Daily union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1865-1866, 1866-07-29
soMrruIvG TO BE THANKFUL ron.

AOAllGEHANsE To nj hAAANEAA u ANA-.
Congress adjourned yesterday. II has
been in session eight months, and if it has
done one wholesome, just, or proper thing,
it is so overwhelmed by the mass Of mis-
chief It has piled on the statute books, and
the injury It has inflicted upon the public
confidence in the stability Of our form of
Government, that it win not receive in his |
tory the credit Of good intentions. 1t has
displayed too much deliberate readiness TO |
do evil, to be entitled to claim that it had |
any other purpose. A cabal Of selfish, plot
ting leaders, utterly destitute of patrio- |
tism or true statesmanship, and intent only
on personal and sectional ends, has ruled its
councils, aud sought to secure their objects
by converting the Government into con-
solidated despotism, and enslaving and de-
grading section, comprising in territory
and population, nearly one-half of the Re
public We state a calm, honest conviction
Of Judgment when we say that the rule Of
such a body continued for a few years will
divide this nation not into two parts as the
late secession movement proposed, but into
many, and that il will obliterate in all Of
them every yestige of republican freedom.
Since the commencement Of the admins
tration Of WASHINGTON there have been par
ties in the nation, and the floor Of the Ma
tional Legislature has been a theatre on
which the spirit Of contradiction and rivalry
has been exhibited. It has witnessed many
scenes in which Incorporate feeling has been
the chief feature, and has been the forum Of
fierce debate upon great and absorbing
themes which shook the fabric Of govern
ment to its foundation-stone. Occasionally
there had occurred breach Of dignity, but
until the outbreak of the civil war, and in
deed some time afterwards, neither House
had degenerated into partisan cock-pits such
as they have now become. There has been
for a score Of years a gradual lowering Of
the grade Of men sent to Congress, but the
oonvulsion Of 1861 upheaved into that high
place class Of men unfit in every respect,
and since the first Of December last it has
displayed disregard of parliamentary de-
corum, a loose personal and political mo-
rality, an insensibility to the responsible
duty devOlved upon it, a lawless, revolution
airy and utterly reckless spirit, a degree of
sectional selfshness, a perverse wilfulness
in wrong doing, a contempt for the Consti-
tuition under which it was sworn to act,
which will stamp it as the most depraved
body Of its kind in the history of the West
ern Continent The men composing the
two hundred or more individuals who have
been at Washington as Legislators
do not deserve well of the country
| There are exceptionsin the Senate and in the
| House-not two score in the latter, and not
halfso many in the other body Seine of
these have courageOusly kept burning the
vestal fire Of the Constitution and deserve
high honor, but as a body it has achieved
an infamous aotoriety, and the majority of
its members will be read Of hereafter as men
who, meeting at an important crisis, had it
in their power TO accomplish an immensely
ofgood, but moved by petty, vindictive, con-
temptible passions wickedly chose to throw
away the opportunity, and strove to keep the
nation trembling on the verge Of dismember-
ment and anarchy.
For this reason we give thanks that it has
for a short season at least, put period to its
destructive work and fervenhy trust that
before it assemblies again the people in every
section may become awakened 10 the peril
in which they stand, and by their potential
voice rebuke it, and enforce a reformation of
its course.
In this event, and the adjournment of the
self-styled Tennessee Legislature a few days
since, we Of Tennessee have cause of great
qualification. Victims in common with
others, of the misrule of Congress, we have
been compelled to undergo a more comp Iete
grinding by a small wheel within this great
machine at Washington. A body Of vulgar,
obscure, incompetent UPSTAIRS have obtained
control of our State government, who neither
have the brain nor the heart to conceive any
higher estimate Of their duty than TO sla-
vsihly learn and ruthlessly inAict upon their
immediate fellow-citizens, whatever the ma
lice Of their masters at Washington might
dictate; and this they have done dutifully
and we'll. We will not recount the vices of
the thing called State government in Ten
nessee, for every reader knows already toe
much of it. Our object is simply to ex.
press our congratulations to the country
that il too has retired for awhile, and
TO urge the true people of Tennessee to SET
on foot movements before November, that
will Undue it with proper respect for the
Constitution and the laws, and restrain the
mad career Of mischief which has well-nigh
driven them TO desperation.