The tri-weekly standard. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1866-1868, 1866-07-07
Senator Lane.

The suicide of Senator Lane, of Kansas, is
a very melancholy incitlent. IF ever the act
of suicide can be traced to rganizat ion and
aorganie condition, il certainly can be Sc
i Traced in this case Lane was a man of the
most impulsiye and reckless type 1--WE do not
i in this case use the word reckless IN its moral
applications) that the West produces man
who had no higher law than his own person
ality-and could tolerate no bride upon his
I will. Lately his health suddenly became
prostrated, and he had to leave his seat in
the Senate threatened, if not actually struck.
with paralysis. twas while in this condi-
ton, with deranged brain and shattered
system, that he was guilty of the act of self
destruction. sszs'sss-a@f zs'ss-s.'-e'
1t was in connection with the heroic
history of the young State of Kansas
that Lane figured most conspicuously; and
/ the part he bore in rescuing her from the
clutches of Slavery, not only secured him the
Senatorship for two successive elections, but
will cause him to be remembered with graft
| tude in her history as long as she has citi-
zen to enjoy the freedom he did so much to
win. OF his advent into the Territory in
1854, after his long and adventurous march
| from Iowa; of the numerous fights he fought
with the Border Ruffians - at the head of
small bodies of Free-State men; of the man.
ner in which he reused the people by his in
| tensely imprisoned appeals; of his ceaseless
PERSONAL and political struggles; of the great
triumph achieved by the Free-State party,
| of whom he was the acknowledged leader,
in so far at least as such men as settled Kan
sas could acknowledge any leader; of any of
the extraordinary incidents that marked the
career of this singular Western politician and
fighter, we do not propose to speak in detail
But there is no danger of their being forgot
ten in the West. At the beginning of the
great war of Secession, he left his seat in the
Senate to take part in the national defence,
and both in the raising of troops and in &C
tual duty in the field, he did as much service
as was possible even to a man of his capaci-
ties. But though a fighter, fitted in the
highest degree for irregular operations on the
Border and against such enemies as he met
on the plains of Kansas in 1856 or in Mis-
souri, in the early operations of the late war,
he was no soldier in scientific sense, and
soon discovered that his mission was not to
plan campaigns or command armies. He
returned to his Senatorial duties, and during
the war and until some time after its close,
his politics were of the most radical anti
slavery type, but latterly he has been in the
main supporter ofthe President and his poll
cy. His course in this latter respect has Sc
cured for him the most violent denunciations
in the State which he representative poll
tics of which are of the Wendell-Phillips or
der ; and he became so unpopular among his
OLD Ir1endS That, DOld and defiant though he
was, he hardly dared to set face among them.
This trouble unquestionably intensified the
others, and because of the others seemed of a
more formidable character than it would
have done to Lane had been sane in body
and brain. In the Senate Lane made no
especial mark, as an orator he found him
self out of place there as he had previously
found himself out of place in this CITY, 1t
was on the stump in the West and in times
of trouble and confusion that Lanes native
oratorical powers and intensity of character
told with effect and their effect under such
circumstances was very great.
Lane was very ambitious man. He was
accused of using means of any kind to attain
his end, and professionally he was not very
scrupulous, though there were doubtless as
many false charges against him as there are
against most of our public men. He cared
nothing for money only to scatter it, and
while he had many enemies, had also numer-
Gus devoted friends. Were we to point |
moral from his untimely end, it would be a |
caution against giving way to the passions
on the part of those whom God has gifted |
with reason.-Neo York Times.