The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1866-06-02
The DUTY of the Hour.
AS IT APPEARS TO A LooKER-oN IN WASH.
INGTON.

1t was quite apparent on Monday to lockers
on in the Capitol, that something was about
"to turn up" The Senate met, attended to
routine business, went into executive session
and adjourned, and those who attended in
hopes of hearing the debate upon reconstruc-
ton had TO content themselves with listening
to the ayes and noes as they were called on
the amendments to the tax bill in the House
The bill as amended passed with only II dis
senting voices.
1t is now supposed that the introduction of
the bill by Mr.. Stevens had something to do
with suspending the debate in the Senate
The bill is radical enough to suit the most ex-
acting It reduces the States to the condition
Of Territories, or nearly so; it provides for
impartial suffrage; it deprives all persons who
swore allegiance to the Confederate Govern
ment of the elective franchise until five years
after they have declared their intentions and
desire TO be reirvested with the rights of citi-
zenship. The bill contains many other provis-
ions equally stringent and will as matter of
course, raise great storm about the heads of
those who support it; but these men sincerely
believe they are right in their attempt to put a
final stop to agitation, by dlsposing, finally and
forever, of those questions which have hereto
fore caused agitation. The party which in
PRODUCES this new measure has a record which
gives it great strength among the people. 1t
took the nation when the Democratic party
had succeeded in bringing it by half century's
misrule to the brink of precipice, at the foot
Of which ragged the wild, red sea Of civil war.
The impetus given by the Democratic party
plunged the Republic into the abyss. The lie
publican party has brought us safely and tri-
umphantly through the raging storm of strife
with an accumulation of national glory and a
vast increase of national wealth, power and
resources. Having done all this believe the
people will trust them to do more and at their
hands expect final settlement of all those
vexed questions out Of the discussion of which
grew the civil war.
Whatever rumors to the contrary may have
gone abroad, it is plain to every observer here,
that the breach between the President and
the Republicans in Congress is daily widening.
The President cannot corrupt Congress; in
the Senate, Cowan, Doolittle and Dixon are
the only accessions he has received. They are
the distinctive Johnsonites, and they are alb
solutely power.css excepting in alliance with
the Democrats, when they are still in hope
less minority. All the Presidents threats
and inuendoes have only served to force the
Republicans of the House of Representatives
into more determined combination for mu-
tual support, and the party in that body were
never more united than now. If the people
throughout the country, who voted for Lin
coin in 1884, will stand by the principles they
then advocated and sustain the men who rep
resent these principles in Congress their tri-
umph is sure and the hundreds of thousands
of graves will not have been filled in vain. =
The elections next fall will be found as impor-
tant in their relations to the future Of our
country as any campaign Of the war has been,
and we hope everywhere to see nominated for
important positions State and National, tried
and faithful servants of the Republic who are
not afraid to meet the issues of the time and
to use all their influence to settle those issues
on the side of Freedom, notwithstanding the
fact that traitors or the friends of traitors de-
nounce them as radicals and fanatics. Who
would not rather have the reputation of Thad-
deus Stevens or that of William Pitt Fessen-
den to day, than that of Henry j. Raymond
or of James Dixonl Each of the first named
is agreat power in himself; the latter are nei-
ther loved nor honored, even by their political
friends or fellow conspirators, and are nothing
in themselves, The first two are positive men !;
the latter are believers in the philosophy of ex-
pedients Positive men write their names and
characters upon the page of history; men of
mere expedients and compromises are lost to
the future in the common crowd which leaves
no footprints on the sands of time"
The people must sustain their representa-
tives and all will be right. The press and the
people should be bold in their assertion of the
right, and in denunciation of any attempt to
compromise with wrong. Now is the time to
show that the will of the nation is, that not
only slavery shall pass away wholly, but that
the wicked, anti-republican and anti-national
spirit With which it inspired the South must
be exercised before the men who act from its
dictation can be restored to the full rights of
citizenship, which they so recklessly and wick
eddy abandoned for the sake of their infamous
cause. asl e '
The people have much to do, and it is not
knowledge of their duty that is wanting, but
determination to perform that duty, Their
cause has been in whole or in part abandoned
by the President in whom they had good rea-
son to believe they could trust with most i'm
plicit confidence. VIM. FL. Seward has failed
to meet the consequences of his own teaching.
and instead of insisting that there is an cir,
repressihle conflict between freedom and slay-
cry, furnishes us a poor weak dish of plati-
tudes which are neither mentally nor morally
nourishing, and advises us to s'trust to luck.a
But we have good, true and tried men for
leaders-such men as Trumbul, Wade and
Fessenden, who never drew disloyal breath.
and who never for single moment, even in
the darkest day, despaired of the Republic
Let us trust to such men, accept their advice.
follow their guidance, and our country win be
saved from all the perils which now surround
her. q, O.