The daily Gate City. [volume] (Keokuk, Iowa) 1855-1916, 1865-10-30
what VIII He do with II.

A problem concerning his imperial posses
sion of Mexico that doubtless OCCASIONS LOUIS
NAPOLEON much solicitude since the suppress
sion of the rebellion and the maintenance,
intact, Of the unity of the United States.
With people at home too versatile and too
prone towards radical republicanism to be pa
tient and unmoved under long quiet and i'm
perialism, the nephew of his uncle adopts the
policy of the first NAPOLEON. and by war
when the national sentiment will permit it,
and by an aggressive diplomacy at all times.
seeks to quiet the nerves of French irritability
and establish so permanently the throne that
not only himself but his heir after him shall
occupy it. Controlled by this idea his CONT
mental policy has been doubtless most con-
summately sagacious. England chafes under
q conviction of nferiority which the Crimean
war established, and the acuteness of NAPo-
LEON has maintained the vantage then gained
Prussah has been rendered anegatiye continen-
tai force so far as the attitude of France to-
wards Europe is concerned, and Austria,
though positive despotic force, has been baf
fed by NAPOLEON and his own autocratic rule
in France strengthened by his assumption of
the guardianship of progressive liberalism and
representative government in Italy, and his
interposition at the Minto of French bayonets
between Austrian despotsm and Italian unity.
The national pride of his people has been
thus grati6ed, and he has given stability to
his possession of the empire by enhancing
the glory of his country.
In entering Mexico he sought a new theater
TO divert active French political forces from
operation in home channels, and further
experiment in the development of his Napo-
leonic idea of restored and consolidated
Latin Empire. The results of that expert
ment are still hidden. NAPOLEON had his
Waterloo. His failure in Russia was the pre-
cursor of it. NAPOLEON III will doubtless
find his Waterloo, and the years-nor many
OF them, either-may trace it from his occu-
patton of Mexico. From our republican
stand point there is no place in all the coming
centuries, no place in all the earth's territory,
for universal empire, especially for Latiu
empire after the ideas of NAPOLEON. for il is
an autocraey and centralism That idea
reached its nearest practicable accomplish
ment under AUGUsTrs CESAR Each wear
of the succeeding centuries has made its full
accomplishment less and less possible. As
Americans we read the tendency of the
worlds progress to be towards democracy.
With no vain hope we look down the ages to
new political world wherein prevail the ideas
of "A al.
ciated in the Declaration of independence.
With the slowness with which humanity learns.
it goes on to that result. Until then autocra-
cies and oligarchies, despotism and central
ism exist but by suferance. We do not ex-
pect them to become permanently expansive
and recuperative. Such seeming tendency
we explain by considering it reactionary by
regarding it as that necessary antagonism
which is condition of republican growth !;
and following it, as a sequence, we expect a
positive propulsion of the race towards uni
versal liberty.
We do not expect any scheme Of Central
Imperialism to succeed even in Europe; still
less in the Western Continent which is the
normal home of Republican institutions Ma
.poleon cannot succeed in establishing per-
manent Empire in Mexico The extent to
which he may carry the experiment depends
probably very much upon the policy that the
Government of the United States may adopt
The evidently well advised Paris correspond.
ent of the Washington Haeltigeneer in late
letter to that journal, says:
| can assure you that he is entirely mis-
taken who believes that Napoleon will ever
abandon Mexico unless he is forced to do so
by the action of the United States Govern
ment. He has there to much at stake to be
reconclled to lose it, while he sees no i'm
minent danger of holding on. How if he
withdraws could he realize that his Mexican
'mbrogtto ,cds ''the most glorious page of his
reign" BY withdrawing his troops Maximil
liam could not remain in Mexico single day
longer; the costly and bloody work of four
years would at once come to the ground the
deIusion which he has systematically practis-
ed on the mind of Europe about the stability
of Maximilian would be at once dspelled
and the expenses of the expedition entirely
lost. and the Mexican bonds sold here under
the moral guaranty of France left in the same
condition as the rebel cotton bonds in Eng
land. His position would then be simply ride
ulous. He could not recover himself from
the great blow that his prestige as the greatest
statesman of the age, who cannot be mis-
taken and does all things for the benefit of
France, would receive by his backing out of
Mexico with all the necessary consequences
Of failure and shame. The opposition in
France would then have arms enough to
shake the very foundation of his throne.
Rather than abandon his pet Mexican
scheme, he will go on as long as allowed to
do so by the United States, without any re-
gard for the actual expenses of money and
men. If it is required, for instance, $780,
100000 and 10000 men a year to keep up his
phantom of an empire In Mexico, and to go
on deuding public opinion in France and
Europe at large, he will be ready to expend
as much money and men rather than ac-
knowledge his utter defeat and failure, and to
endanger his personal safety and the success
sion of his son to the imperial crown.
To show that NAPOLEON does not propose
to withdraw from Mexico this correspondent
states that the Emperor has recently sent ad-
ditionsl troops secretly to Mexico, also q
French Minister of Financs to MAxIxnlAs
with Inspectors of Finance, over dozen su-
bordinate officers and several gen darmes
officers that MAxIMrIIAS's bonds have gone
IL u. r.x.