Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1862-09-23
Leaders as well as Policy.
By WENDELL PHILLIPS.


All agree that what we need is wise
and settled Policy, resting on ripe Pub
lie Opinion. We may hope that despair
Of success, on its present plan, will incline
the government to another. In that case,
we ought to under stand ourselves in
time.
undertaking our. enemies, and using one
hand instead Of both have been our err
rors hitherto. Let US run no risk of re-
peating either mistake. Radical men ask
Of the President an emancipation policy
"a proclamation declaring all slaves free
men. OF what use would such proca-
nation be, if Halleck and Mcclellan in
the field, and Blair and Seward in the
Cabinet. are left to execute it? II would
not be worth the paper it wasted. We
have plenty Of good laws nowg but no one
executes them-as Mr.. Greedy has shown
in his terrible letter to the President The
confscation law, and all the action of Con
gress in that direction, are, as yet utilities,
because the President omits TO put them
in force.
j In all Rarliahaents and Congresses, a
measure proposed aud adopted is left to
be shaped by its friends. In all govern
ments, new policy to be tried is tried by
its friends. This IS the dictate Of good
sense. and the usage Of all governments.
When our government accepted the plan
Of the Monitor, they employed Ericsson,
its inventor, to build it. When the British
people demanded the Reform Bill, the
King called to Office Lord Grey, the life.
long champion Of that change. If the
President should proclaim Emancipation,
and Halleck, Mcclellan, and Buell. smoth
er, under pretense Of executing the meas
ure, it will be failure. Let us provide
beforehand against such danger. Let
il. be understood now that our claims ofthe
government is, satisfy yourself fully that
"your Cancellation Policy has failed, and
"then We demand a proclamation Of Free
"dom-war, on war principles te
conducted by such men as Sumner of Mas
sachusetts, Stevens of Pennsylvania, and
Wade of Ohio, and their friends in the
Cabinet-and by Hunter, Sigel, and Ere
mont in the field. The country has given
Conservatism and Cancellation year and
half of time, thousand millions of dol
lars, and two hundred thousand lives, to
try their plans and do their best. Under
Cabinet and Generals Of their own
choice, their policy has been fully tried,
and failed. We stand now about where
we were when we started But for Scots
absence, one could hardly distinguish the
Washington Of Sapts18G2, from the Wash
ington Of Sept. 1861.
= Our language now should be, "dente-
men, your game is played out. Give US
place. We have had sham fights and
rose-water imbeciles and traitors, till the
land is satisfied. Now we will m Ike war
in earnest, with an idea in it, urder states
men and soldiers"
The times are too serious TO risk anoth-
err mistake. Let thinking men solemnly
impress it on the nation that, no matter
how high in Office, or how wide the rule
reaches, no Emancipation policy is Of any
value, unless its earnest and downright
friends are put at the head of affairs.
Let us state now that whenever President
Lincoln, according to his promise to Mr..
CIR eley, adopts a new method, dictated By
necessity, we demand, according to good
sense and all national usage, that he put in
to the Cabinet men who have advocated
that policy since the beginning Of the war;
and give the control Of the army to sol
diers whose hearts are ia that plan-soI-
diers ike Siyel who hava favar t,at ! "a
verse; and like Fremont, who, thwarted at
every point. and robbed Of both men and
supplies, can still boast that, thus far, he
is the only general before whom Stonewa
jackson has retreated, though having two
men to our one. This demand springs
from no weak partiality for favorite men,
but it is an imperative necessity, fair
claim, a simple conformity with approved
and judeious custom.