Rutland weekly herald. [volume] (Rutland, Vt.) 1859-1877, 1864-09-08
RUTLAND HERALD.
SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 8, 1854.
The platform ana the Candidates.

peace "on the basis Of the Union" But
if IT, rebel authorities should refuse 10
ente, sogotiation except upon the
basis ZION OF the oh'oh anu
the ack,..... AT of their separate |
independence, we are left wholly in the
dark as to whether the trainers OF this
platform would then renew the war OF
surrender utterly to the demands OF the
traitors. The Importance of this ques-
tion Is seen when we remember that the
rebel authorities now declare distinctly |
and unreservedly that it is useless to APP
proach them at all with propositions for
negotiation ON Union basis. A cessation
of hostilities Is of all things what the
rebels desire they are approaching ut
ter exhaustion they want time to re-
cuperate; they want our blockade
raised they want Grant, Sherman and
Farragut withdrawn and after this is
done and they finally refuse terms of
peace based upon Union, as they then
certainly would, it would be our privilege
to commence operations anew against a
relieved and strengthened enemy, or
yield to the destruction of the Union.
Which would it be a We have nothing
in this platform to show. 1t is a plat
form with the most important plank
left out. 1t is a weak, miserable, rickety
concern, no more suited to the great
crisis OF the nation, than is canoe to
navigate the great ocean,
The other portions of the platform are
but vain repetition Of stale charges
against the administration, added to
which is some insulting sympathy"
to our soldiers, insulting because they
are at the same time told by these "dem-
ocrats" that they are engaged in a
hopeless and ubiquitous crusade and
that all their labors and sacrifices are
for an oppressive and unjustifiable pur-
pose. There is of course not word in
the whole miserable platform against
the rebels and traitors whom our SOL
diers are fighting and who have by their
Internal ambition and treason rendered
necessarysall the sufferings and caused
all the bloodshed and mourning in the
country. The platform accuses only
those striving to defend the Union it
is SO pitiably weak against those striv-
ing to destroy the Union that it contains
not word against them. Rebellion is
ignored, the government only assailed.
Upon such platform, they have placed
Mcclellan, who has protested to be a
war man, alongside Of Pendleton
'peace" man Of the most ultra yallan-
digham stripe. The platform is well
enough for Pendleton it is utterly
inconsistent with McClellan's former
acts.
Mcclellan in the address made by him
in June last at West Point, proclaimed
that our only salvation was in the pros
ecution of the war it was to preserve
our government from destruction that so
many of our comrades have given their
lives : and he exclaimed
"Shall such devotion as that of our
dead comrades be of no avail ? Shall it
be said in after ages that we lacked the
vigor to complete the work thus begun
That after all these noble lives freely
given we hesitated and failed to keep
straight on until our land was saved.
Forbid 1t, Heaven, and give us flrmer,
truer hearts than that"
The platform on which he is placed
declares that hostilites must cease, the
war must stop.
The platform denounces arbitrary
arrests. Mcclellan was the man who
ordered the arbitrary arrest " Of
the Maryland Legislature. His friends
in the Convention were obliged to de-
fend him on the ground that he acted on
credible evidence that members of that
Legislature were about to commit acts
hostile to the Union cause, that he acted
on grounds of military necessity" for
the public safety. They thereby in eff
ect defended every similar act Of the adj
mlnlstratlon Which the same men so
fieroely denounce in their PLATFORM
These acts are right and justifable when
committed by Mcclellan they are tyr
annical, despotic and subversive Of our
liberties when committed by the admin
istration. What a lame and impotent
conclusion Mcclellan in 1862 was in
favor of confiscating rebel property and
in the language of one Of the delegates in
this same Chicago Convention, "sus-
pended the writ of habeas corpus and
helped enforce the odious emancipation
proclamation"
Why Is such man, who stultifies
their resolutions, put upon such a plat
form? The resolutions express the SEN
timents and purpose OF the Convention
30 far - zion dared express
them. The managers of the Contention
know that their candidate is man Of
such clay that, if elected, he can be ma
nipulated into any desired shape. His
whole career, one series Of weak indecis-