Wilmington journal. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1844-1895, 1866-04-19
From the National IntelIigencer, April ~

The RADICAL MAJORITY have carried measure
against the remonstrances of loyal Executive, in
the Senate Should it pass the House also, the civil
rights bill becomes law. The objections so ably
and impregnably set forth remain. They show how
the statute may be fairly construed, upon legal
principles, to deny the reserved rights of the
States, to augment national burdens, to fOment
social irritation and popular disaffcction But it
remains TO sec how far, in practical operation, a
most miscellaneous statute, considered even apart
from its Interior object, may be enforced by lib
eral-minded and just Magistrate, whose constit1l-
tonal duty it is to take care that the laws be faith
fully executed, in q manner which shall avoid the
most serious of it's possible i'll consequences.
This great Republic is not at the mercy of party
pGltcasters, frantic agitators and State gamblers
In them is not the comprehensiveness which ap-
preciates, the wisdom which conserves the moral
principles. which WHITES this majestic system OF
public order-the admiration and the glory of the
human race Not even with statesmen who de-
serve the name lies the fate of the benefcent Con-
stituton under which we have been bred to politi-
cal justice, mutual reliance, and enlightened toler
anec. But the sovereign people Of this country
will take care of their own. They may, as they
have been, be betrayed by demagogery, without
head to understand, or conscience to feel the ex-
tent CT it's crime, into bloody collision with each
other But, tremendous was the scale on which
the distressing spectacle was displayed to an as
tonished world this sanguinary segment of the ma
tional cycle has been passed, and the air throngs
with the shining promises of hope, of peace, and
of love. Shall they be darkened and dissipated ?
Shall the heart ache and the shudder of 1861 come
again People of the United States, be warned
that your demagogues are again gambling for
your heritages of liberty, your guarantees of pros
perity, and your needs of victory In the awful
name of God they buy you and they sell you in the
Halls of your Legislature, and under the impious
disguise of justice to all men, pervert the functions
of lawgivers to the procurement of your abasement
under the barbaric feet of negroes. Some of them
bankrupt of consistency of reasonable beings,
would enfranchise an insensate rabble OF negroes,
and by controlling them, vote themselves into life
long power to govern, to degrade, and to defy you
Others would convert the whole land into king
dom of hate, the reflection of their own bitterness
of soul from past affronts and suferings which
they were too cowardly to punish and are too ma
levolent to forgive. Both must have power OF OPP
preston, or lose the only solaee OF their remorse
their disappointment or their shame. They are
said to be fanatical. Believe it not There is now
q great plot among them-a perfect method OF
madness-in which detail is disproportloned
no fundamentally distorted, no contingency I'M
counted by the characteristic enthusiasm and SIN
cere but fatal zeal of the fanatic. All is as SOBER
rs shrewd, as uncomfortable and as cold as ever
sedition was planned, stratagem contrlved, or as
sassination canvassed, by the desperate and mon
strous usurpers of the dark ages. There IS not a
fanatic in Congress. There is no Gerrlt Smith, no
Giddings no Lovejoy. There is Sumner, With
his scrap-book of fraud !; Stevens, vivid III every
motion and look of his contemptuous command
to an associate, ''to he'll with your conscience
Fessenden, the FESTIVE, envious. but compulsory
follower of Sumner Wade, the blasphemous and
tians by thanking their God, in open Senate, for
the impending death of fellow Senators. Such are
examples of the fanatics. AS well class the cold
but delusive dexterity Of the midnight gaming
board with the imprisoned but preposterous earn
estness of the mourner's bench, as the .soulless
ratiocination of these mems politics with the hon
est but unreasonable fervor of the John Browns
the Giddingses, ard the LoYejoys OF former day.