The evening Argus. [volume] (Rock Island, Ill.) 1861-1871, 1866-01-15

abilities and complications inherited from
his unfortunate predecessor.
The president knows that the people of the
insurgent states accept in good faith the re-
suits of the war they have done SO with the
same courage and fortitude they 80 signally
displayed throughout the contest. The cheer
ful acquiescence In results they were power
less to avoid may be incomprehensibie to
mean nature, and little souls. And tho they
emerge from the conflict with blood-stained
hands-though they were insanely wicked In
preoipitating a causeless rebellion, they are
to-day, in all respects, better than those who
seek further to increase their calamities. or
desire, in a spirit of wantonness, to augment
their humiliation. He who desires longer to
hold the people of the south under the forced
rule of military and official mercenaries lie
stranger to those feelings which most adoru
humanity, or ignorant of the plainest max
inns for governing mankind. l repeat that,
while the president adheres to free elections,
and is seeking to substitute the rule OF the
laws for the sway of the sword, he is ent tied
to whatever aid we can bring to his support.
The decent people of our own state, am sue,
will concur in this opinion; nor will they pause
to discuss passt wrongs or indignitles, real or
supposed 1t is with the living present they now
have to deal, and in doing so they will seek to
strengthen the executive in every effort he may
make for the practical enforcement of the policy
avowed in the message. And the president will
soon know, what he has been too slow to believe,
that it is to that portion of the people of the
United states who opposed his election he must,
to a great extent, look for reliable and intelli-
gent aid. Such view of things may be sugges-
tive of painful political collisions but if the
country is to be rescued by adherence to princi,
PIES neither party pride, nor party organizations
will be permitted to impede the work. 1t is well
known that Brownlow and his creatures are now
engaged in writing letters to prominent radicals
in this city, urging continuance OF military
rule, and military commissions, and asking that
the southern Representatives may be refused ad-
mission. Their opposition to free and legal cleo
tions is notorious, while their denunciations of
the principles of the message are wholly undis-
guised. The same may be said of the seedy pol
itical Adventures, who for while held high
carnvalin Louisiana, and the like of whom are
now claiming, with less than a thousand con-
stituents to be "the state government of Arkan-
sas." 1t is a notable fact, that in every instance
throughout the south where. :he elections have
been free, or conducted under the auspices OF
the president the people have chosen those who
heartily approve the policy enunciSted in the
message Every woudbe official who does not
sustain this policy is appointee of some military
or other despot who knows that peace and plum
der are incompatible things. 1t is only from
these military appointees who hate and fear the
people in pI oporton as they have wronged them,
that the president may appreheud any opposi-
ton in the southern states. And now venture
this prediction In Tennessee, where almost all
civil power is in the hands of this class where
we are iusulted and oppressed by ignorant and
irresponsible usurpers; where we daily con-
front the sickening scum which rises when the
nation boils"-in this state we will soon behold
the united power of the so-caled state govern
ment, (save only few members of the legisla-
ture,) directed ignorantly, but spitefully and
snergeticaly, against the aims and purposes of
the president. Within the next year, or immed-
lately after one free election, they will below
for negro suffrage, negro equality, freedmen 5
bureaus, and military posts permanent and
necessary things. In all this they will only have
proved true to their instincts, and will have
made public the secret motives which control
them now. Bitter, indeed, but impotent will be
the excavations when some one shall read to
them the message which the president, yester-
day, transmitted to the senate, and in which he
officially declares "that the rebellion waged by a
portion of the people against the properly consti-
tuted authorities of the government has been
suppressed" The president well knows that his
power TO suspend the writ of hGbedS corpus rests
solely upon the act of congress of July 2, 1868,
and that his power, by the express terms of the
act, is limited to the termination of the then ex
listing rebei!ing. This message restores this con-
stitutiona! writ to the people of the United
States and though military commissions for
the trial of political offenders may hereafter have
less to amuse their leisure, the people, thank
Heaven, are once more secure withie this an
cient intrenchment of constitutional freedom
1ou know my relations to the president, and
therefore do not respond to one of your iuuuir-
les. You ought, likewise, to know that am not
In the habit of asking quarter from political foes
or personal enemies. What | have written, and
what propose to do, are prompted alike by a
sense of duty, and not because | would seem to
seek the favor or forbeaTance which too many
vainit suppose is pleasing to power. As to
another matter to which you refer, will briefly
state that the proof which was submitted to the
commission before which was arraigned in 0c-
tober last, satisfied me that the president was
not, as had previously believed him 10 be, per-
sonaIly officially responsible for my arrest,
the prosecutions by which is was followed, But
prefer not to dwell upon matter wholly per-
sonal. When public liberty is once more secur-
ed to the citizen, private wrongs will be consign-
ed to forgetfulness.
Very truly, &C.,