The daily phoenix. [volume] (Columbia, S.C.) 1865-1878, 1866-11-07
"A Radical Tnreat-A Severe Reply.

a Radical Thrcnt--A Severe Reply.
The New York Enening Post, con
Quoted by William Cullen Bryant,
has dropped its moderate tone, and
now comes out in the 1iercest of radi-
cal threatenings. The following cx-
tract from one Of its recent issues we
find in the New York World:
''Thus, with the rejection of the
amendment, we shall enter upon an-
other political struggle, more intense
than that through which we are now
passing, more injurious to the couu-
try, and especially to the Southern
States-a contest of which the issue
is not doubtful; for the 10000, 900 Of
the Northern States will begin to see
the unreasonableness Of the Southern
leaders, and will lose patience with
these men, who SO stubbornly refuse
the mildest terms ever offered to
beaten rebels. Hitherto the country
has wonderfully restrained itself, but
we advise no one to push its patience
too far. 1t is not at all impossible
it is not even improbablc-if the
amendment should fall, through the
obstinacy of the Southern leaders,
that the laws which are still on the
statute book may be enforced against
the politicians WHO led their States
into treason and rebellion
''Hitherto we have given only mercy,
but Justice is still alive. 1t seems q
monstrous thing to the Southern
politicians that some of them should
l,n Ind cd
they were to be hanged for their trea-
son, as the law demands? Suppose
their estates should be taken from
them, us tho law requires? If they
will take our advice, they viii think
Of these things. They are not mas
ters of the situation. They have no
more power now, nor strength with
the country, than they had the day
Lee surrendered to Grant. Then
they would have joyfully accepted the
amendment-it is great folly of them
to reject it now Their attitude, their
conduct, their words, their preten-
tious claims, are all irritating to the
Northern people, who fought through
four years to put down treason, and
now see the leading traitors aspiring
to the highest offices, and demanding
where, if they were prudent, they
would supplicate; and if they were
only reasonable, they would accept in
silence the large and free mercy which
is offered them"
To this and similar threats, the
Richmond Times publishes the fol
lowing scathing reply. We have
read nothing more terribly severe in
any newspaper article:
''The brutal threat of the malig-
nant fanatic who edits the New York
Ecening Post, that if the Southern
people do not adopt the constitu-
tional Amendments, their leading men
shall be hanged or exiled, and their
property confscated, is the most de-
prayed and infamous specimen Of
cowardly and inhuman bullying
which ever disgraced the press OF any
country. No brave, noble, but un~
fortunate people were ever thus me-
naced before, and the threat of the
Post is worthy only of the Greek bri-
gands, who, when they have captured
tourist, and borne him to some
mountain fastness, inform him that
if his ransom is not forthcoming by q
certain day, he shall be fayed alive
The hoary wretch who thus insults
disarmed people when he uses the
language of coarse menace, seems to
have forgotten the immortal valor
an q patient endurance which the
threatened section exhibited during
four years of unparalleled sufferings
and privations. He aeems to forget
that in that contest all was lost save
honor, lat that, although crushed by
a people who brought the aid Of every
nation OF Europe to help them do
their ftork, the South, although de-
feated, is to-day more respected and
honored by Christendom than our
merciless and unfeeling conquerors.
"And the insult conveyed in this
menace is the more reprehensible,
because, while we are called upon to
sanction and aid in the accomplish
ment of our own dishonor, we are
promised not even vile price for our
self-abasement like that which Judas
took, and then went aud hanged him
self. We are each day called upon to