North Branch democrat. [volume] (Tunkhannock, Pa.) 1854-1867, 1862-10-08

PAo~SuiAA6 os WhsNA VIC 0iU w pooc 1u6RACifs
at the polls on himself, his measures, and his
men. 1t may be that We are too late, but let
us not despair Of the republic, and clinging to
the hope that it is possible to save it from
final destruction, 60 forward, and through the
Democratic ticket do aIl that is at this time
practicable, be it little or much, ultimately,
available or not, towards the refrigeration of
our unhappy country.
You allude in your letter to the subject of
the recent discharge of prisoner in due
course Of law from arbitrary executive arrest
after special order had issued from Wash
ington for his conveyance to military prison
in the Capitol. "a military prison in the
Capitol!D 1t was triumph of the law, ef-
fected by the determined attitude of the
Judge who held fast to principle, and did not
finch; and from an open conflict with whose
judicial mandate the usupers of authority did
finch, The arrest and the offence committed
having been officially made known at Wash
ington, the order was given to take the pris-
oner thither, and that order and the Judges
direction to produce his body in court, were in
the Marshalls hands at the same moment.
The ineyitableness of the conflict between
the military and the judicial orders being oh.
vious, and the consequences of the conflict not
easy to be reckoned, the Secretary of War
gave way; and thus was achieved, by the de-
termination of an unarmed magistrate, the
defeat and disgrace Of system of barbarous
and brutal violence, which, when the history
of this Administration comes to be written,
will stand high on its catalogue of useless
crimes. 5''
Let those who would justify the men who
have plunged Mr.. Lincoln into these depths
of preposterous error, show precedent for it
in the whole history of the States. Do you
remember one recorded case of arbitrary ar
rest in the course of our Revolutionary con-
test; from the outbreak of our difficulties to
the peace with the mother country? In the
bitterest straits of the war of 1912, when
there really were those " TRAITORS in our
midst" who exist now only in lively imagin-
ations>>or on fiippant tongues, was it ever
heard that Mr.. Madison ordered an arrest d?
In 1858 and 'S9 the people of England went
through revolution which altered their in
stitutions from what they had been under the
Stuarts, to what they now are, without resort
to such violence: afterwards, when Stuart
invaded the country, throwing them into the
last degree of terror and confusion, at the
head of an army which cut its way to within
four days march of London, he was repelIed
at no such cost to freedom or violation of the
law. AT later date, the same people in the
war OF the french Revolution passed through
period of twenty years probation, during
no small part of which their national exis.
tence was thought to be at stake, sometimes
from insurrection at home, sometimes by inva-
sion from abroad, and always threatened by
the most formidable military power the mod
ern world has seen. They had all that time
both in and out of parliament an opposition of
unmeasured ferceness but nobody ever
heard of an arrest, unless by warrant of q
magistrate, for the disloyal practices'
and intemperate speeches which were daily
INDUCED in, to the most extreme and
furious lengths, and in language of the high
est invective, by the whole anti-war party,
from Mr.. Fox down. In troubled times there
will happen in any country, much that is
unjustifiable and our past history may
furnish instances of it. We have had
mubs that committed summary violence,
and abused persons and property; we have
had over stringent legislation, dealing in in
justice, and Furnishing, perhaps, the innocent
with the guilty. But that is not usurpation;
that is not the unlawful, unconstitutional as
sumption of power not delegated to those
who use it; that is not seizing authority !;
that is not mixing and confounding the care
fully separated duties of the different depart
ments of Government, as do those who serve
Mr.. Lincoln and betray the State.
Let me say in conclusion, things have come
to pass at which the Republicans them
selves, more unspairingly than we do accuse
and denounce, (without being arrested) the
administration which they brought into pow
er. They wonder at the functionaries whom
it employs; at the measures of their Con-
gress; at the reign of corruption; at the
downfall of the Constitution and laws
Let them wonder at nothing but themselves.
When for President of the United States,
who in not n monarch that reipns w;thout
governing, but ruler that rules, and who
himself must possess the nerve and ability for
command, the Republicans chose man Who'll.
ly incompetent, they inoculated, deliberately
inoculated, the State with all the mischief
that has followed. Why should they won
dor? why complain of Mr.. Lincoln2 why
curse their own work Let them be pleas.
ed with ruin 70 But they can be useful il
they will Should the Democratic party be
found next month in large majority, let the
Republicans persuade their chief 10 dismiss