The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1867-01-01

- - pects "a ~ New. 0t~'a8
The year 1866, which, ON this imperial littl
island, came In with snow and rain and slush
has gone out yelled IN snow storm worthy
"the pitiless coast Of Labrsdor.n II has beer
an eventful year, gloomy In IL beginning, dsrl
and stormy 10 Its ending and stormy through
out among many Of the nstions Of both hemi
spheres II has been marked In Europe b,
Prussian victories which will rank with TIL
greatest Of the first Napoleon, and by rsctif
cation Of the map Of the Continent which viii
probably be more enduring than that Of the
old Holy Alliance Of my odd years ago. Prus
sia has been enlarged from second to nrs
rate Power, Italy has been msgniaed - I
State Of twenty odd millions OF people, Aus.
tria has been shorn Of her strength snd hunili-
ated In every way, and the French army, aftes
eighteen years Of occupation IN the protection
Of the Holy Father, has at last been Withdrawn
from Rome. Tho temporal kingdom Of the
Pope, which dates behind the empire q Charlie
magne, will be marked BY the historian from
1867 a. contracted within tho shadows Of ST.
Peters and the Vatican.
Sushare tho leading events on the European
continent embraced In the calendar Of 1866,
and the end Is not yet In the East and the
West, and In the centre, kings, emperors and
dynasties rest upon the crust Of . volcano;: the
elements Of combustion ere ct work and .
grand eruption may take place when least ex-
pected. Napoleon, intent upon his great En-
dustrisl Exposition, still cries "the empire is
peace" while industriously preparing for war.
Baffled and checkmated by Bismarck In refer.
ence "to the lands along the Rhine" worried
and badgered out of Mexico by Seward, and
clipped Of his prestige among the French peo-
pie, he has q difficult and delicate game to
play; while England, though successful in
smothering the Fenian movement, stands per-
picked, if not appalled,, by the really formida-
BILE revolutionary agitation of John Bright
Thus much for the Old World. And wAiA Of
the New? Mexico throws the book of Don
Quixote and Sancho Panza, the adventures of
Munchausen and the travels of Gulliver COM
pletely in the shade. Poor old Spain has been
sent OF with a broken leg from Chile and
Peru, and the imperial giant of Brazil and
his confederates have caught Tartar in The
pugnacious "little Jack" Of Paraguay. With
the Fenian fiascos in Nova Scotia 2and Canada
the Irish republic set up at Union square has
vanished, O'Mahoney has retired, Roberts has
fallen from grace, and Stephens has gone to
parts unknown, and so have all the collections
from poor Irish workmen and chambermaids
for q the men in the gap" These Investments
were simply of the order Of Slievegammon
and the South Sea bubble.
And. what of Southern restoratons With
the opening Of the year 1856 there were eleven
Southern States excluded from Congress, at
the end the number is reduced to ten. Ten
nessee, in adopting the constitutional amend
ment, has come in. The great North, from the
Pcnobscot to the Sacramento, has endorsed
this test Of restoration, and it must go through
At the rate of one State per annum it win
only take ten years to finish the work, and this,
perhaps, all things considered, will be fast
enough. A revolution of fixed facts is one
thing, but . revolution in fixed ideas IL
another. And when the Supreme Court OF
Tue Ouiscu osutcs, III tuo DTeu ScOtt uecbiOb
has fixed in the Southern minds the absurdest
ideas Of Southern State rights Of seventy years
preaching and practice, we have chronic
disease which can be cured only by tune and
patience. But what II the Supreme Court il.
relied upon South to upset this constitu-
tional amendment Then Congress, the SUI
preme Legislative embodiment of the nation,
must exercise its authority and reconstruct the
Supreme Court. That will do. and il is job
which must be performed if nothing else will
avail. The thing was done under Jefferson, In
the displacement OF certain so-called mid
night judges appointed by John Adams
Repeal all the acts OF Congress relating TO IL .
and the court, as 1t is, falls to the ground with
the constitution as 1t was. Then the court may
be rcorganized TO meet the issue OF the war.
the verdict Of the sovereign people and 'the
constitution as it u.s." which l. about as near
TO that Of Judge fancy as chalk Is to cheese.
This is the prospect, and 40 believing that
the war was not failure, but that what the
war has decrecd will be made the supreme
law, even including the reconstruction Of the
Supreme Court, we turn tho matter over to
Congress. and wish all our readers IA Happy
New ear"
The MuddIc in Missouri.
We publish to-day in another part Of the
paper batch Of official communications on