Cincinnati daily press. [volume] (Cincinnati [Ohio]) 1860-1862, 1861-04-05
The LOnssn Timos's Opinion of President

LincoIn's Ihausural address.
The London Times, referring to Mr.. Lin
coins Inaugural Address, says:
Mr.. Lincoln's expressions are studiously
cautious and moderate; bat they really
amount to this That he will enter into no
negotiations with the South; that he will
hold 30 much Of the property of the United
States Government az is still in his power;
will possess" and "occupy"--that is, recap
ture, the citadels, arsenals and other properly
Of the United States, which have fallen into
the hands of the South; and further, that he
will collect the revenue from the seeding
States, which, if done in the mildest man
ner, implies very strict blockade. In max
ing these announcements, President Lincoln
may be doing nothing more than his duty,
but we can not conceal from ourselves that
such policy is neither more nor less than q
declaration Of civil war.
A second article, in the Times of March 10,
discusses Mr.. Lincoln's Address at greater
length. We copy the material passages:
The speech takes up grounds strictly con-
sttuti0nal. In it the President confines and
entTenches himself behind the express pow
ers which the Constitution has given him,
and refuses TO recognize any other. he is
capable Of considerable flights of fancy, but
can notemancipate himselffrom the shackles
bond, and he finds there that he is bound to
execute the law in all parts of the Union and
to preserve the Federal property, and he in
tends to execute the law and preserve the
Federal property accordingly. What the
consequence of performing these acts may be,
it is not for him TO consider his business is
to execute the law; let those who made the
law answer for the rest.
Mr.. Buchanan took much the same view
of his functions, but he extracted from that
view the inference that he was bouud to do
nothing; while Mr.. LincolH considers that
he is bound to do exactly the thing which is
sure TO produce the war which he conceives
it TO be beyond his power to declare. Nor
is it his discretion alone, which the President
believes to be circumscribed by the Oonsti-
tuition. Not only does he seem to conceive
himself prevented from doing any thing be-
| yond its strict precepts, be does not feel that
he is allowed to know of any thing uncon-
| stitutional
He knows that his fellow. countrymen are
| dissatisfied, but he is forbidden to know that
| seven States are in fagrant rebellion. There
| is Presidential as well as q judicial knowl-
edge, and, as courts of law are not allowed
to know many things which are perfectly
| notorious to the rest of the world, SO it is
with Presidents, part OF whose duty it is to
have puTer eyes than to behold any thing
that savors Of rebellion. We see that this
| way of looking at the question finds favor in
the eyes of the purely Republican journals,
while the South appears to consider it. as far
as we can judge from their organs in New
York, as the flinging down the glove, which
it will not hesitate a moment to take up.
Had Mr.. Lincoln been President at thetime
the Secession was first threatened, an essay
| on the Constitution and a few words of
| friendly persuasion might have been an ap.
! pToprlate way of dealing with the subject.
But 1t is childish as well as dangerous, thus
| sudiOusly to ignore the real state of the case,
and TO seek by constitutional Teasonings to
influence men who have placed themselves
out Of the pale of the Constitution altogether.
There is no safer maxim in human affairs
than carefully to examine ones own position
and that Of ones antagonist before abnouuc.
ing any resolution, and 10 base that resolu-
ton on actual aud real, not on imaginary or
conventional considerations. With the real
state Of America the Federal Constitution
has most. unfortunately, very little, to do
The President might almost as well go back
to the social contracts of Rousseau. The
question is not judicial, but political; moi
one OF law and powers, but of reason and
expediency.
We believe that, instead of ignoring the
secession Of the South, and determining to
treat it as non dVena, the President ought to
recognize it as q reality. We do not say that
| he ought TO recognize the right to secede,
which clearly does not exist, any more than
the right to rebel against the English Crown
claimed by the American colonists existed as
Jart of the English Constitution.
We do not Say that the President is bound
to treat as legal the Confederacy which has
risen up IN opposition 10 his own; but what
we maintai is, that as q wise man, patri
otic magistrate, aud good citizen, he is rem
deIing an evil service to his country if hC
does not deal with things as they are, insteat
Of as they ought to be.
When civil war is as imminent as it ap
pears to be at this moment in America, 1t il
well to admit the only possible alternative
that of hearing what terms the South i:
prepared to propose in order to avert 81
dreadful calamity. The last alternative
always remains and the fratricidal sword
will not have lost its edge by remaining il
the sheath few weeks longer.
= The South has shown NJ
sign of any wish to return on any terms int
the Confederacy it has left; and the Mort
has employed the short interval of Secession
to raise upa new barrier against reunion il
the shape of an illiberal tariff, all the bsne
fits of which will be on one side and all tn
burdens on the other. The South offers t.
the Border States market for their slave
and law against the Te-establisbment of th
slave-tFade, which may be considered a.
protection of the human commodity in whic
they deal. The North requires them to con
tribute TO its manufactures and tax them
selves for the benefit of New England an
Pennsylvania. The struggle may be pain
! full one, but We fear that it will be decide
rather by interest than by sympathy, an
that Mr.. Lincoln's constitutional lecture
will avail little against the consideration
suggested to the Border States by the hig
price of manufactures and good markC
for slaves