The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1866-11-17
The Scare Military.

The Scare Military.
From the Tribune
Five military gentlemen, named Curtis, Hin
on, Bennett, Morse, and Dudley, have issued
proclamation inviting an army to assemble il
Washington on the lst proximo, by its presenc
to honor and assure protection to the loya
majority in the Thirty-n ninth Gongress''-"tC
show how stern loyalty can rebuke treason" "tC
prove that the threats of atreacherous Executive
against the legislative branch of the Govern
ment cannot intimidate free peoples" and thit
call, which can hardly be very important what
ever may be the response to it, has thrown the
National hateaigenOer into such state of mipd
that we do not believe, if put to the familiar
test, that 1t could pronounce its own name with
out suffering. 1t is "pained,n it is also
shocked" 1t finds in this call the project OF
an establishment en- pe7mdneHce of an organized
IoIce 10 be subject to The orders of CO1gre 49, y
IL fears that disastrous calamities are impend-
ing over our beloved country" although it
takes the precaution to add that Heaven only
1nows' what they are. "Butler, Wade and
H Hcotthey" are the Danton, Robespierre, and Marat
OF the enterprise, and each OF them is TO carry
IN nus red right hand "sword smoking with
the bloody execution" And all this because
nye members OF the Soldiers and Sailors Union
nave called Convention TO be held in WASH
Ington on the 1st OF December!
Let us be calm ! Let us, in such tremendous
emergency, leave mysteries to the naturally
hyster1cal sex! Let us remember in the first
place, the character OF the men to whom this
appeal is addressed. Admitting il to be sinister
III Its purposes, although nothing like this has
oeen proved against 1t, what is there in the
character St OF the American volunteer, as exhi-
Dlteo through several years of bloody civil war
winch authorizes the National Inteuiqencer or
any oiher newspaper, TO publish these suspi-
clons or to presuppose that If this committee
des1en mischief, the veterans of the reOublic
will be made Its blind and unquestioning tools9
that troops who have fought and bled for the
law, Its support and its supremacy will be
among the first to discard it?-that the cham
Plons OF order will be ready, upon the least
invitation, to inaugurate anarchy ?-that the
upholders of the Government through the
dreary days OF doubt and disaster will plot
t tor me return OF confusion, and become
themselves Rebels against the Constitution?
:Frtol0 fdcte, the very suspicion is itself an
insult. No matter what may be the motives
or the designs OF d. s. Curtis and the others.
harm, what reason is there for apprehendinS
that any considerable number OF our retired
soldiers Will be betrayed into acts OF folly and
On 9i CRIME that che u "lerociousn Forney, the
sun more ierclous" Wade, and the inexpressi-
bly, "ferocious" Butler, have only TO commane
an attack upon the White House, the lanterni-
zatlon OF the President, the confscativn and
immediate consumption of his ExcelIencvis
small stores-have only to speak, however fool
ishly or Wickedly, to be o6eyed! Forney NAV
nave nightly persuasive way of his own.
& Maae,s talents may be Of a, peculiarly Sc
Napoleon in magnetizing divisions and regi.
ments; but that either of them, or ali
three together, can use the late army, or
any part of it, in forwarding destructive
and disorganizing projects, we do not believe,
they DO not believe, and nobody in the posses
sion Of his senses believes. Whatever strength
they may have IS in their fidelity to law; and
ths 81 least attempt to employ the military power
OF the land for their own selfish or ambitious
purposes would leave them without the power
of corporal, the laughlng-stock of gods above
and OF men below. Congress itself would dis
dain to be assisted by such auxiliares, by such
defenders; and the simple and Ignominious end
Of the speculation would be, that Mr. Forney
and his two friends would be marched to the
round house In the custody of the very troops
upon whose oredulIty they had so imprudently
relied.
OF course, there is a barely possible mischief
in the suggestions themselves of the L,LeHiqencer
Conscience, 1t is said, makes co wards, and the
President and his advisers know best what
violent designs, provocative of violence in
return and IN self defense, they may have enter
tained and nOurished Whatever apprehen-
siOns may be we'll founded arise solely from
Mr. JOhnson's lll-consIdered after6inner attacks
upon Congress. They spring naturally from
the idea, which he has done nothing TO dis
courage, that it is claiming powers which, by
the provisions of the Constitution, do not
belong to it; and that, in some way, by the
strong arm OF Presidential authority,
the representatives of the people must
be-, and ought to be, checkmated in
their determination to pass laws of
which Mr.. johnson did not approve Hence
those rumors which have filed the minds of |
the people with indefinite fears; hence those
rapid deductions from the Presidents sWasby
speeches which have put the republic earnestly |
upon its guard; hence the gro wing conviction
of the community that there is nothing too
absurd, nothing too dangerous, nothing too
unprecedented, TO be included in what is called
the Presidents "poIicy." That officer now
pleases to assume the part Of injured innocence.
Let him possess his soul in peace. His life is
not in the smallest danger, and Congress will
tue "pain" and "shock" Of the late elections,
his EXCelency ought not to be frightened by
such simple matter as Mr., r. J. Hinton's mill
tary convention.