But the President had had enough of
Gen. M'Clellan, and did not desire to call into hi
councils a man who would infallibly have come in
as the master and dictator, if he had consented to
come in at all; and he had, besides, personal reasons
for not wishing to deprive himself of the services of
Mr. Stanton, whom he thinks to be as honest, as
efficient, and as vigorous as he is unpopular, and
whom he resolves shall not, if he can help it, be
sacrificed to an unjust clamour. He had also a very
reasonable and well-founded objection to the dicta-
torial attitude assumed by the anti-slavery doctrin-
aires and "exterminators" in the senate, who had
taken it upon themselves to usurp his functions of
Cabinet making, and prescribe to him what Secre-
taries he should appoint or dismiss. Believing,
moreover, as he appears to have done, that although
his cabinet might not be a very good one, he would
fail in constructing a better from the ranks of either
the Democratic or the Republican party, he resolved
to defeat the dictators of the secret caucus, the
friends of M'Clellan, and the enemies of Stanton,
by one and the same course of action, which was no
other than the very simple expedient of persuading
Messrs. Seward and Chase to withdraw their resig-
nations. In this he succeeded after a struggle of
three days, commanding them with "pleasant impe-
riousness" to resume their portfolios. The two
obeyed with equally pleasant submissiveness, and
once more Mr. Lincoln stands before the country as
master of the situation.
But the unpleasant part of the business, as events
will speedily show, is that the situat ion is a very bad
and untenable one. It is true he has asserted his
authority against the unwise and violent theorists
who are pushing him along the facile grooves of
revolution, and refused to part with the most Con-
servative of the politicians who share his confidence;
but he has not succeeded either in satisfying the
Ultra-Abolitionists, who have his soul in their keep-
ing, as Mephistopheles had that of Faust, or in
persuading the public that his administration can
or ought to stand, or that he or any of his Secre-
taries can save the country from the countless perils
that environ it. After the Ist of January some of
these perils will take a formidable shape, if he
issues on that day his threatened proclamation of
freedom to the slaves of rebels. This and many
other dangers will have in due time to be con-
fronted, not only with a diminished support on the
part of the people, but, worst of all, with a dim
nished and diminishing army.

It is, in fact, the military, rather than the politi-
cal, situation that causes disquiet. The telegraphic
reports that are permitted to reach New York from

the headquarters of the Army of Potomac represent
the troops to be in " high spirits," and "eager for
a renewal of battle." Were it possible to make peo-
ple believe these statements, or to hide from them
the real state of matters, the military censors of the
telegraph might flatter themselves with the notion
Att, if they had not inspired confidence, they had
4,q‘plAts prevented mistrust, and done some-
. ®.render unfashionable the crime of despair-
. -
4, :li." 'titrepublic, But these reports deceive no-
be falsehoods in the evening, which the
Post.- de in the morning succeeds in dissipating.
According to the newspapers, General Burnside's

army is in nowise daunted by its late disastrous re

pulse, but, like the war-horse of Scripture, snuffs
the battle from afar, and rejoices in the hope and
prospect of victory. But between the published
telegram and the private and unpublished letters

from soldiers in the field there is a wide discrepancy.
The one is all optimism—the other all pessimism

The one speaks of valour, strength, and discipline

—the other tells a tale of discouragement, weak.

ness, and desertion. General Burnside admits a
loss in killed, wounded, and prisoners, of nearly
10,000 men. Reports from the camp, while they

do not assert a much greater loss under these seve-

ral head, introduces anew element to account for

the rapid depletion of the Federal ranks. Ten
thousand only may have been killed and wounded;

but twice the number have disappeared since the

day of battle. Twenty thousand soldiers have, in
American parlance, "skedaddled" by ones, twos,
and threes ; and, in some instance, by whole com-
panies. In fact, if these letters from officers as well
as from soldiers may. be believed, the once great
Army of the Potomac is rapidly melting away. it
has no longer its former confidence in General
Burnside ; it never had any in the subordinate briga-
diers, colonels, and captains appointed by political
influence to command it, and threatens to disappear
altogether before the winter 15 novo shall baye

