American citizen. [volume] (Butler, Butler County, Pa.) 1863-1872, 1866-06-06
VOLUME 8.
Making Treason 0dious,

MbkinS 1f6dS0H tdl0us,
The, President directed that Raphae
Semmes, the late commander of the lat
Alabama, shall not while he remains up
pardoned, hold or exercise the function 0
Probate Judge, to which Office he ha
just been elected in Mobile. This is a,
Indication Of caution and prudence wbicl
will be commended by every good citizen
When Mr.. Johnston became Presiden
he made many speeches 10 many deputa
tions, and the refrain OF avery speeci
was that treason must be made odious.-
No sentiment he ever uttered was mort
approved. Tt was not because he was un
derstood to mean that there must be uni
versal vengeance. No sensible man wish
ed that there should be general hanging
and confscation aud outlawery. No one
who kuew history and human nature i'm.
agined that the peace that had been won
could be secured by vlndictive policy
Treason was to be made odious by hon
oring patriotism. The Government was
to favor tho who had boen faithful 10
it during the long, dark day of rebellion
Such policy was founded in common
sense. 1t was ineligible to the dull.
est mind. Why, then, has it been so of
ten disregarded
We are not Of those who say or believe
that the President wishes to put the Coy
ernmeut into the hands Of its enemies
1t is sheer folly to insist that he is anx-
ious to welcome red-handed rebels into
Congress. A man is not proved villain
because his views appear to be short
sighted and perilous. Some of the hon
estest men in the world have done the
most mischief, but for all that they we're
not bad men. That the President should
wish to see the Union restored 10 It's nor
NAL condition during his Administration
is most natural and laudable; nor is it
necessary to suspect the motives of such
n desire. We disagree, indeed, with
many of his views, and the temper in
which he often discusses public affairs in
his popular speeches is most lamentab;e.
His disposition to make assent to his the
ories the test of patriotic fidelity is, of
course, simply preposterous, and any sys-
tematic attempt upon his part, which wo
do not anticipate, but which is clamor-
ously urged upon him, to prostitute the
vast patronage of Office to the promotion
of his own purposes, however honestly
those purposes may be entertained, We
trust will be constitutionally opposed to
tbe utmost. But we believe he heartily
deplores the unpromising state Of feeling
in large portions OF the late rebel section,
and while he is inclined to attribute il
to the delay of Congress to admit loyal
representatives from that section, he
probably entirely forgets how much of
the unsatisfactory condition of the late
insurgent States is due to departures from
the policy of making treason odious.
When the Union men of those States
who have suffered every kipd of outrage
who have been fined, mobbed. imprison-
ed, and have seen their Union peighbors
hunted aud tortured and hung Tor their
fidelity to the Government, see man
like General Humphreys, Of Mississippi,
n conspicuous, leading traitor hastily par
doned by the President that he may be
come Governor; when they see Mr.. Mon
roe, Of New Orleans, another chief trait
or, pardoned that he nav heeome Mayor;
when they see members of the Cabinet
deliberately annullng the law Of tha land
in order to appoint late rebels to national
Offices, while the most noted aad tried
Union men in the insurgent States ask in
vain for such recognition of their fi1eli-
~, how can such men help bitterly feel
ing the contemptuoHs sporn with which
the triumphant rebels regard them How
can they help asking why they might not
as well have been rebels? How can they
help the conviction that the policy of the
Executive is Cancellation of rebels and
not recognition of Union men, or avoid
asking with intense incredulity whether
this is the way in which treason is to be
made odious?
On the other hand, what is moEs natu.
raj than that the late rebels yho, as the
President solemnly declared last year
were to be made oo.d1iiops, seeing exactly
what the Uniop men see, should depoHncs
Congress precisely as they used to de-
pounee 1.-THE NcIth," should heap every
insulting superlatiye upon the most loyaa
men IN the country, should vociferously
declare their "righis," and begin vehem
emily to expound the Constitution which
for four years they have trampled unde,
foot? What is more natural than tba,
these men whose treason. the President
taught US, was to make them odious. shoule
persecute with savage ferocity the mos