Cleveland daily leader. [volume] ([Cleveland, Ohio]) 1865-1873, 1866-02-22

the best demonstration of remark
. in the article from which we
have quoted, to the effect that the
: reasoning powers of political parties act
ing unler excitement are completely want
ng. OF the truth of its statement it is its
own sad monument.
Seriously, however, the frightened cry
of the Herald that the Union party is no
more is entirely groundless. That party
is neither dead nor dying True, it has
been treaeherously deserted by man
whom it placed in power, but that deser-
tion is not fatal to it. An open enemy is
loss dangerous than traitorous friend.
When any body contains within itself ele-
ments foreign to it, it gains rather than
loses strength by sloughing off the alien
matter. And so it is better for the great
party of freedom that those who are op-
posed to its vital principles should leave it
than that any false compromise should be
patched up with them. Their departure
leaves us stronger, more united, more de-
termined than before. The President has
abandoned us, but not the people, and to
the grand constituency of the people we
can afford to go on this great issue, conf
dent that its suffrages will sustain U.S.
The Herald complains querulously
that a want of that mutual compro-
mise and confidence on the part of the
President and Congress, which might have
averted the quarrel, has been the cause of
the difficulty. 1t says:
"Want of confidence-or rather suspicion
of each other-has brought about this politi-
cal catastrophe"
The most obvious answer to this COM
plant is that this whole contest is one of
principle, a fact which, as the Herald
never had any principles whatever, it has
naturally failed to comprehend. The
question as TO the condition of the South
and its fitness for restoration to power lies
at the bottom of the difference and gives
it its importance. On this question the
President and his party are at swords
points. The difference is fundamental
and essential, and all efforts TO compro-
mise it are, from the very nature of the |
case, futile
But granting that there has been want |
of mutual confidence, who is responsible |
for it? Is it the grand Union party or
its representatives in Congress, who greet
ed the President on his Inauguration with |
the fullest and most implicit trust who |
have given his administration an uneues-
tioning support until now; who have
praised him, his measures and his mes
sages as no President was ever belauded |
before; who have abstained from criti-
cizing him even when his acts deserved |
severe condemnation; and who have sacri-
iced everything but principle for the sake
of harmony with him? Or is it the Presi-
dent himself, who has restored the unre-
pentant traitors of the South to all thu
power which he could give them; who
has coquetted with Northern Copper
heads, been closeted with Bright,
Bigler and Florence, and written letters to
John Van Buren, and Horatio Seymour;
who has given courteous audience to dele
cations of South Carolina and Virginia
rebels, while be has turned ms back upon
the representatives of his own party; and
who has taken occasion to discriminate, in
making his appointments against those
who maintcd the great principles of that
party2 The Herald tries to throw the re-
sponsibility of the alienation upon Con-
gress, but to do SO it falsifes the facts.
The whole course of the Postmasters
paper is so obviously dictated by self-in-
terest, entirely unregulatOd by principle,
that it cannot but disappoint all candid
aud sensible men. Its evasions would
provoke to anger, did not its cowardice
and weakness excite contempt. 1t looks
at the whole vast question of reconstruc-
ton through the narrow windows of the
Postotfice, and evidently believes the loss
Of the government patronage TO be
greater cataclysm than the disruption of
the Union. It's blank uncertainty wheth-
er to endorse Congress and offend the
President or to endorse the President and
offend the Senate; its futile endeavor TO
get over the difficulty by doing both and
its blank terror are ludicrous and yet
pitiable. We hope for the credit of COM
mon manhood that it may soon regain its
courage come out of its bewilderment and
take decided position on one side or the
other.