The New York herald., 1868-03-18
Progress Of the Revolution.

day. Governments were dull. Gold closed at 139K.
Progress Of the Revolution.
Where shall we stop? At what point will
all the people unite to arrest the tide of revo-
lutionary fury that threatens to sweep away
one after another every breakwater, every in
stitution that the fathers Of the republic set up
in the hope of giving stability to the govern
ment of the people by securing the rights and
liberties Of the masses? Sometimes doubtful
powers may be assumed one department of a
| government may invade the prerogative of
another, or the laws may be absolutely sus-
pended in their action. All this may be
| rightly done to save the government in times
| of great peril-in times when the rage of war
| makes imminent necessities, and the law would
obstruct those who would save the nation;
but never at any other time. And to argue
that any fact but open war can justify such
things is to excuse every act of perfdy and
usurpation of which governments and peoples
have been the victims since the world began.
Yet here we are in absolute peace. Not foe
is arrayed against us anywhere, save such
as an effective police could cope with.
Our tranquility is not menaced by any
organization even one hundredth part so
dangerous as the Fenians might be to
Great Britain. But in time like this we see
aside and the pride, the passion, the revengeful
spirit of an arrogant oligarchy put in its place.
| Congress abolishes the executive, usurps all
the powers of that Office, and then, in mock
cry Of legal forms, proceeds against the officer
for the crime of protesting-not to show that it
has right on its side but only to show how
worthless is the mere name Of law against the
| fact of a majority. Not content with this, but
afraid Of any supervision over its pretence to
act legally, it takes away the prerogative of the
Supreme Court. By implication of law and
common custom and usage that court had grown
to be council of revision, pronouncing with
authority on all the enactments of the national
legislature; and no Congress had ever desired
to escape that revision, for all had at heart the
good Of the people and felt that safety for all
alike lay in strict observance Of the law But
this Congress desires to escape that revision,
pronounce on its laws-by that very fact con-
Tossing that it knows its law to be in defiance of
the constitution made to secure the safety of
| the people.
| How is it, then, that the people stand still j?
| that they look on SO patiently? that they move
with such moderate protest even at the polls? !?
Have they suddenly grown Indifferent to the
national welfare? No. They are deceived.
They are cheated as to the purposes, the
policy, the spirit, nay, the very identity of this
| party in power. When the devil crept up
| behind the doing parson and from the pulpit
preached murder, robbery, blasphemy, every
horrible crime, the quiet congregation won
dered little with itself, but concluded that it
was all in Gods justice, though simple people
might not understand it. So the people now
though they wonder at these laws and cannot
see the necessity for all this violence yet accept
all on their faith in the party leaders; for they
believe that the party in power Is still moved
with patriotic purpose-is still the same
| party that led the nation in the war. Here is
the real trouble. The people do not see exactly
where we are in the history of the revolution.
They do not see where the great party of the
war, the real political embodiment of the people,
was switched off and its place and name
seized by the horde of scheming, corrupt, un-
scrupulons rascals and insane dreamers that
are now driving the nation to ruin They do
not scan closely enough what took place at the
end Of the war-on the main points Of the his
tory Of which all agree Certainly the Southern
leaders began the struggle In pride and folly.
On them must forever rest the blame for that
And they began the war with a fixed object In
view-with full, deliberate purpose. What they
could not endure was that the country had
grown 50 that the free States must forever con-
troll its destines under the constitutional sys-
TEN. Power was passing out of their hands,
and they precipitated q conflict, hoping to
compel the free States to accept such changes
in our system as would assure their strength in
Congress against the growth of the North. The
constitution and its equal distribution of power
was what they struck at; and to defend and
maintain 1t was what the Northern people fought
or. During the war we became used to the
first abuses Of power we had ever known: but
there was no protest from the people, for all
saw the necessity that some things should be
done for which the law gave no authority.
Many important points In our financial system
are In doubt as to their constitutonality "a
was the way in which our armies were brought
out; and the law was violated every day in the
invasion Of personal rights by arbitrary arrests