Weekly national intelligencer. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1841-1869, 1864-07-21

stand the gravest ocnsure of the Attorney General
Of the United States.
What wonder that under such an administration
of our military affairs paltry squadron Of two or
three hundred bold riders can, with entire mpunty
cut railroads between Harrisburg and Baltimore,
and Baltimore and Philadelphia; or that mere
squad Of ten men approach within four miles
of city containing 200 900 inhabitants, gsrrisoned
by 70, 900 men, and burn at their leisure the man
hundred men should, by simply sitting down before
one of the forts of Washington and establishing
weak skirmish line, succeed in placing the capital
OF the nation under siege, cutting its telegraphic
COMMUNICATIONS with Baltimore, burning the house
of cabinet minister within six miles of the city,
and reducing the Government to the ecc-sity of
relying on river and sea navigation for its connec-
tions with the great North And all this, be il
remembered, happens in the fourth year Of the
war, with men by hundreds Of thousands under
arms
And now we ask, the whole nation will ask, ,cho
President, the Secretary Of War, the Chief of staff,
or can it be that military affairs are still left
at such loose ends Gas we know them to have been
before) that sometimes one and sometimes the
other of these functionaries assumes to exercise
the direction of the war; selects he points of mill
tary occupation, and assigns the officers to their
several commands? In theuncertanty resting on this
bject we think there is doubt about one thing,
and that is, that if the President cannot discover
and correct tn. source of these blunders the peo-
pie in the approaching election will not be slow to
discover one method by which they can put an end
to this reign of military Incompetence in Wash
ington. No respect for the Presidents "honesty
of purpose" and no admiration for the purity,
intelligence, and administrative skill which they
may recognise in the other Executive Depart
ments of the Government, will stand in the way Of
riddlng the War Department of the incubus which
now visibly rests on it under its present manage
Matchmaking it shame and areproach to the
nation And in SO saying we intend no particular
personal allusion to Mr.. Stanton, for we do not
know to-day that be is responsible for these things
1t may be that he confines himself strictly to the
civil detsis of his office, and does not meddle in
the matters which somebody under him or above
him brings to such confusion. But we do know
that somebody responsible for the late gross NAL
feasance, which must ever stand in our military
annals as national disgrace, SO long as posterity
shall revert to the time when FIVE hundred men
laid Washington under siege for two days with
ten or twenty thousand men behind its defences
Such is the penalty which nation pays for being
ruled in any department by its ignorance rather
than its intelligence.
Nor does the evil end with the disappearance
of the late fright. Who, after such an exhibi-
ton of military incompetence in our counseIs, can
repose any confidence in the military admins
tation so long rs it shall remain subject to its
present directors What security can any man
feel when the watchmen from the walls of our ma
tioDal capital lift up their voices only to expose
their own Ignorance Of the nature and extent of
the peril from which they call the people to save
them? What Governor of what State will be
prompt hereafter to respond to the tap of the drum
in Washington if its alarms are beaten with most
vehemence when there is the least known about
the necessity for disturbing the country? An inn
mense clamor has been raised without cause during
the last rev Gays. VINO Is sure that while the
conditions of our ignorance remain as they are the
next clamor may not come with cause, and find
the War Department as little prepared to meet
real danger it has proved little prepared to
face an imaginary oney Let all loyal people lay
these things to heart, but, above all and first
of all, let the President Of the United States be
assured that for these things his countrymen
will hold him to strict account and that they will
exact full atonement for the great indignity which
the nation has just suffered in the eyes of the
world.
The President, we know, is ambitious to earn
not only the good opinions of his fellow citizens
but also to receive their votes Mt the next election
II he woutd reccigc them he must be careful 10
deserve them; andif he should in this way vindicate
his claim to the renewed confidence Of the country
we are sure that we could sincerely rejoice in his
success, not from any interest we take in his per-
sona fortunes any mole than in those of any other
man of any other party, but because wo desire the
best welfare Of the Republic in this day, when she
requires the highest craftsmanship and the most
exalted capacity to conduct to wise conclusion
the affairs of the State. His merits and his pre-
tensions are now trembling in the balance, held by