Raftsman's journal. [volume] (Clearfield, Pa.) 1854-1948, 1865-08-09
Stand by the Administration.

Stand by the Administration.
During the perilous days OF the Republic,
when the fortunes of war seemed full of
doubt and uncertainty, and dark clouds low
cred over the country, we were want to
make earnest appeals to the people OF the
North to stand firm in the faith of ultimate
victory, and to raise up and strengthen the
hands of him who has since been martyred,
by cordial sympathy and a practical coop
Grafton in the great business of putting
down the rebellion. Amid the dangers
and struggles of that time, it was almost
treason to hesitate or doubt. Necessity
seemed to demand an unquestioning sup
port to the Government de factO, regardless
of the political issues he was supposed to
represent.
In the presence of our great emergency
all considerations of political policy were
blotted out, and in the popular expressions
at the polls, during those years, was exhib-
tied the solemn sense of the masses, of the
absorbing and controlling necessity of stand
ing by the government regardless of party.
Looking back upon those days-upon the
overwhelming defeats which were registered
against the democratic party, and the bitter
odium which attached to those who evinced
a lack of sympathy to the government,-we
can see the true secret Of our national
strength and our national success. 1t rest
ed in the exalted loyalty of the masses,
which subordinated everything to an un-
questioning loyalty, and cast aside, or at
least postponed, the old issues upon which
they had been arrayed in bitterly hostile fac
tions 1t was sublime spectacle, involving
as it did demonstration of reliable high
moral popular sentiment sufficient to pre-
serve the nation in SO great crisis.
Now that we have emerged successfully
from the terrible armed struggle, and have
reverted to a condition of quasi peace, there
are many among us who mistak enly imag-
inc that the necessity for steady and per-
sistent support of the Government is at an
end. They forget that in everything ex-
cept its armed array, the position of the
South toward the Union is unchanged, and
that in the silent struggle of reconstruction
which has interviewed all the fruits
of our bloody sacrifices are involved.
They forget. somewhat too easily, we think,
the unscrupulous nature of the foes with
whom we have contended, and the unchang
ed bitterness which has animated and Will
continue to animate them, until the last de
tail of rehabilitation shall have been ire
vocably settled. They seem to forget that
under the promptings of humiliatlng defeat
the rebels are still full of that ''unconquer
able hate and study of revenge which ami
mated Milton Lucifer ;, and that SO far as
results are concerned, the present is crisis
equally, if not more important, than that
which existed in the darkest hour Of the
war.
We deem it to be now, as much as ever,
the duty of true patriotism to rally around
the national administration, and to sustain
the President by pronounced and cooper
atlve popular sentiment In the difficult and
critical task to which he has fallen heir
through the assassination Of his predeces-
sor. We believe him to be actuated by the
purest and best of motives, and impelled by
a wise regard for the law, in the enuncia-
tions of his policy. We believe that he has
hit upon the best and most feasible method
of harvesting the fruits our ofrecent struggle,
and that it differs in no essential from the
policy which would have been adopted and
carried out by ABRAHAM LINCOLN had he
lived.
With regard to the great and substan-
tial accomplishment of the war-the aboli-
ton of slavery-the President is as firm as
adamant. In that direction he has showed
no shadow of turning, no iniirmity of pur-
pose He has laid it down as the corner
stone of his policy that every rebel State
shall harmonic its organic law to that end !;
that it shall return to the Union only
spirit and in truth, emancipated. With
him this is the Alpha and Omego of rehabil-
itation, simply because his province extends
no further
| The question Of suffrage is one with which
| he has nothing to do as the Chief Execu-
| tive of the Nation. He leaves it where he
| finds it-with the States themselves-under
the indirect coercion involved in the fact
that Congress is the final Judge of the ex-
I tent of organic preparation necessary to en-
| title rebel States to resume their Federal re-
lations. In substance, President JOHNSON
has said to the States, "Clothe yourselves
with the altered status which has resulted
from your own acts, and then present your
selves to me. Primarily [ will pass upon
the military question involved, and which be-
longs to me to decide as COMMANDMENTS
Chief. When [ have done SO, and have of
ficially recognized you as in condition of
peaceful allegiance, then, and not till then,
can you incur the civil law for its judgment
upon your rights. y
This is practically what President JOHN
SON has declared. 1t involves the gist of
the whole subject of restoration of the
States, so far as his authority extends. To
that extent it is the duty of every good and
loyal citizen to rally around and sustain him,
as much so as if it were contest between
him and foreign power.-Bufdlo Com
1nerctdl
THE PRICE OF GoLD.-The Neao York
Herald says that there is at present strong
feeling among the gold operators in Wall
street for a rise in the premium on coin.
| The argument is this: That the disburse-