The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1866-08-08
The Issues of the Hour.


1t is impossible not to see that the great
questions which ever since the cessation Oh
actual hostilties have been agtating the
mind of the whole country, are assuming
new phase, and, indeed, indications are not
wanting that an important and perhaps dam
gerous crisis is approaching. The issues are
fast narrowing down, the lines are being more
and more sharply drawn. AS the unchanged
spirit and insolent aims of the rebels become
daily more apparent, equally apparent becomes
the design on the part of a considerable par
ty at the North to coalesce with these traitors
and concede all their demands for the purpose
Of securing through their aid the control OF
the government. The trick by which they
propose to accomplish this cid has been for
some time past quite manifest. They intend
if possible to make the people Of the North
believe that the position of the two sections
of the country has been changed, that the
people of the South are truly loyal, and anx-
ious to resume their duties as well as privi-
leges in the Union; while Northern Radicals,
under which term are included all who have
steadfastly upheld the cause Of the country
when it was most hard beset, are represented
as preventing the restoration of the seeded
States to their constitutional rights and as la
boring to keep alive and spread the fires of
sectional hatred. To convince the country
that this is the true state of affairs, is the first
part of the programme; and it is being car
ried out by every species of Misrepresentation
and malignant innendo against men whose
devotion las proved itself beyond all POSSIBLE
ity of honest doubt. At the same time no
effort is spared, no subserviency is deemed
too base and contemplate which may concili-
ate the friendship and cooperation of that
class who plunged the country into war, and
who wait but the opportunity to renew their
old career of insolence and aggression. Ev-
cry specious argument and suggestion which
can be devised is brought into use to familiar
ize the public mind with the idea of return
to the old order of things as it existed before
the war.
Such combination of forces as this, the
alliance of the worst political elements Of
North and South, would under any circum-
stances be powerful for much mischief But
having secured to itself the aid OF an AFRO
CANT and INSCRIPTIONS Executive, armed with
the vast enginery Of official patronage, it
boldly assumes to possess a national charac-
ter, and claims to represent the deliberate
sentiment of the country. Whether it does
so or no. the thoughtful men Of the country
will easily determine by q slight examination
Of iss principles and purposes as they are now
unequivocally displayed The determination
to wrest from the loyal North the fruits of its
hard-won victory, to turn the country over
to rebel control, restoring to these bloody
handed traitors, whitewashed with the Presi-
dental pardon, all the power they lost through
an appeal to violence, and to abandon the
Union men of the South to the tender mer-
cies of their bitter and relentless enemies
these are the no longer hidden purposes of
the party which supports "my policy;' and
the bloodstained streets of New Orleans and
the blazing dwellings and churches Of Mem
phis are examples of the means by which
those purposes are to be accomplished. Is it
to further such ends that the men of the
North gave their sons to die on Southern bat
tlefields and to starve in Southern prisons;
that they burdened themselves with the noun
tain of debt which now weighs down their
every effort, and stints in the form of taxes
every possible expenditure? No, never!
thousand times neverl These heavy sacri-
fees they freely made in the cause of liberty,
justice and equal rights,-that the principles
of the great Declaration might find expression
in fact, and man be as free to speak his hon.
est thoughts in the South as in the North.
This is the work to which they have set them
selves, and they are not of the kind who give
up or look back. They know the faith of the
nation is pledged to those faithful Union men,
white and black, who are being shot down
ike dogs by mobs that hurrah in the same
breath for Jefferson Davis and Andy John
son." and they will not sit supinely by and see
the nation dishonored by the failure of that
pledge. The Southern rebels have had one |
Illustration of how terrible may be the wrath
Of patient and long suffering people. 1t |
would seem as If that lesson might have suf-
feed them. But if they really stand in need
of another they are taking sure way to
get it.