The Wheeling daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1865-1903, 1866-12-04
The PrenIdcn1,n nIen.n-e.

space this morning to the Message. 1t
was issued yesterday evening from our
Office in the shape OF an extra, and was
eagerly sought after by the reading
public. There was an intense anxiety
TO see what position the President
had taken in reference TO Congress.
We think we can say that the gem
eral expectation was agreeably disap-
pointed in the tone of the document.
While few expected Mr.. Johson to be
conciIiatory and compromising as re-
CARDS his policy, yet many persons
feared that he would rashly attempt to
arraign Congress and provoke retalia-
ton on the part of that body. While
the President re-asserts his "policy,"
and is more than ever confirmed as to
its salutary and saving benefits, yet he
takes evident care to avoid the coarse,
Vituperative and disgraceTul language
OF his campaign speeches last Septem-
Der, and to place himself strictly on the
defensive. In this respect his message
contains nothing new, and no one will be
edited by the arguments put forth.
Mr.. johnson, while seemingly firm in
his former opinions, has been very per-
ceptibly modified in his manner, and
we doubt not realizes that his position
is not of that sort before Congress and
the country to warrant him in any as
symptoms OF style. We need not at
tempt to point out his careful avoidance
of the real issue before the people in
the late elections. That omission will
strike the reader at once. He ignores
the elections altogether. He does not
even refer to them in the remotest de-
gree. lie simply leaves with Congress,
as he affected to do this time last year,
the responsibility of effecting full
settlement with the rebel States. This
is gratuity on the part of the Presi-
dent that is cheap enough in view of
all that he has said in the hearing of
the public within the last few months,
and will be taken at its proper dis
count. He can rest assured that Con-
gress will assume the responsibility
which he thus with SO much would-be
concession, turns over to their keep
ing.
No one would gather from the mes
sage that there was any unusual cause
for the course pursued by Congress
toward the South. The drift of all
the President says is to make it appear
that it is merely wanton exercise of
partisan power,-dangerous because
needless, to refuse representation to the
late insurrectionary States. He quotes
the Declaration of Independence, the
Constitution of the United States, and
also extracts from the State papers of
Washington, Jefferson and Jackson.
The common sense of the country will
ask what have all these citations to do
with the anomalous and unprecedented
facts of our situation. All that is quo
ted has no bearing whatever upon the
great difficulty that conrronts us. We
are dealing with IA rebellion, and with
rebels who have not only forfeited that
representation upon which Mr..
johnson lays so much stress, but, in ad-
dltiOn, life aud property. The repre-
sentRtives OF the people in Congress
have foregone MI desire, and all their
plainly established right, to enforce
against the authors and principal par
ticipatOrs in the rebellion the extreme
penalties OF the law, and have mani
tested only AN anxiety to secure the
nation, the whole people, the North as
well as the South, against the possible
reviviicatlOn of the rebellion in any
shape Whatever. Mr.. John b. Baldwin,
himself leading rebel, not long ago,
in published letter, INDICATED the
full, unquestioned and prescriptive
right of the Government to exact all the
penalties of treason, while doubling
and combating the expediency of so
doing. And yet the President of the
United States, the man who was elected
upon the strength of his frequent,
persistent and, il we may so call them,
ultra declarations in favor OF the fullest
cxactiOns and enforcement of those PEN
Rlties, stands forth to-day in fragrant dis
regard OF all his uttterances, and ar
rHigus Congress and the country as the
actual prosecutors of the people of the
South. This is the Presidents position,
stripped OfHll verbiRgo and all disguise.
He means, if he means anything, that
the rebels lost none of their franchises
by their rebellion, but that, on the con-
trary. their position is equal in the sight
OF the Constitution to that of those
who defeated their rebellion and pre-
served tho Government from destruc-
ton. There is no escape from this
construction of his whole argument.
1t needs simply to be thus plainly sta
ted to see how self-stultifying and self
degrading is the position OF the Presi-
dent.
1t will he noticed that Mr.. johnson
puts in II claim for the accustomed rep
resentation of the South in both Houses
of Congress. Three-fifths of the ne
groes are still the basis of his estimate
as to what is due the rebels. He takes
no account OF the fact that we have no
slaves la this country any more. Mel
Their does he take any account of the
gross and manifest injustice OF count
ing the former slaves of the South in
the basis of representation merely to
give increased political power to their
late owners.
OnLhe FeniRn question Mr.. Johnsou's
position is one of evident embarrass-
ment, the great problem being how not
10 say anything offensive to the Fee
mans and yet not violate the obliga-
tons of the Government in the matter
Of the Neutrality laws. 1t is a mere
venal Ofense, it would seem, to
fit out expeditions against Il for
aiUy, y,nvar from, O,,. 6Dl