Bradford reporter. [volume] (Towanda, Pa.) 1844-1884, 1862-09-11

dency, so fortunate to the country and 81
fruitful of saving consequences to the whole
people, batf1ed the immediate purposes of tht
conspirators.
The adversaries of Mr.. Lincolns Admins
! istraton are nearly in every case the adver
| saries of the Government. The attack the
| one to weaken the other. We recognize il
| the Executive the embodiment of that au
thority which can alone destroy the rebellion
and rescue the Republic. If the Executiv,
arm is paralyzed, there can be neither unity
among the people, victory for our armies
nor hope for the preservation of the Govern
ment.
While thy enemies Of the.war propose ad
herring TO the form of mere party organiza
tion, the loyal men have yielded their pref
erences and systems, coutent to defer to the
days of peace the revival of disputes which
can only be repeated now to the injury of the
common cause.
Let the people decide whether that interest
is deserving of confidence which, in the midst
of war, refuses to abandon the prejudces
of party strife, and in the midst of national
peril devotes itself to the work of dividing
the people.
The opponents of the war are more anx.
ous to prove their hatred to party than to
the public enemy. They insist that the de-
mon Abolition is the most dangerous foe of
the public peace. We can see but one great
criminal-but one great enemy to the Re
public-and he is now in arms against our
countrymen and brothers. To defeat him at
once and forever is our first and most i'm
perative duty.
The adversaries of the war insist that they
contend for the Union as it was, and the Con-
as it was but not for the return of the
armed associates of the sympathisers with
treason to the places they so long occupied
and so basely deserted. And while we renew
our fealty to the Constitution as it is we al
so insist upon the addition of that duty
which the opponents of the war so steadily
ignore, viz: The enforcement of the laws"
whether these laws are for the confscation
of the rebel property the emancipation of all
slaves who aid to defend the flag of the
Union, or punishment of the reckless palt;-
zans in the adherng States who aid and com.
fort the rebel enemy, demoraze the people,
and paralyze the arm of the Executive
If, in word, we have sympathy to bestow
it is not for the murderers of our country's
liberties, but for the defenders of those liber-
ties. The gallant soldier teaches US by his
example to persevere 10 devotion to our coun-
try. He offers his life to the Republic with
accomplishing spirit, reposes full confidence
in his superiors, ,sustains the Government of the
United States, and sees but one antagonist
before him-the rebel who strikes at his own
heart and at the Union of these States We
should be unworthy of the advantages of
peace and of home if we did not strive to i'm
itate at the ballot-box au example so freely
set before US by our fellow citizens on the
battle field
In the fuflment of these grave duties, we
invoke to the standard Of our countrymen OF
every class and opinion We scorn the base
ness that invokes party hate or popular pre-
judice. When we behold the adopted and
the native citizen, the Democrat and the Re-
publican fighting side by side in the army,
We are inspired by the lesson to do likewise
in the quiet walks of civil life.
Loyal men of Pennsylvania it is for you
to determine between the friends of the Gov
ernment and the war, and the opponents of
both. 1t is for you to declare for the SYM
pathiZers with freedom or the sympathizers
with slavery and the rebellion. 1t is for you
to decide whether you will strengthen Abra-
ham Lincoln or Jefferson Davis 1t is for
you to say whether the traitors shall be
crushed or whether our free institutions shall
be crushed. There is, and there can be, no
middle pathway. There are, indeed, but
two parties-patriots or trators-those who
are for the Union and those who are against
it, And all men who are not openly for
the Republic must be counted among its ene-
mics
1t is fact that You cannot too carefully
ponder, that the leaders of the opposition to
the Government in this State are the same,
with descredible exceptions, who encouraged
the policy which encouraged the traitors to
commence the rebellion. Their whole effort
since the war began has been to divide the
people of the loyal States They announced,
early in 1861, that Pennsylvania should join
the South in the event of separation, and
this is their secret hope to-day They would
have held the hands of the Government that
the rebels might strike at its heart and would
have succeeded but for the prompt courage
of President Lincoln. They followed the for.
tunes Of General Breckenridge up to the period
of his desertion into the ranks of the rebels.
They repeat his arguments in this their Coun-
try's darkest hour. Their plea for the Con-
stitution was his plea before he drew his
sword against it. They clamor, Us he clam
ored, against the Abolitionsts. They de-
plore emancipation. even while they deny
that the most effective emancipationists are
the shareholders themselves. They bewail
confcation acts, Willie Jefferson Davis Sc
questrates the property Of all loyal men in
the South. And, as if to complete the par
allel, and to show show sincerely they love
the traitors, even as they pretend to des
pise the treason, they see our brave mea per-
ishing on the battlefield and in hospitals,
from the disease of the swamps and the bull
lets of the foe, aud discourage enlistments in
order that they may be relieved and, while
prating of negro exodus into the free States