Juliet signal. [volume] (Juliet [i.e. Joliet], Ill.) 1844-1???, 1864-07-26
From the New Albany LEDGER
Now aud Then.

upon them as q nation. Their govern ent,
as limited and defined by the Constitution.
was, by the wise and good, in every part Of
the world. regarded as the best that bad
ever been devised by moral man.
When we reflect upon our situation then,
and upon the woefui change which has
come upon Us R0to, we are almost ready to
believe we are under the influence of some
hidenus dream
Then every mans personal liberty was
safe and his rights Of property secure
Neither could be taken from him except as
punishment Cor crime and by due process
of law.
NoW no mans liberty is safe. no proper
ty is secure. Any mau may be seized and
cast into dungeon, or his property taken
from him and confscated. by irresponsible
agentsor officers Of the Government, and the
laws and the courts are powerle6s to pro-
tect hin.
Then the burdens imposed upon the
people by taxation were so light as scarcely
TO be Needed. Direct taxes by the General
Government were wholly unknown.
NOp the tax gatherer is at every mans
door. We are taxed for everything we buy,
for everything We sell-for everything we
eat, for everything we wear-for ev, rything
we do and for everything We do not do !;
and the Government is still striving 20 die
cover how all these taxes can be increased
how the greatest possible tax can be screw.
ed out of every possible thing.
Then we bad no natiG nal debt to impose
future burdens on ourselves or our poster
ity.
NoIo our national debt is already greater
than that of any other nation in proportion
TO population and RESOURCES, and it is every
day increasing with such enormous rapid
ity that bankruptcy and ruin cannot be far
distant
Then honesty and integrity in Office
were deemed important and essential. If
official delInqueDcies occurred, they were
rare, and, in general, severely reprobated
and punished
NOD official honesty seems 80 be the ex
ceptIOn rather than the :ule Civil officers
fatten upon fraudulent acknowledgements
in the army hunt for c.tton rather than
the enemy. Everywhere immortality and
confusion are rampant.
Then We had a currency that was relia-
BILE and possessed intrinsic value
NOU gold aud silver as a medium of ex.
change have wholly disappeared In their
place we have Shin Plaster Currency. 20
called from the initials Of the Manufacture
er. 1t has this popularity that more there
is made OF it the more worthless it becomes.
When one receives a dollar Of this currency,
he can buy about fifty cents worth Of any,
thing be may require, but there is no GER
tainty that it will be worth fifty cents, On
even FORTY, six months hence
Then our DatiOEHl reputation stood high
in every part of the world. The flag of bis
country was o sure protection for al Amer
lean citizen wherever be might be.
NOtc We have NJ national character any
where. All the desputs Of the earth rejoice
at cur Illumination, aud the apparently de-
plprable failure Of our system Of seli-eOv
eminent. They are establishing monarch
upon OurbOrders, and only await favOra.
BILE pretense and opportunity 70 interfere /
more directly with our own affairs The
name of an American citizen is no longer
an honor, but q byword and reproach.
Then We were one people from Maine to
Georgia, from the Atlantic to the Pacific
ocean. We were bound together by all
the ties of relationship, friendly intercourse
and the sans glorious memories.
Nosc we are divided and discordant peo
pie, busily engaged in sewing the seeds OF
enmiry ard animoslty to grow up and
children 8 children 20 the remotest genera.
tiuns.
Then our resources we're strained TO the
utmost to build railroads and lines of com.
muuiOati1n between the North and the
) nth, the East and the West, as bonds of
Union that should unite us more closely
together. and cement and increase that
mutual trade aud intercourse that was so
profitable to us all.
NO1c we are mutually employed in burn
ing. tearing up, and destroying those great
lines of communication constructed at such
enormous expense and productive of such
great advantages, and If is costing rs ten
times more to destroy than it did to con.
struct them.
Then our people were engaged in the
peaceful business of their ordinary avoca-
tions. They had no thought Of war, and
little personal knowledge of it's horrors and
its mseries, and the rattle of the drum wes
only at holiday parsdes.
NOtC the hum of industry has given place
to the claDg of arms Hospitals for sick
and crippled soldiers are constructed of our
school houses and manufactures. The
Provost Marshal with bis machinery for
enrOlling and drafting and for arresting
Then all over the wide extent of our fer.
tile and magnificent country, the fields
were teeming With luxurious crops, and
cheerful and happy homes we're surround.
ed with all the appliances of an enlighten-
ed and prosperous people.
No0 for hundreds of miles all the i'm
prOVements have been swept away Ruin
and devastation mark the track Of hostile
armies composed of brothers warning
against their brethren. Lurid flames Of
burning houses light up the midnight sky.
Husbands and fathers are shot down uoon
the threshold Of their dwellings,, and wives
and children are driven out homeless and
forIornJ with no better protection or suppprt
than the beasts of the fields or of the for.
ests..
Then thousands, tens Of thousands. yea.
hundreds of thousands of stall art men. the
hope of their country, the pride and sup
port Of their families, we're living in the
full health and strength of mao hood whose
bones are now bleaching in the sun or
heaped in shallow pits upon hundreds of
fields of slaughter.
Then wives and children were rioicipg
in happiness snt plenty, where nos5 the
widows aud Orphan's cry is beard in every
town and village throughout the land.
But why pursue this terrible comparison
furtherG We might continue i. to a much
greater length, aDd still fail to give sufic.
lent force and completeness to the horrid
record, BY means of which the best aud
happiest government 10 the world has been
converted into one of the worst and most
miserable.
And now the important question occurs,
who is responsible for all these horrors?
PROFESSIONALLY it is tbC men who have
bad control of the Government for the last
three years, and those who have sustained
and SUPPORTED them.
Rlthough varioGs causes, bsvs coutribu>
sed to foster and build Up the so called Re-
publican. party, 1t is undeniable that the