melted, unless, which no one expects, some heaven-
born general shall arise in the interval to lead it to
victory.
The publication of General Burnside's letter, in
which he assumes the entire responsibility of the
unhappy movement against Fredericksburg, has
not satisfied either the army or the public that he
is the proper man to command so large a force.
Everyone admires his courage; everyone applauds
the fearless avowals which he makes in his singular
letter; but most people shake their heads with mis-
trust when they learn that the President has
refused to accept the very proper resigna-
tion of so indiscreet and unfortunate a leader.
There did not need at this time so unlucky a
proof of Mr. Lincoln's kindness of heart
as a man, and his incapacity as a states-
man to deal with great events. It is sufficient for
him that a man does his best in the position in
which he has been placed. General Burnside has
done his best, and, therefore, should neither be
blamed nor displaced. Such appears to be the rea-
soning and the motive in the President's mind ; but
such a course of action is not the one that in the
great crises of a nation's destiny brings out great
soldiers or great statesmen, and that turns the de-
feat of to-day into the victory of to-morrow. Mercy
to proved incompetency may be cruelty to the na-
tion; and to continue General Burnside in chief
command, instead of placing him in that subordi-
nate position where he might achieve success, under
the direction of a more judicious superior, may here-
after cost the lives of thrice as many men as perished
uselessly at Fredericksburg; if not the total col-
lapse and failure of the war.
The seal of secrecy on the objects and destination
of the expedition under General Banks has at length
been removed. The General has gone to Ship
Island to prepare for an attack upon Mobile, and
is to supersede Gen. Butler at New Orleans. But
Gen. Butler, though removed, is not to be dis-
graced. He stands high in the President's estima-
tion—higher even than Mr. Stanton—and is thought
among all the worthy soldiers of the Republic to be
the most worthy of reward and dignity. Perhaps
amid the new complications that are certain to arise
in the Ministry, when the President shall have
either withdrawn, modified, or renewed his procla
mation of slave emancipation on Jan. 1, a place may
be found in the Cabinet for the President's fa-
vourite. Gen. Butler, though odious to the Demo-
cratic party, is the idol of the Republicans and ex-
terminators, and if he were appointed to succeed
Gen. Halleck—which is not an improbable result—
the appointment would be hailed with delight, not
only by the ultra-Republicans, but by a large class
of people, who look upon vigour as the one thing
needful, and who are content to condone Butler's
numerous offences, in consideration of his great
virtues of strength and firmness, if not of success.
The part which some of the preachers of New
Ycrk and New England have played in this war
has not been creditable to their Christian charity.
The Episcopalian and Roman Catholic clergy have
not fanned the flames of dissension, but have for
the most part confined themselves to their proper
function—the cure of souls. Not so the Puritans
and ultra-Evangelicals, of whom the Rev. Dr.
Cheever, the Rev. Mr. Beecher, and the Rev. Dr
Tyng are the types. These gentlemen have made
themselves political partizans, converted their pul-
pits into arenas of strife, and angled for the applause
and sometimes caught the hisses of their congrega-
tions, as playactors do with their audiences. Not
contented with their own liberty, and with the
absence of slavery in the North, they have sought
to enforce their own ideas upon a different people
living in a different state of society—not by the in-
fluence of persuasion, but by the aid of the sword,
the rifle, and the torch. They have been intolerant,
persecuting, rabid, and relentless. They have
evinced the spirit of Mahomet and the Caliph Omar,
and of their own Puritanic ancestors who burned
witches in Salem. Were they priests of Rome they
would be Jesuits and Grand Inquisitors, and had
they lived in Spain in the days when the auto da fe
was a recognised institution they would have
burned heretics for the glory of God and the ad-
vancement of truth with all the zeal and gusto of
their prototypes and predecessors. Many of them
hold slavery, intemperance, and the consumption of
animal food to be equally sinful in the sight of
Heaven, and invoke the aid of the civil magistrate
to free the negroes and to prohibit the sale of alco-
hol, if not of mutton chops. They hold it to be
their duty to God and to man to be intolerant
of that which they believe to be pernicious to
the body and hurtful to the soul ; and in the execu-
tion of that supposed duty preach doctrines which
not only tend to prolong and embitter the war in
which their country is engaged, but to destroy all
liberty whatsoever, except such as they may be
graciously pleased to concede to an oppressed peo-
ple. The Rev. Dr. Tyng declared on Thanksgiv-
ing-day from his pulpit that it was not merely the
duty of the clergy to restrain " but to uproot the
crimes of the wicked," and among the crimes of the
wicked he enumerated the holding of negroes in
bondage and the sale or use of alcoholic liquors, both
of which crimes were to be " uprooted," not by the
tongue of the zealous preacher, but by the sword of
the civil magistrate, urged into action by the dicta-
tion of the priest. He did not explain how the
sword of the civil magistrate could be properly em-
ployed in punishing acts recognised to be legal and
constitutional by the very same law which appointed
the civil magistrate and allowed liberty of con-
science and of worship to all men, but simply noti-
fied that if he, and such as he, had the power, they
would usurp the functions of the Executive and es-
tablish a theocracy upon the ruins of the republic.
On Sunday last Dr. Cheever, commenting upon the
disaster at Fredericksburg in the church of the
Puritans, declaimed against the folly of intrusting
the war power to military men, and stated that if
Congress, acting as Dr. Cheever would have had it
act, had passed a decree of universal emaneipation,
all the defeats of the Federal arms would have been
converted into victories. Because this had not
been done by Congress the wrath of God was upon
the Northern people, and would continue to be

