The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1861-09-06

N~'S "0 Po'1SFefy VI LILO ueatn Vi 1choiooh
Davis, Provisional President, or Dictator rather,
OF our rebellious Confederate States. Consider
ing that his health has been in very shattered
condition for several years, and considering his
extraordinary labors, anxieties and exhausting
excitements of the last five months, we were not
only prepared to believe the report of his death,
but we think it somewhat remarkable that he
was not carried off three or four months ago.
Assuming that he has at length gone the way OF
all the EARTH the first question suggested is:
what will be the effect of his loss to the bad
cause Of this Southern rebellion?
We think that the loss of Davis at this time
will be more serious to the rebel cause than
would have been the defeat of Beauregard at
Bull run. Davis was the man of all the aspiring
leaders of the South for the post Of Provisional
Dictator of the rebel States. Educated as
soldier at West Point, his conduct at the
ingly popular throughout the South as mill
tary chieftain. His subsequent prominent career
as Southern partisan leader in the United
States Senate, and in the Cabinet of poor
PIERCE as his Secretary of War, and again as
the anointed champion Of the Mississippi dis
unionists in the Senate at Washington, had
given him character in the cotton States for
craftsmanship and administrative talents fully
up to the standard of his military reputation.
Thus combining the practical training and
knowledge and popularity of the regular sol
der with very large experience as fire.
LOT md ivil
officer, State and federal, Davis was the very
man required as the provisional head of this
desperate experimental Southern confederacy.
Selfconceited, self-willed, arrogant and des-
potic, we have in these pecularities Of
Davis the very qualities which, of all others,
were most needful to enable him to give
force and authority to his position as President
of the Confederate States He was invested with
this Office because Of these very qualities, and
because the crude, loose and irresponsible
embryo government Of which he was the chief,
and the exigencies of the armed rebellion with
which it was associated, demanded q dictator.
He was named the President, but the few
mon who thus appointed him expected him
and aided him to assume the powers of an
absolute despot.
| Thus we can account for the wonderful mill
tary energy, activity and resources brought
into the field by the rebel States. They have
been called into requisition by Davis, the abso-
lutte despot of the new confederation. We anti
cipate the question: was he not subject to the
laws of the Confederate Congress? by answer
ing that that Congress, consisting of only one
house of from twenty to thirty sef-appointed
disunion managers, was nothing more than the
obedient corps legislatD of the Southern Dicta-
tor. They legslated according to his will;
and all his subordinates, military and civil,
were taught, before appointed, the necessity of
absolute obedience to their chief. Our read
ers will thus comprehend to some extent the
loss to the rebel cause of this man Davis, with
his great popularity, his abilities and indus
trious habits, his unbounded authority and his
| dictatoral character.
| With the decease of Davis, Alexander H.
Stephens-a superior debater and politician
although jaundiced, dried up and very feeble
little man. Of about ninety pounds in
weight-sueceeds to the Office of Provisional
President of the rebel States. For the
| paramount duties of this oflice-thOse OF
dictator of the rebel armies-Stephens, we ap
prehend, is no better qualified than is Horace
Greeley to stand in the shoes of General Scott
Stephens is an able lawyer, an able stump
| speaker a skilful, intriguing politician, and
withal, a man Of strikingly conservative ante
cedents, opposing to the last gasp the secession
| Of p,,ttb &c In h,1-
the helm of this Southern rebellion. He is not
the man to hold in check the rival political fac
tons and the rival ambitious military chief
starting up in the rebel States To be sure
the provisional term of Davis and Stephens ex
pires in February, when rebel President and
Vice President are to be regularly elected; but
this interval to February under Stephens, OF
under anybody else, will probably break down
the whole concern.
Such men as r. Barnwell Rhett, of Soutl
Carolina, or ex-senator Mason of Vir
gnia, could play the Southern Dictator
with will, but not with the comprehen
sive abilities and graceful condescension O
Davis. Stephens has not been trained tc
recognise the superior blessings of des
potism of any sort and we may, therefore, ex
pect to find him unequal to the squabbline
chiefs and ferocous factions of the rebel camp
And so we think that the loss of Davis will
be more serious than the loss of great battle
to the rebel cause If gone to his final account
the strange coincidence of his death with the
total wreck Of the dashing privateer bearing
his name will have its effect upon the impress
BILE public mind of the South. In connection
too, with the late disasters to the rebels in the
field, and the manifest hopelessness of their
sinking cause, the loss of Davis, among many
of his followers, would be accepted as judg.
| ment of Providence.
|
| CLEAN SHIRTS AT PREMIUM AMONG THE RE-
BEIs.-The following, from the Memphis Argus
of August rs, is a somewhat suggestive official
proclamation
] To THE CITIZENS OF MEMPHIS
Applications have repeatedly been made TO me, ex-
ecutve officer Of the city for protection against ndscreet
parties who sent impress citizens into service
] against their will steamboats,. Many Of these men
have been dragged from their beds wives and children
but has there been taken who had clean
] horn ify yha vvyah