Raftsman's journal. [volume] (Clearfield, Pa.) 1854-1948, 1861-07-24
aRRcKInR1ner

BGECK1NRlOGE.
Treason has assumed various DISCUSSES, in
this country, during the last twelve months !;
but # is recognizable under them all. The
garb in which ex-Vice President Breckinridge,
now Senator from Kentucky, arrays his, has,
however. not even the merit of originality,
and as disguise, it is the fimsiest OF all.
The speech that the ex-Vice President made
on Tuesday, in the United States Senate, was
pitiful thing, and yet, in the circumstances
surrounding him, nothing better could nave
been expected. His position is an AWKWARD
one. He was for four years in the p!ot TO ;sn as,
stroy the Government. He consorted Win
Davis, Slidell, Wigfall, Floyd, COBB, Ihomp-
son. Davis. Rbett and all the leading consplra-
tors He was in all their confidence, and
figured in all their plans for the future. He
was their selected candidate for the Preslden-
CIV of the United States, and his defeat was to
be- the signal for the destruction of the Union.
n was impossible for any man to have bound
up his political fortunes with others more
completely than Mr.. Breckipridge bound his
up with those of the leading Southern traitors.
Doubtless, part of the ultimate plan was his
election to the Presidency Of the Southern
Confederacy.
His speech passed by like the idle wind,
and had no effect in the Senate, which imme-
diately proceeded to vote support to the Pre-
sident in the most liberal manner. But 1t is
on record that Senator, who has been honor
ed with the second Office in the Federal Gov
ernment, opposes all measures to sustain the
Government against the most wicked rebellion
ever known. and the past position, as we'll as
the present infamy of the man, entities him to
some notice. This confederate Of traitors,
who has long been plotting with the destroy
ers Of the Government, talks of the Constitu-
tiOn as il he thought 1t q sacred thing, when
the acts of his life proved that he was untrue
to it. He was under oath to support il, while
he was aiding to overthrow it. He knew and
connived at the reasonable work of Floyd,
Davis, Wigfall, Mason, Hunter, and others,
each Of whom was bound oy oath, as strongly
as be was, to maintain the Constitution and
now he says that Mr.. Lincoln has not ad-
hered strictly te the Constitution. If Mr..
Lincoln had discovered the Capitol in flames,
and ordered firemen to extinguish them, he
would have been guilty of precisely such
violations of the Constitution as those charged
on him by Mr.. Breckinridge.
But where was Mr.. Breckinridge's love for
the Constitution, when he saw the treason of
his Southern associates in the Senate Chamber
going On last year? He never complained of
the Secession of South Carolina as being un-
constitutional. He never raised word of OBJ
lection to the firing on Fort Sumter, or the
rObbing of the Mints, Custom Houses and
ArseDals, which were certainly not constitu-
tional acts. He never uttered syllable a.
there ore even Southern men that admit that
to have been treason of blackest hue ; at all E.
vents, it was not constitutional. These and
hundreds of other unconstitutional acts have
passed unnoticed by the ex-Vice President,
and now he has the insolence to accuse Presi-
dent Lincoln of doing that which is unconsti-
| tutional, because he has resorted to extraor-
| dinary measures to suit the extraordinary e.
| mergencies of the time, and has shown that
| he possesses the Jacksonian power Of taking a
great responsibility for the sake of saving the
nation.
The people, who are the source of all politi-
| cal power, constitutional as we'll as legal, ap-
| prove of every thing that President Lincoln
| has done, and they have such confidence in
his purity, his patriotism and his firmness, that
| they intend to sustain him, as their represen-
tatives at Washington are now sustaining him.
| This national trouble in which we are engaged
is going to bring men to their proper level.
| raising some and lowering others. In the fina
settlement there will be few among the now
prominent men who will sink lower than ohm
G. Breckinridge.