Delaware gazette. [volume] (Delaware, Ohio) 1855-1886, 1861-04-19
wa Hara a eovarnmant. .

We Have a Government.
We can hardly credit the senses when con-
templating the change that has come over our
countrymen within brief weeks space. For
months, under Democratic Administration,
was the question hourly, anxiously, asked,
Have we Government? That question, un-
der Republican Administration, of one short
month, is answered in the affirmative, and
men of all parties thank God, and take cour-
age. Faces brighten on every hand, and with
out regard to political afinities, congratula-
tions are exchanged, and mouth answers to
mouth that the glorious stars and stripes are
not to be trailed in the dust, but the Union
which they typify- is to be sustained.
a short time since, we rebul1ed symptoms
Of impatience, unjust and unreasonable, that
were finding vent among the people. To de
mand OF Mr.. Lincoln's Administration that It
should reconstruct, in four weeks. a govern
ment that for as many, years the whole power
of its rulers had been employed in tearing
down, was task of two herculean proper
tions for the power of man. Think, for
moment, of the labor Mr.. Buchanan, for
lifelong a man of political cxpedients, held
the Executive chair, not TO give direction, but
to tamely serve men who were his masters
He worked from no principle, but was wal
ter upon the tide of chance expcdients. His
Cabinet, until a few weeks before the end of
his inglorious term, was a nest of traitors, and
Cabinet meetings were wicked eabals, plotting
the destruction of the Government. All the
honesty that was in the Cabinet, unfortunately
pertained to one from whom age had stripped
all moral courage, who was easily blinded by
designing men, and who, when his eyes were
opened, only used their sight to make good his
retreat from the impending avalanche. a
Secretary of War, whose treachery to bis flag
sinks the crime of Benedict Arnold to a mere
misdemeanor, and to whose treason was added
the attribute of common thief. And thus
passing through all the Bureaus, from Treas
ury to Navy, reigned corruption or imbecility.
Cobb, a secessionist, bankrupted the Treasury,
making financial panics to add to govern
mental anarchy. Floyd, sowing treason in the
army, disposing the troops with direct refer
enee to a surrender of the Capital, and trans
fer of the men and munitions to the rebels,
while Toucey rendered himself Infamous in
scattering the navy.
And even after Buchanan had aroused him
self from a leihargy, or rather we are disposed
to believe was victim of an upbraiding con-
science. and Cass had fed, and the Cabinet so
reconstructed that treason could make no fur
ther direct advance, the Executive even then
so embarrassed the honest officers that at best
the form of Government was but preserved,
while the whole aim Of the President evidently
was to nurse out his term, careless if the 4th
of March inauguraied a civil war.
The world never looked upon such scena
of doubt and distrust as held all hearts at
Washington when Abraham Lincoln, with un-
covered head, and in the midst of hundreds of
foes, whose only check to their wishes of as
sassination were the fears of detection and the
hangman's knot, swore to defend the Constitu-
ton. His steps to the White House were
dogged by murderers. and nothing saved him
from his foes but the eagle eye of the scar
worn hero of Niagara aud Mexico. and the
true men of the army he had called around
him. Treason was in the Senate, and an army
of thousands of desperate men were enclosing
the forts of Sumter and Pickens, and their
handful of men, with the batteries Of death.
Il is needless to follow the picture farther,
political ruin. Mr. Lincoln with his Cabinet,
has, in one month, brought the country into a
comparative posture of successful defence
| With digniied reticence of Cabinet cOunsels
treason has become panic stricken with a
! trembling looking forward 70 the future, trail
! tors Hy hither and thithcr, as looking for a
! blow from an unseen hanl. The Treasury has
been strengthened, credit has been braced up
| into healthful action, aud an activity given TO
the Army and Navy that clearly demonstrates
that secession will meet with no further tenn
porizing. but if it would make any advance
must meet the stern realities of war.
While every one has wondered what could
be done with the case of Fort Sumter, the
Administration has solved the riddle by de-
termination to send supplies to its garrison,
and now the country is in admiration at the
foresight that thus places the rebels clearly in
the wrong and compels them either to swallow
! their boasts or themselves bring on war, By
an act that so clearly viii place the secession
lists in the wrong as to lose them even the sym
pathy of those in the border States who would
gladly find an excuse for joining in their trea-
son. There may be bloodshed. there may bC
reverses to the Government, but through a
these, eventually, will emerge in triumph thC
cause of the Constitution and the Laws, ant
the Administration of Mr.. Lincoln will b.
hailed by al good men as the country's deliv
erer from treachery and destruction. Yes
even now the question is answered, We hav'
a Gov vernment.-C Cleveland Herald.