Washington sentinel., 1853-10-19

public affairs, and exist, finally as the mere
mercenaries Of power. The genius of our in
stitutions is against any such idea. Frequent
changes in administrations frequent elections,
and rotation in office, however heretofore they
NAV have alarmed superanuated politicians,
are now regarded by intelligent and rejecting
statesmen as necessary to the healthy operation
of the functions of the government, if not to
the permanent welfare Of the people. Refer
ring to the principle which justihes the removal
from Office of all who have violently and pub
licly differed from an administration chosen by
the people, our critic indirectly attempts to
SANDER Thomas Jefferson, by attributing to the
great historical necessity which led him to dis
place his adversaries on his accession to the
presidency, the mean and miserable motive of
a mere lust for spoils. If Governor Marcy ad-
vocated this necessity, Thomas Jefferson cstab-
lshed the principle; and the reviewer in . Put
mum y can no more say, with propriety, that it
is " barbarian military maxim that sustains
removals from Office at the present day, than
he can charge upon Mr. Jefferson 9 brutality"
| in eNpelling from station the aiders and abet-
ters of monarchial doctrines, and the adyersa-
ries of democratic principles He tells us that
Mr.. Jefferson removed but thirty-cight persons
during his term of Office. Will he now show
us, what number of removals, upon this ratio,
should be made at the present day, in con-
federacy of thirtv-oue States and five terrific
ries, with twenty-six millions Of people, and u
! vast and varied government patronage? Let
him make the calculation, and present it to MS
| in the next number Of i" Putnam" and we
think, when he shall have finished it, he will
| find that the example Of Mr.. Jefferson, in the
earlier days Of the republic, has not been out.
ragged by the present executive. Were the i'm
mortal sage of Monticello now alive, and Presi-
dent of the United States, there would not be Q
"Galphi or a" Gardener" left in Office and
these have been the especial tavorites during
the last four years. for whose retention our re-
viewer now sets up his pious prayers.
But, again, why does this croaking calumnia-
tor, in bewailing the awful degeneracy of the
times, and the proclivity to medioer'ty in our
public councls-supposing all this to be so, for
the sake of the argument-why does he not
manfully tell us who is at fault? Is General
Pierce to be held accountable if weak men, or
wicked men, are put into Congress and into the
State legislature? You may plead that you do
not make such charge; but you expect the
new President to put stop to all such al
legged enormities, to cure the body polite of its
diseases, to captivate the world with deeds OF
noble craftsmanship, and to do various and
sundry other things of the same character, III
the short space of six months! Could madness
60 further than this? Would it not be a man,
lier and uster course, at once to charge upon
the people, that which is falsely laid at the door
of the President? If they have sunken SO low
as not to know how to select their own serv.
ants, our critic should proclaim it, and not
meanly argue against state of things which
cannot exist unless the people themselves are
corrupt and guilty.
| Some of the contradictions Of this writer are
inefaby amusing He begins his essay by
congratulating General Pierce that he was
supported and elected by the fusion Of so many
heretofore diversified and discordant elements
and yet, one of the first grave charges which he
urges against our "new President" " is, that, in
constructing his cabinet, and in making his
principal appointments, he proceeded upon the
policy Of recognising the different interests Of
the democratic party which placed him in
| power.
His anmadversions upon the members ofthe
cabinet, are no less suggestive. Of Governor
Marcy he speaks as "aNew Y ork conservative,
identified with no great measure quietly with
| holding the fact that the Secretary of State is
one OF the first publicists now alive; that since
| lSl2-l4, when volunteer in the American
army, he aided to take the first flag and first
prisoners from the British in that war, his con-
nection with public affairs has been one unbro
ken series of brilliant and distinguished services
to his country: that he has been q Senator il,
Congress, Judge of the supreme court of New
York, governor of the State of New York for
| six years. and secretary OF war under President
Polk for four years and that his name is den.
tilted with some of the greatest measures aud
some of the greatest men in our history.
He denounces Caleb Gushing as a "New
England whig," but cooly forgcts that Mr.
Cushing has been a prominent member of the
democratic party for more than ten years; and
that he is a most accomplished linguist lawyer
and orator. He forgets, also, that when the
Mexican war broke out, General Gushing, then
a member of the Massachusetts, Legislature,
took his stand against the bitter antagonists to
the war, in that body, and when they defeated
his proposition to appropriate $4,000 to the
Massachusetts regiment, which he advocated
with memorable eloquence, he advanced large
amount of money out of his own pocket, for
the purpose, and the regiment was made ready
for service. He was then elected colonel of the
regiment, and subsequently, while in Mexico,
was appointed brigadier general by Mr.. Polk.
jefferson Davis is disposed of in single
line Of concentrated falsehood; our reviewer
calling him "a southern seceder noted only for
extreme and violent opinion" The Secretary
of War was not seceder in any of the often
sivc senses applied to those who looked to Sc
ccssion as the immediate and only remedy
against northern aggression. He was States
rights man, who held, with many of the first
statesmen of the north, that it was only when
the States could no longer resist the encroach-
ments of the general government, or an infuri-
ated fanaticism, that the idea of separation
should be considered. After such mis.state-
ment as this, we are not astonished that the
writer in Putnam should have deliberately
kept out of view that Jefferson Davis is one of
the ablest of all our public men-a man of un-
doubted truthfulness--an orator of the first
class an educated gentleman, and brave and
gallant patriot; that he served in Congress for
six years-resigning his seat to take part in the
Mexican war, in which, at the head of his gal
liant Mississippi regiment, he was -eminently
distinguishes and that he concluded his mill
tary career at the battle of Buena Vista, from
the field of which, after deeds of almost incred-
ible darino he was carried as it was supposed,
mortally wounded He still suffers deeply and
daily from those terrible injuries, while men
who never risked hair Of their heads, nor OK