The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1867-09-26
Public Dignity.
From me N. Y. Tribune.

what powers it may not carry DOWN.
Public Dignity.
From he ". Y. Tribune.
1t is not a small matter that any public
event of respectable Importance, belttled and
besoiled by the undignihed carriage of those
who participate in it, should pass into our
chronicles with the taunt of degrading reminis-
cence. The Antietam conservation is case
in point. We do not every day dedicate such
a cemetery; it is not often that we encounter
such demand for grave, decorous, and ele-
waited propriety; the ceremonial is an occur
renee which mustp into history; and yet we
began with advertising for poem, and ended
with speech by Mr.. Johnson. Yet this is
one merely of many similar instances Inc
Western tour, with its many horrible viola
tions of good taste and good breeding, was
quite as bad. The Masonic solemnity IN
Boston was even worse; and it will be long
time before the brethren can open lodge
for the despatch of business in their new
and beautiful temple without thinking
unpleasantly of Brother Johnson's rheto-
rical struggles. These days OF festora,
ton and of reconstruction, of the national
new birth, of a fresh start in the country
career, should have been among the
most splendid in history; and so they would
have been if Mr.. Lincoln, who was one OF
NATURES own gentlemen, had been spared to
u.s. He had no artificial manners; he was in
capable of doing or of saying anything for
effect he pretended to no polish, nor was he
by any means an accomplished orator; but the
sweet sincerity of his character the touch
ing simplicity of his instincts, the untlinching
integrity of his heart, made him seem elevated
in his demeanor and courtly in his carriage,
and won for him respectful affection which
any public man might be proud of. 1t is Won
deTful how such an example elevates the
whole tone of national mind. The mean, the
mercenary, and the malicious kept in their
dark corners while Mr.. Lincoln was living, or
merely emerged therefrom to be encountered
and put to rout by indignant majOrities.
Men we're ashamed to be irresolute in their
patriotism, to be swayed by class prejudice
or by outworn hatreds, with such an eX
ample of catholic humanity constantly be-
fore them. With the new President forced
upon us by destiny they raised once
more their ignoble heads; they grew
meanly hopeful and disreputably aotive place
hunting and all the expedients of faction be-
came the order of the day; haters of human
liberty, doubters of mans capacity for self
government, sneerers at social equality, lifted
up once more their hateful voices and politics,
which had been only another name for patriot
ism, lapsed into the old conventional ruts,
with occasional triumphs of the bad and the
base, and with constant vigilance and labor for
the honest and intelligent. Nobody supposes
that we could possibly have had this condi-
ton of affairs if Mr.. Lincoln had lived; nobody
hopes that we can be quite rid of 1T until MIR.
johnson be at least politically dead. The
faults of the man have tainted the country,
have contaminated public feeling, and have
warmed into life a crowd Of creeping creatures
who enjoy, or who hope to enjoy, the Treasury
heshpots.
1t is a curious fact that what men most
dreaded in Mr.. Johnson should be precisely
the opposite of that fault into which he has
helplessly fallen. 1t was thought, and his
publicly uttered words gave sanction to the
opinion, that he might be too unrelenting in
his treatment of treason, and'postpOne reunion
by his unconciliating policy. ltturns out that
he is too easy, too soft, too forgiving, and too
forgetful. The man who is one thing in the
morning and another in the evening is the
victim of lack of character; and having set
tied this, we are at once let into the secret OF
Mr. Johnson's mournful want of personal
dignity. 1t is not merely that he does not
comprehend the situation. The trouble is that
he does not and cannot, having been denied
certain qualities of mind, rise to the nobleness
of the g eat occasion. He is proof against re-
spectacle emotions, He has none OF that
poetical feeling which helped us so much in
the day of our darkest disaster. He does
business in the White House as he used to DO
it in his little law Office, and he issues procla-
nations with the same facility with which he
formerly issued writs. He is in the embarrass-
ing situation of a small lawyer with his prac-
tice suddenly and boundlessly enlarged.
Therefore he founders. Therefore he initiates
himself like the frog in the fable. Therefore,
with but few qualities to provoke admiration,
he expects to be exceedingly admired. All
feeble men are apt to be fussy. And Mr..
Johnson is nothing if not fussy in the extreme
We never had President before in precisely
such a Iredicament, and Divine Providence
grant that we may never have anotherl
We began by saying something of Official
dignity, and we end by assuring the people
that dignity in the Executive quarters is just
the one thing which it is folly TO look for. II
order that no more fine occasions may bt
spoiled, no more rambling and incoheren'
speeches recorded in our annals, no more NOR
tiiying additions made to our history, we beg
leave to suggest that if there be any more
cemeteries to cOnsecrate, any more Masonic
temples to dedicate, any more monuments u
hallow, the business, if it cannot be accom-
plished without the presence of President
bad better be postponed until after the mex
Presidential election. At any rate, let us nave
no more tWaddle over the graves OF our de
parted heroes. They may not hear H. an'
happy are they in not hearing it. But some
thing is due to the living. Something Is als'
due TO the memory of the dead. Silence i
always golden-let us have no more brass
pewter speech
The PTeSIdent's Party.
b. ON The ~ Y Tribune