New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1865-06-28

President Johnson has pardoned this person
in compliance, it is said, with promise made
to his wife by President Lincoln. We are glad
of it. No good can come of hanging the chieiS
of an utterly defeated, brOken-down rebellion
But, if any of them are to be hung, 1t Is wrong
to pardon this one because
I. He is not dupe of the Southern State
Sovereignty delusion. Heknows the resolu'
tons of '9S to be bogus. Educated in the
nurture and faith of John Marshall, John Quincy
Adams, Henry Clay aud Daniel Webster, he
remained an ardent Wing until the Wing party
irrecoverably broke down, when he rated to
the plump and oily Democracy, holding up his
porringer at once for ladle-full of "the spolls.
So he is without the excuse Of believing In the
right of State to dissolve the Union.
II. Nor is he pro-Slsvery fanatic. On the
contrary, when young Wing member Of the
State Legislature while Madison still lived to
inspire the movement, last vigorous effort
was made to rid Virginia Of Slavery, and
he gave that movement his best efforts.
His speech showing tho ruinous influences
of slaveholding on the State, through Its
Indictment to contempt for labor, with
general Incidence and thriftlessness. has
rarely been surpassed. Garrison or Wendell
Phillips have scarcely equaled it. And it is
barely ten years since he gave that speech to
Republican member of Congress to read as an
exposition of his views on the great question.
III. Having become o Democrat by trade
and pro.Savery agitator, Faulkner got into
Congress, where he voted for the worst schemes
of pro-Slavery aggression, whereby the North
and the South were brought into determined
antagonism, and at last into bloody col
liSon. Meantime, he had persuaded Mr..
Buchanan to send him as Plenipoten.
tiary to France; and to his influence at
that Court, most treacherously exercised,
we attribute its indecenty early recognition OF
the Confederates as entitled to bellgerent
rights, and the obstinate belief of Napoleon
that the Rebels must win. We believe he did
the country more harm during the last four
months of his stay at Paris than be could atone
for if he were to live q thousand years.
Nv. Retutning when superseded by Mr.. Lin
coin, he plunged over eyes and ears into the
Rebellion: Yet he was no Disunionist-for, liy-
ing Just over the Potomac, he could not be.
He evidently regarded the Rebellion as but
new grab for power by that pro Slavery Democ-
racy TO which he had sold himself, which, like
the Dutchman with his horse, had "got
off to get on better" 1t was not half the
country, but the whole, reconstructed on the
Montgomery platform, with Slavery for its
avowed cornerstone, that Faulkner and such
as he struck for. He had seen the Southern
Democratic managers make so many bold
throws and win, that he judged them invincible
and resolved to share their triumph. He sought
neither safety nor ease, for bis home was where
it must at least as often be within the Union
lines as the Rebels. lie simply went in to win.
V. Having bet his pile on the horse he
deemed matchless and lost the race, he now
concludes to draw his stakes. All right. Let
him have it. But it would be most unjust to
hang any traitor and not hang Charles James
Faulkner.