Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1864-11-17
From the Wisconsin State Journal.
Fer Eight Years---What it Means.

The name of ABRAHAM LINCOLN is enrolled
among the great men who, in the Presiden-
tial chair, have SO won the confidence of the
American people that they have been marked
out for the distinguished honor Of being twice
| entrusted with the Chief Magistracy Since
the days of ANDREW JACKSON no man has
been twice elected President until now.
Such a recognition Of the ability, fidelity,
patriotism and devotion which Mr.. LINCOLN
| has exhibited in-the discharge of the mighty
| responsibilities of his position, in time of un-
paralelIed trial and difficulty, is an encourage
ing evidence of the intelligence and stead
fastness Of the popular masses, and happy
augury for the future. .. ..
1t announces to the people of the insurrec-
tionary States our unchanged and unchange-
able determination to make no terms with re-
bellion except absolute submission to the
Constitution and the laws. 1t tells them to
look for no change of policy, no wavering, no
relentment, but only vigorous, unremitting,
relentless war, with the whole power of the
National arms, until rebellion is crushed
and loyalty to the National flag is again es-
tablished over every inch of the soil of the
Republic.
convention representing whatever there
was of baseness, of cowardice, and of treason
in the North met at Chicago. 1t represented
yet more. The programme of its proceed
ings was the product of joint deliberation be-
tween Southern traitors and Northern sympa-
thizers meeting upon British soil. That Con-
vention said to the American people: 1T is
time to stop fighting; 60 to the ballot-box
and proclaim the dissolution of the Republic.
The war is a failure let the nation commit
suicide" And the American people respond.
not with all the indignant emphasis which
would have characterized their answer had
the proposition been presented in its naked
enormity, instead of being, as it was, care
fully and blandly garmented in ambiguous
phrases, specious circumlocutions, false pro-
fessions, and
arguments of fine inposture.''
But the answer is unmistakable. seNo"! shout
the people, if this great Republic must
def the inevitable hour has conceive
have some choice as TO the manner of its
DEATH Let it not fall, if fall it must, BY
craven suicide Let it meet its fate in man
ner worthy of its past history, and worthy of
its grand aspirations Let it perish, if perish
it must, in an heroic struggle to maintain
itself overwhelmed by superior force but IN
conquered in spirit, going down Ike the glo-
rlous old Cumberland, her innsbruck flag still
WaVin. aloft, the SYMBOL of indomitable and
deathless resolution aL .tt -E
And the people know and feel that there
Is no such melancholy alternative as national
dissolution by suicide or the SUPERIOR power
OF rebellion presented. The Republic will
neither surrender nor be overwhelmed. She
Will not stoop her naughty forehead in the
DUST, either at the dictation of rebels at the
south, or OF their craven abettors at the
North She never stood more proudly erect
more hfmIy seH-eentered, or felt "a more
auroral hope than now, as, with barred arm
and defiant eye, she holds aloft the old flag,
ana utters the inspiring battle-cry:
FOR THE GREAT EMPIRE OF LIBERTY, For
wARDln