The Wheeling daily register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1864-1878, 1867-02-08
WASHINGTON GOSSIP.

Mack, the Washington correspondent
of the Cincinnati Commercial, discourses
as follows concerning the proposed I'M
peachment and what action the next
Congress is expected to take in relation
thereto: ff.s@
People who imagine that the i'm,
peachment agitation has entirely Giel
out-and / notice by the papers tnat
many think so-are greatly mistaken.
1t was never intended to do more at TINS
session than start the subject for the
purpose of educating the public nina
up to the required point between De,
Gambler and March. Ashley was selected
as the most senseless and fit person to
herald the thing-just as Aleck. Long
was picked ont more than two years
ago to feel the way toward the recogni-
| tfon of the Southern Confederacy, on
behalf of the Democratic party. Ihe
political equation stands thus: as Aleck
was to Vallandigham, so is Ashley TO
Ben. Butler. Aleck played John the
Baptist to the peace Democracy, anu Ash-
lev is lust now figuring in the same role
for the Impeachment Radicals. Prepare
We the way for the Bottle Imp, says Ash
lev, and make his path straight, for he
cometh to turn Andy out, and then
post offices shall much abound for US
| ioyalists. Butler is now on the ground
himself, and Ashley's occupation is,. IN
measure, gone. The determination
never was greater than it is to-day 10
force the President out of office ana
General Grant rith him. You may laugh
if you please at that last clause, Dut
time will vindicate it's truth. 1t ID o
necessary part of the programme, and
there is no disguise about it among the
loyal few who have undertaken to en-
gincer the business. Butler has recent
" proclaimed in a speech, in Boston,
that Grant was worse than Johnson,
and occupied the most humiliating po-
sition of any man on tho American con-
tinent. And it will be remembered that
in his Mozart Hall speech in Cincinnati,
he limited at the very same thing when
he spoke of sweeping the regular army
out of existence fiji attempted to inter-
fere to prevent the removal of the fres-
ident before his conviction. Ihats
lust exactly where the row comes In.
The first step in the Butlerian plan Is 10
pass an act of Congress declaring the
President incapable of holding his office,
pending his trial before the Senate.
The Constitution declares that the Pres
ident, Vice President, and all civil of1-
GERS may be removed by impeachment
upon trial and conviction, &c. Butler
proposes to 90 behind the Constitution,
remove the President first and convict
him afterward. -,
Does any sane man think this will be
quietly submitted tot as thy servant
q dog that he should do this thingf' Is
Johnson fool and an imbecile, that he
should be forced from office in plain vio-
lation of the letter of the Constitution,
as well rs of the law that protects the
meanest criminal on earth from punish
ment until after conviction
One plan for the removal Of Grant l
understand to be this: First-To de-
clare the President incapable of holding
office during his trial; then the Presi-
dent pro tenn. of the Senate becomes
President of the United States, and er-
o6icio Commander-in-C Of the Army
and Navy, and as such he will exercise
his right to appoint, remove or suspend
"his subordinates" He may not have
the right to deprive Grant of his COM
mission, or rather, he may not care to
exercise it, for the question of right
will not enter largely into the consider
alton when things have come to such a
pass, but he can order him out TO the
plains to fight the Indians, or anywhere
else he pleases, and in his absence ap-
point some man after his own heart to
command the army. Another plan is to
displace the General by almost abolish
ing the regular army by act of Con-
gress.
Now, all these revolutionary schemes
can be stopped only by the voice OF the
people. If the people choose to let them
come by supinely folding their arms
and "hoping they will all blow over"
we'll and good. / am convinced they
will not blow overland am equally
convinced that three months hence 1T
will be too late to avert them. No such
revolution as this country is now
threatened with was ever stopped after
it had been permitted to begin until it
had spent its desolating fury, and sacri-
feed the welfare of nation and the
/ lives O1 lUOuSdlltlS VI lhhotShs pN"P'''
1t should not be forgotten that revo-
lutionists, in all times and in all coun-
tries, have relied upon the very enor-
nifty of their schemes to turn suspicion
into derision and to furnish in their
inception a theme for fidicule, rather
than for fear. 1t was so in France in
the time of Louis XVI; it was so in
England with the party under Crom-
well, and it was so in America as late
as 1860, with the secessionists of the
South. The smile of derision at the idea
of civil war had scarcely died away
when the first gnu opened on Fort Sum-
ter. A million of lives, North and South,
and hundred thousand millions of dol
lars have since been the cost of q strug-
gle which was not averted only because
the people refused to believe it was
coming until it was too late to do aught
but choose sides in bloody and relent-
less war.
THE FORTIETH CONGRESS.
When Balaam's Ashley transmitted
the gift of speech to his posterity on
two legs, he ought to have made some
conditions as to its use. / don't think
that sagaciOus animal ever meant to
tolerate such abuse of the distinguished
honor conferred upon him and through
him upon his descendants, rs we now
witness every day in Ben Buffers Ash
ley in the House of Representatives.
Balaam's Ashley was, according to the
learned Recommendations, an ungainly look
ing fellow, with long ears aud q clumsy
head; but then you see nature has o
beautiful law of compensation which
we may admire but cannot explain, and
when she gives an ugly head she has a
way of putting something substantial
inside of it, to make up for the lack Of
external adornments. Conversely, as
with Buffers Ashley, when she bestows
little pains ON the outer walls, she
doesn't half finish the citadel within.
Hence, we find Balaam's Ashley, with
the face of an ass, talking the sense of
q philosopher; while Ben. Buffers Ash
ley, with the locks of Apollo and the
brow of Hyperion, opens his mouth only
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