upon it. War, he added, was a beneficent power in
proportion to its destructiveness. And as for the
policy of not inciting slaves to insurrection, he
laughed it to scorn. The mischief done by New
England clergymen of this stamp, in originally ex-
asperating the Southern people, and in continuing
to inflame sectional animosities in the North, has
begun to excite the notice and the anger of all who
really love liberty, and who object, as men of Eng-
lish blood and extraction are generally found to do,
to no form of tyranny and domination so greatly
and so abhorrently as to the tyranny and domina-
tion of priests, and has led to the proposal, far more
serious than it appears, to reconstruct the Union
without including the Puritanic State. In alluding
to this subject at the anniversary meeting of the

New England Puritans last night, the Rev. Mr.
Beecher said, according to the report in this morn-
ing's Herald!—" He understood that an effort was
to be made to placate the South to induce the rebels
to lay down their arms, by our setting the example,
and to have the West, Pennsylvania, and New York

come in, and New England left out in the cold. He
defied them to keep her out. New England was
the pickpockt of the globe—the picklock of the
world_ She could go where air could go; she could

fly where birds could fly; she would be found where
the seasons could travel. Did they think that by
geographical and political lines they could keep New
England at home? Why, New England Would vex
them more by the printing press after she was sepa-
rated from them than she had ever done before.
There should be a murrain of it. Did they think
they could keep New England's daughters from
being fair, and would they have a league and cove-
nant that Southern and Western men should not love
them ? If they would not allow New England to

regenerate the rest of the country by her religion she

would immediately marry her daughters to them,

and do it by the original process of—[Mr. Beecher

dropped his voice to a whisper, so as not to be heard
by the score or two of ladies just behind him, and

amid a general outburst of laughter repeated the
word regeneration,' without the first syllable.]"
The phrase " pickpocket of the globe," though
apt enough to describe the New England contrac-
tors, who have grown enormously rich out of the
profits and plandere of the war, was probably a