Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1867-04-10


ernment what state governments are legal
and republican in form.
Connecticut.
! The tull returns from Connecticut give Eng
| lish a.out 1000 majority for Governor. The
Senate is Republican by one majority and
the House by sixteen. The vote was several
thousand less than last year, and it is proba-
bic majority of this diminution was caused
by the heavy rain keeping Indifferent Repub-
hc'tlis 1T home ON election day and our read
or, understand this is not a mere fancy, as a
stormy day always helps the Democrats,
wherever the election is held. A large num-
Der OF foreigners We're also made into voters
/ i'll the large towns just before election, and
helped TO swell the Democratic vote. But
m re than all these endorsements, the de-
feat Is attributable to the fact that Connect
cut has dIsllked impartial suffrage more than
any other New England State and is the on
/ ~ state east Of the Hudson river that keeps
up the odlous and undemocratic discrimina-
ton against black men on account of their
color. In 1865, when a proposed amend
Hent To the state constitution, abolishing
1hi> discrimination, was submitted to the
| popular Vote, it was voted down BY major
/ lty al over 5000, although the state had been
carried by the Republicans the preceding
! 7pring by nearly 1000 majority Dixon,
me Of the United States Senators from the
state. elected Republican, followed
Johnson into the Democratic party, and Sem
ator Foster, who failed last year of re-
election To the Senate, has proved to be
rather cold in his Republicanism. In short
there have been altogether too many of the
Republicans of Connecticut who have been
o. i silaky kind, inclined to follow Weed
ind kaymond rather than to cut loose from
a te'nporizers and fight the battle squarely
for equal rights and impartial liberty The
issue was made squarely this spring, the
Republicans coming well up to the position
occupied by the Radicals in other states, that
sheSe time-serving Republicans either staid
1T home or voted the Democratic ticket, and
thus contributed to the result which has
made the Democratic party drunk with ex-
uitatlOn all over the country. The Republ-
can party has thus, at the expense of defeat,
got rid of this dead weight OF politicians
the future without them than it ever could
| have been with them.
In view of the fact that the Democrats
have had no political victory to exult over
since the elections in 1862. it is perhaps I'M
reasonable t. deny them the privilege Of
growing now by telling them that their tri-
umph is of little if any political signif-
cameo. If they can extract comfort from this
election, coming as il does as little CLEAN
ii success i'll the midst Of Il hitherto unbroken
series Of defeats-they ought to be allowed
u proclaim that event with much con fla gra-
ton Of tar and noise Of gunpowder But
when they talk about the grand reaction
against radicalism, the beginning of which
they pretend to see in this election, we beg
them to remember that this James f. Eng
ii~h. who has just been elected governor. was
1 member of the Congress which proposed
the abolition amendment to the Constitution,
and was one of the two three Democrats
who voted for that amendment for which he
vas unsparingly denounced at that time
y the Democratic press Of his own state az
we'll as of other states. Mr.. English also
usually voted in Congress with what were
called the War Democrats. separating on
those questions from those who represented
the great majority of the Copperhead party
If the North. Then he could not have been
nominated i'll Connecticut by Democratic
convention for governor, for he was held
traitor to Democratic principles. Yet now
Democrats are wild with JOY that in Con-
necticut there is one man still acting with
their party whose record renders him a
II chance would the party have had for sue
cess, if they had nominated Thomas H. Sey-
nour, whom they tried to elect IN 1868, in
stead of Mr.. English ? What would have
become Of their - great reaction - with
such a standard-bearer
Let Democrats consider this phase of their
victory, and moderate their exultation a lit
de by the reflection that their barren triumh
in Connecticut was only obtained by turning
heir backs upon both the men and the policy
which they adhered to in the dark days ofthe
-ebellion. If they can find food for ioy in /
The contemplation of a - reaction - thus in
5erpreted. the country may yet feel tolerably |
safe in the belief that, whatever party may
hereafter triumph in Connecticut or else
where, the men and the principles which
would have bound our government hand and
loot, and left it helpless at the mercy of trai-
tors, are buried beyond all hope of . reac-
ion or political resurrection