The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1867-12-03
SPIRIT OF THE PRESS.
RDTFoRlAL oPrN1oEs OF TEN LRADINe JOURNALS
UPON OURRNNF TOFICs--COMPuBD EVERY
DAT FOR THR EVENING rKLEeRAPH-
Congress.

Congress.
From me N. Il Tribune.
This session of Congress promises 10 pe OF
unusual importance. When the present ne
representatives. were elected, the republican
marty was powerful in most OF the Northern
a,atss NV the ballot in all Of the Southern
states by military occupation. The party was
sbaroed with reconstruction. That work is
dome. Mr.. Johnson's course was embarrassing
INT those very embauassments compelled it
10 labor with unusual vigilance and industry.
Reconstruction, so far as it is a legislative poll
tical policy, is finished. Mr.. Johnson will find
Il as impossible to change the policy as it
would be for him to initiate Joshua and stop
the srnn and moon. We have given the negro
the ballot aud it cannot be taken from him
without social convulson. We do not think
there is any party-unless, perhaps, a frag-
ment Of ignorant Copperheads-that seriously
proposes to annul manhood suffrage. In the
North prejudice has kept it back, but with us
it is not practical question.
Here and there, new stitch may be neces-
sary, but the Reconstruction work is ended
and very good piece Of work it is. If uni
versal amnesty had been formally coupled
with impartial suffrage, the moral effect upon
the South would have been better. We should
have graciously conceded in the beginning
what those who knew the heart of the
people felt sure we should certainly grant in
the end. We have virtual amnesty now,
because our people are too brave, and too mag
unanimous, to enter upon the business of con-
hscatlon and capital punishment. The negroes
are doing their work very well. They labor
with diligence, and, as the elections show vote
promptly and intelligently. We certainly have
not seen any of that blind and docile obe-
dience to their old masters, which we were
assured was inseparable from their former
condition of slavery. Nor have we noticed
any evidences of the malignity and vengeance
which the Copperheads assured us would
result from their accession to power. We
have had no general law of disfranchsement
In the State Conventions, no voting each other
farms, no effort to force themselves into Office,
no clannishness, not even the excesses of
whittier races emerging from slavery. 1t will
be some time perhaps before suffrage is as in
tellgent as in the North; but we believe it to
be quite as intelligent as in many wards of
New York city. Events already Justify the
wisdom of impartial suffrage, and Congress
may well leave reconstruction to time.
Impeachment is an immediate question.
We have not discussed it, because we bslieve
1t has passed above the range of newspaper
discussion. Impeachment is matter of law
and evidence and nothing is more indecent
than the clamor for its passage unless it is the
clamor against its passage. Our danger is
are tempted to impeach an officer who differs
with the Republican party. Mr.. Johnson may
leave the party without committing crime
against the Constitution, and now with the
law plainly written, and the evidence before
them, our representatives must act as though
the Republican party never existed Possibly
there is evidence of high crimes and misde-
meanors. We do not see it in the printed
volume, and at the same time we do see an
amount of gossip and slander in the shape of
evidence which it is painful to have in print.
There are er parte Standardization secretly
without the privilege of cross-examination
or explanation, from witnesses of every grade
of responsibility. The American mind will
certainly revolt against this, as the English
mind revolted against the enormous revelations
Of Titus Oates; and Congress could do nothing
better than to pass resolution either forbid
ding these scandal-gathering committees, or
giving their investigations tone of fairness.
We trust that impeachment will be immedi-
ately considered, together with the revelations
of the other Investigating" committees. Then
Congress may begin its work.
The most important part of this work will
be financial. The country is in condition of
fever. We have lived an artificial, extrava-
giant, unnatural life, and we are paying the
penalty. Some of us insist upon remaining
feverish, preferring the flush and burning of
disease to the monotOny and calm of health.
Others, who see that such course is merely
exhaustion-that we must get we'll as soon as
possible, If we mean to get well at all, and
that the Ii niger we wait the more difficult con.
valescence will be, urge upon Congress the
adoption of the true policy. Let us be
honest and prompt, and sincere in our fnan-
cial transactions. Let us say that a debt
is debt and dollar dollar, and that any
sacrifice necessary to the payment of an
honest debt in honest dollars receivable at
the Mint, win be gladly accepted. There is
nothing easier than to do what is right-noth-
ing more perilOus than to do what is wrong,
but seems expedient. We trust that our re-
personalities will enter upon the session con-
scious of this, and determined to place the
country, so far as legislation can place it,