The daily register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1863-1864, 1863-11-17
TERMS OF DAILY PAPER.
The Question Involved.

going about to inform people that three and
three do not make five. Take the follow
ing, for instance, from the Cincinnati
GaSette: gs7tiO 15eI-
"The sole question now is, sohether the
Government, schich is struggling against a
rebellion ,ohich seeks its life, shall be support
ed, or mott Those who are for supporting
it have, in consistency, no alternative but
to support the war, and the constituted au-
thorities which conduct the war. All sup
port which falls short of this, however
rightly inclined, is no support at ALL"
Who is so ignorant as not to see the in
correctness of these assertions and the ar
guments they apply? So far from the
question whether the Government should
be supported in struggling against the re-
bellion being the sole question, it is no
question at all. No country was ever so
unanimous as this is upon that point, and
those who hold contrary opinion are, in
numbers and influence, totally Insignificant.
The question upon which the country is
divided is an entirely different one, namely,
whether the Administration shall simply
use the power intrusted to it by the people,
under the Constitution, to break the mill
tary strength of the rebellion and restore
the Union, or whether this power shall also
be made the instrument of securing mere
party ends. repugnant to one half the loyal
people, whose blood and mouey, equally
with that Of their neighbors, are spent to
sustain the Government and maintain the
integrity of the country. What Democrats
and Republicans divide upon is, whether,
in this war. the dogmas Of abolition sus.
tanned by the latter, or the Constitution
and laws of the Union, shall be what our
armies are to fight for. The Democracy do
not ask to have any Of the peculiar views
of their party made the test of loyalty
They are ready to drop party and unite
with every loyal citizen to sustain what
the President and Congress asked them in
the beginning to sustain, and what only
they have right to call upon them to
make sacrifices to sustain,-thoSe funda
mental principles of our Government upon
which there can be no dispute. So far
from asking any abatement in the righteous
prosecution of the war, what hundreds of
thousands of Democrats are shedding their
blood in our armies, and what other hun
dreds of thousands Of their Democratic
friends are encouraging and aiding them!-
They only ask that the party in power shall
not use the resources of the nation, the
wealth and strength of Democrats and Re-
pubicans alike, to enforce its own special
doctrines, and carry out its own plans
They have no right to do it. 1t is neither
Just nor honest, and in the end
they will find it is not even polite.
Nearly all the opposition to the Admins
tration, grown in two years from insignif-
canoe to formidable power, springs solely
from this attempt to direct the wa to par
tisan ends and all the terrible violations of
the laws of the land and the rights of citi-
zens which go to make the Administration
unpopular are employed,not to crush the
rebellion, but to intimidate the conserya-
tive portion of the people. indignant at such
fragrant breaches of solemn obligations, no
less than OF common honesty. Who DOES
not perceive that every act of the Admin
istration which meets with opposition is
either an attempt to carry out party objects,
in contradistincton to National objects, or
else attempts 10 punish citizens for protest.
ing against its partnership and trying to
arouse the people to sense of the perma-
nent wrong which such course inficts up,
on them? Let the President go back to
the principles proclaimed by him in his
inaugural; let Congress be guided by the
spirit of tho resolutions it passed in the
beginning of the war and there would
cease to be division in the North. A few
radicals would return to their natural posi-
ton of open hostility to the Union, and re-
sumo their denunciat'ons of the Constitu-
ton and laws of their country; but the
hearts of the people would be filed with
10Y, and the war, now beginning to sett
upon us as burden Of immense proper
tions, would be borne up again lightly by
the cheerful good will of all the people.
We repeat that conservatives expect no
aid from the Government for any of their
peculiar ideas. They throw them aside, and
only ask their opponents to do the same in
good faith, as they once agreed to do The
conservatives of the North have no special
regard for the Institution of slavery, any
more than they have for the institution of
divorce, or the marriage of blood relations.
But what they do deem precious aud inal-
lenabe is the constitutional rig ht of States