The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1868-07-14

what the heterogeneous opposition, whose
plans were laid last week in New York. real
ly intend to do, in case they get control OF
the national administration, is not to be
learned from their resolutions, nor yet from
their published speeches. There is always a
certain plausibiity about Democratic plat
forms. The meditated mischief, like forcing
slavery into the territories, repeating the Mis-
souri, compromise, judicial Matchmaking OF
slavery, secession of States from the Union,
though shaped in the distinct purposes of the
party leaders, is always covered up under
some equivocal phrase in a resolution made
capable of two constructions. Speeches made
and published are made for the market where
they are vended, and are not allowed to Of
fend the general public sentiment.
What then do the S eyinour men mean to
do or attempt? We may learn by closely
scanning the votes of the few representatives
of that party in the present Congress. Do
they mean to tighten taxation by retrenching
expenses or establishing specie payments ?
Nearly all the extraordinary appropr ations
that have been voted or defeated in the pres
ent Congress have received the support oI
the handful of Democrats in the House. No
Democratic scheme of specie payments has
been brought forward. No measure of finan-
cial reform has been originated or advocated
by Democrats. They have perpetuated and
aggravated as much as they could the nation
al embarassments hoping to make political
capital out OF them.
All the rigorous repression of expenditures,
all the thoughtful expedients for returning to
specie values and sound currency, have
originated with supporters of the Republican
policy The Democrat in Congress denounces
the expenditures made necessary by the war
which he waged, and the murderous spirit he
exhibits in the South, and the frauds upon
the revenues he commits in the North. and
when asked to aid in some remedial legisla-
ton, he says:'I have no responsibility in run
ming this machine" His grievance is not
so much that the government is plundered,
as that he is not allowed to be the plunderer.
While upon questions of finance, revenue
and public economy we fail to find any plans
~ 'ONO ~ 'hS OppOSlJlOll, WHICH even DrODl-
ise relief to the country, we need not be long
in discovering its true aninluS and the objects
it means to achieve as soon as it is clothed
with the necessary power.
The votes in Congress indicate that upon
certain measures the opposition are unit.
Upon these they tolerate no dissent and no
compromise.
L. These measures are the sustaining Of
Andrew johnson in all his arbitrary assump-
tIons of legislative power, and in the corrupt
use he has made Of the executive power to
thwart the salutary legislation of the peoples
representatives. Every Democrat in the
House and Senate from first to last, without
wavering Or hesitation, and upon every triv-
ial and insignificant point, sustained Andrew
johnson in his late trial. They voted for
him, lobbed for him, fillibustered for him.
bet on him, and subsidized him, until, with
the help of the necessary recruits from the
Republican party, they secured to him a NOM
nal acquittal, and immunity to push his odi-
Gus policy to the end of his term.
2. Every Democrat in Congress by the
same arts and the same zeal has steadily re-
sisted the restoration to the Union of the
rebel States upon the basis Of suffrage to all
loyal citizens. They scout this reconstruc-
ton as negro domination. Is it Irish domi-
nation to allow naturalzed Irshmen to vote?
Will the ballot do any more for the illiterate
negro, than it does for the illiterate white
raise him one grade in the social scale, where
he can be protected from abuse and acquire
the knowledge necessary to give him real
political influence?
3. Every Democrat from Andy johnson up
and down opposes the 14th amendment of the
constitution, declaring the citizenship of all
persons born in the country or naturalized,
and basing representations upon the number
of persons of the classes allowed to vote. The
Democrats got the control of the legislatures
oftwo States last year, and in each they re-
versed the action OF their predecessors rati
flying this amendment They want the old
olsarchy restored to not only all the in
fluence they held before the war, but they
want them clothed with the political rights
and powers fraudulently wrested from three
or four million freemen and citizens, who
are to be disiranchised for having sided with
the Union in the contest waged by the rebell-
ion. They would have the political result to
the shareholders for having been defeated
in war and having lost their slaves, and hav
ing fairly forfeited their lives, to be an as
sumption offve-fitths instead of three-fiths of
the rights of the negroes.
So we explain to our bewildered friend,
ifany are left in that state, that the result of
a Democratic triumph will rot be free trade,
specie-currency, financial reform, retrench-
ment, low taxes,-nothing of the kind, only
all old abuses perpetuated for the benlit OF
new set But it will be. the repeal OF the 14th
amendment, and the remanding to serldom
if not co slavery of the true and faithful ne
groes, the indefinite delay of reconstruc-
ton, until under Seymour with Wade Hamp-
ton and Ned Forrest for Commander of dis
tricts, the nonsense of being free men and
voters can be dragooned, shot, bludgeoned
and beaten out oftwo hundred thousand poor
landless black men, who had voted in four or
five general elections; and until northern en-
terprise, capital and intelligence stigmatlzed
as men ,rith carpet bag can be mohbed out
of ten, halEaepopulated and impoverished
States-and the malignant wrecks and ruins
ofrebellion shall be able to setup again in the
.farest part of the Union, their gloomy Sa-
bara of barbarism, which righteous war and
Gods judgments have just destroyed.