Weekly national intelligencer. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1841-1869, 1863-11-05
FALSE FRIENDS DISCOVERED.

abettors grave umbrage 1t was inevitable that, in
pleasing the great of his loyal countrymen by
| the decision he reached in this matter, the Presi
dent should dsplease that noisy faction Of imprac-
ticabe politicians who now by their clamsrous de-
mands and now by their insulting murmurs, have
pursued him with such an underwriting "pres-
sure" to use his own word in describing their
solicitations.
1t is perhaps well that the country should have
in this renewed outbreak of factious spirit of
fault-fnding on the part of these anti-savery ex-
tremists fresh demonstration of the fact that po-
litcal petulance and acrimony are not the exclu-
sive offspring of the proslavery sympathies to
which it is so common for some persons to ascribe
any and all dissent from the policy Of the Admin
istration at this juncture There is no journal
which processes to be more thoroughly anti-savery
or more persistenty opposed to the rebellion than
the New York Independent, a political paper of
the Congregational denomination and yet it is safe
to say that in no paper published on this side of
the Confederate lines has the President been made
the object of more sneering illusions or contemp-
tuous criticisms.
We all remember how assduously he was bera-
ted in its columns a little more than year ago,
before he had issued the preliminary proclamation
of freedom. A single specimen of the lndepan-
dent style of animadversions at that period will
suffice:
eve have no doubt whatever that Mr. Lincoln means
well and tasks himself to do we'll for the country But
he is overmatched He cannot carry the GOoern
ment in its great erigency We are being worsted on
every side by inferior foe. How that Good
materials make poor armies, and poor materials make
good ones bad with skiul managers is gaining
ground daily against good cause with well wsher aud
golden dreamers to manage it, How comes that Blame
him Does any believe Mr.. Lincoln less than hon.
est But affairs too mighty for him. He wishes he
almost resolves he turns back He inauguraes policy,
Like snow, he mets in handling. His advisers clash.
His Generals quarrel He s half craZed with
this side and counter persuasons that One e1hor
and another warns He is threatened by radicals and
threatened by conservatives What shall he do9 SO he
does nothing He leaves his Generals to their
till some wisdom some folly against his peace,
when he resorts to the first expeden to aay the trouble
The device that qulets trouble raises another The
is good is the President that is oDertazed. But
there is country well a President. There is a
well an Administration. Every prudent man
oresees the utter exhaustion of the country if have
more such year the last. Yet have the same
Cabinet the floating expedients the stationary
Generals 1t is notorious that the Generals who control
the military affairs of the army pro-ssvery in their
beliefs and sympahies One drop of poison is match
We happened to learn from credible source at
the time that the objurgatory articles which lit
tie more than year ago embellished the loyal
columns of our New York contemporary were sent
to the President by an admirer of the Independent,
with the request that he would read them as the
exponent of Northern opinion, or of that phase of
Northern opinion which found reflector in this
journal. The President accordingly, it was said,
devoted portion of one Sunday to their perusal--
an encroachment innocently made, we doubt not,
on the hours of that sacred day, under an impress
sion that the Independent was religious and not
secular paper. On returning the papers to the
hand through which he had received them, the
President, we were informed, simply said, in reply
to the question what he thought Of them, /" asked
myself after reading those articles, Abraham Lin
coin, are you man, or are you dog, that men
write such things about your"
Such was the treatment which the President re-
ceived from the Independent little more than
year ago. Since that time one would suppose that
Mr.. Lincoln had manifested a disposition sufi-
GENTLY progressive" to mitigate the acerbty, if
not to conciliate the support of these zeaots But
such is not found to be the fact Indeed, it was
easy to foresee that it would be quite impossible
for Mr.. Lincoln, for any body else who does not
meekly register their daily edicts, to expect any
thing but harsh invective and studied depreciation
at their hands No amount of concession to the
whimsy of yesterday will procure any kind, or
even fair consideration for a refusal to comply
with the demands Of today. And hence it ought
to surprise no real friend of the President or we'll
wisber for the success of the Government, to dis
cover that the Radicals are just as exacting, GEN.
sorous and factious as they were before any thing
had been done to propitiate their favor. The Pre-
sident, by his answer to the Missouri deputation,
proved himself as we'll as a patriot. He
did not abnegate his functions as Chief Magistrate
and blndly follow the guidance of a hand reached
from behind his chair. For this degree of self
assertion he is roundly rebuked by the self-ap-
pointed custodians of his conscience and dignity
The New York Independent, true to its Therstes
vein, rails at him as follows
The Address Of the Delegation as it stands the Pre-
sident does not but first msstaes its points and
then answers these mis- statements His special pleading
is points which the address did bring into contro
versy. He swings his scythe among of straw
but we do not that he has cut down Mr. Drake The
details Of the address, but bandages his eyes look
ing at ts The centrs fact