The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1867-05-29
Jenerann pnrln.


classes from the extreme bitterness with which
Mr. Davis had previously been regarded, and
as sign ..of their disposition to Judge in
more temperate spirit the motives Of the great
but unsuccessful attempt of which he was the |
head and 'front.' There can be little doubt but
that the protraeted and, so far as the public
are permitted to judge, the unjustidable CON
6nement of Mr.. Davis without a trial has
touched the generosity Of the community in
considerable degree, and that numbers
who reprobated and still condemn his
course have been moved to indigna-
ton by a line OF treatment against
which the very worst of criminals
would have an irrefragable right 10 protest.
We were aware at the time the article referred
TO was penned that some such action was con-
templated as that which has now been carried
into effect. We were also aware that the con-
victions expressed in it would bring us some
censure. But we were persuaded that the
honor of the country was compromised by the
course which the Government was pursuing,
and were satisfied that it was our duty, by
whatever humble means that lay in our power
to urge il to a different One Opinions as to
the nature and extent of Mr.. Davis RESPONSE
bility to the laws or the culpability of
his action might reasonably differ; but
there could be no rational difference
the Justice of his unexplained and untried
imprisonment. In the absence of technical
justification, we look for extraordinary circum-
stances touching public safety or the like to
find warrant for course which, in such ex-
ceptional cases, may be defensible If not legal
No such circumstances could be found The
present release of the prisoner shows that
they could not be found. The trial of Mr..
Davis and the subsequent carrying out of his
sentence, whatever that might be, would have
been, a year ago, regarded by the public with
oomplacency. The longer he was held untried
the longer was public feeling against himself
modified by condemnation of the mysterious
conduct OF the Government. 1t was thought,
and the thought with many grew, as time
wore on, into conviction, that the Govern
ment through its officers had been placed in
false position, and that it was to shield itself
rather than to further the ends of justice that
the unreasonable postponement was due. As
a consequence, the public eye glanced from
the prisoner to the Government, and from the
Government to the prisoner, until widely
felt if not often expressed persuasion obtained
that the imputed guilt of the latter was in
some measure condoned by the unwarrantable
method of its expiation.
Had Mr.. Davis been tried by court martial
and shot on his first capture, the bulk of
Northern opinion would probably have justi-
fed such process, as it could easily have
been made to appear that the national safety
demanded it, whatever might be said of the
letter of the law. But with delay passion
cooled, and it began to be perceived that Mr..
Davis was not an ordinary criminal, not the
leader of riot, a house burner or murderer
taken red-handed, but political prisoner
amenable to different consequences; standing
vicariously for many millions of people, whose
punishment or acquittal must be morally
identical with his own; and in the opinion of
many even in the. Northern States defensible
even by the strictest construction OF the Con-
stitution he was charged with violating.
1t is now felt by the sober and rejecting
that, both with regard to justice and to ulti-
mate cordial reconciliation of the lately con-
tending sections il was most fortunate cir
cumstance for the whole country that the
Confederate chief escaped the fate which
many bitter partisans invokedfor him; and we
feel confident that when the effect upon the
South of his enlargement is fairly tested, it
will be acknowledged, putting his rights or
wrongs as an individual entirely aside, to
have been a salutary thing for the nation.
The outcries of lamentation and vitupera-
tion with which a part of the press has ao-
companied the release of Mr.. Davis and his
journey nerthward, are contemptibly woman
ish and weak; and the apprehension of
his peculiar opponents that Mr.. Greeley
would gain too much political capital by
placing his name on the captive's bail-bond, is
equally so. 1t is one of the worst features of
our political life, that no possible action, how
ever pure, chivalrous, and noble, can be per-
formed by an individual of the least promi-
nence, but that it is straightway despatched
with the foulest abuse and attributed to the
most despicable of motives. 1t is small
wonder that the influence of newspapers
should wane when their writers suffer party
feeling so completely to overshadow all sense
of truth, decency, and generosity. The criti-
cisms upon the course of Mr.. Greeley are of a
piece with the slurs directed at those who
have dared to show Mr.. Davis attention
or compassion. Even his counsel, Mr..
Charles O'Conor, than whom a purer and
more elevated character does not exist in the
community, has not entirely escaped assaults
which are disgraoeful to those who have made
them Why such demonstrations should
have been made we are at loss to conceive.
There certainly has been nothing to justify
them. 1t would have been impossible for Mr..
Davis and his slender party to have travelled
towards Canada--whither he goes to see his
children-more quietly, more unobtrusively,
or in manner better calculated to eyince his
earnest desire to avoid observation, than he
has done. But it would really seem as II
some of the newspapers wished it otherwise,
with the hope that the populace might
thereby be melted to insult or mob him.
All this is SO small, 80 frivolous, and so
spiteful, as to be anything but creditable to
the community. 1t is natural that those
who have lost friends in the war should have
no love for Jefferson Davis, but that is no good
reason why they should be instigated to insult
him. There are empty hearths at the South
as well as the North, and the officers who
directed the Federal armies travel through 1T
in every direction without meeting, SO tar as