The Ottawa free trader. [volume] (Ottawa, Ill.) 1843-1916, 1868-08-08
}joluical.
Gen. Ewings Speech.


in New York city, was one of the ablest and
most conclusive arguments against radicalism
the campaign has yet produced. We have
sought opportunity to lay it before our read
ers, but after months delay, regret that our
limits admit of but the following extract
On the 4th of July, three years ago, the war
for the suppression of the rebellion had wholly
ended. General Lee had surrendered to General
Grant the Army of Northern Virginia, and its
officers and men were blowing the fields Of the
Old Dominion, drenched with the blood and
scorched nv the fires of four years of devastating
war. Joe Johnston had surrendered TO Sherman
{appause) the daring and stubborn Hoops which
our Western army had driven inch by inch from
Belmont to Raleigh ; and Shelbys frontier COM
mand were scattered over the hemisphere from
Montana to Brazil. (Laughter) There was not
in arms Confederate soldier, mounted or on
foot not dockyard, fort, or arsenal in which
there was rebel ship, cannon, or musket; not a
rood of land on earth, or foot of deck on sea,
over which Confederate banner waved The
last rebel privateers We're being dragged for con-
domination from the Indian Ocean and the North
Pacific; aud the haughtiest leaders of the rebel
lion were wandering Outcast over the earth, or
seeking pardon of q President who was noble
hated and the laboring white man they had des-
pissed. Applause.) Never was there rebellion
more utterly overthrown, or a cause more hope
losslv lost.
The people Of the Southern States, with won
derful prcmptnoss quiet, and unanimity. sub.
Tnittod to the result. You all know il was COM
monty predicted and believed, North and South,
that when the great armies of the Oonfederaoy
were conquered dispensing, they would fiji the
land with guerrillas, and wage Vondean war
fare moro destructive and irrepresslble than the
regular war out Of which it grew. But this pre-
dictlon was not in tho smallest degree verified.
Within sixty days after the last great battle of
the war; the Federal marshals and tax-gatherers
executed their processes unarmed and unattended
throughout the Southern States, in the jungles
lately swarming With guerrillas, and over fields
lately shaken with tho roar of rebel artillery
The whole people Of the South bored to The author
Ny q tie nation, with hearts in which, as they
were human, there were yet doubtless revenges
and sorrows, humilations and bereavements, and
undyiOg attachments TO the cause they had dear
~ loved and mavely maintainedJ but which
yielded implicitly all that people, the Pres
ldeLt, or the war party had ever told them were
the purposes of the war; And by the Constitu-
tional Conventions and Legislatures chosen by
the electors of the Southern States the year the
statutes were amended, abolishing slavery and
the harsh codes founded on it, abandoning the
doctrine OF secession. repudiating the rebel debt,
and, IN short, giving every guaranty which men
could give, that in spirit of concord they recoy-
nized and accepted accomplished, every avow-
ed object of the war. H'it.'
Now, the Republican party was bound, in
loyalty, honor, and good conscience to accent
this submission, and at once restore the Union
by admitting tho southern States TO representa-
ton so far as they presented senators and repre-.
sentatives personally qualified. iApplause 1t
was bound TO do IT, out Of obedience to the Con-
stitution, in the sacred name of which the war
was waSed, and which, while allowing each
House to judge of the qualifications Of its own
members prohibits the exclusion from represen-
tation OF any State as q .SAae. And it was bound
to do it, because the war was ayowedlv wuged
for the sole purpose of efecting the uncondition-
al restoration of the Union, Immediately upon
the unconditional submission of the Southern
people, through amendments of their constitution
and laws, to the national authority Said Sher-
man to the South, in his Atlanta letter: I'VE
don't want your negroes or your horses, YOUR
houses or your lands, or any thing you have
ace only acaa and lcW MFe Il. just ojedieace 10 tie
Constitution and taos Of the Cated Statss.' iAp-
plause9 And in that declaration he expressed
the sole purpose of the war as declared by the
Government, and understood by the army and
navy and people of the Union. The Republican
party, in its National Convention in lSG4-iust
after Horace Greeley had tried to effect a dis
honorable peace through George N. Sanders and
Beverley Tucker misses and laughterl-declared
that the war was, and should be waged only, to
force "an unconditional surrender OF hostility
by the rebels. and return to their Just allegiance
70 the Constitution and laws Of the United
States And from the beginning to the close of
the wa, there stood, and still stands, on our
statute books, law declaring that the war should
DC Waged in no spirit of oppression, but solely
TO restore the Union with all the dignity, eaual-
ity, and rights of the several states unimpaired."
lApplause) That law was the pledge of the
Republican party made in 1861, and reiterated
IN National Convention il 1864, that the ire
mendous pewers confided to it by the people,
without regard to party, for the vindication of
the national authority, should never be used for
party or sectional dominion And on the faith
OF that pledge were given every dollar of money
and every drop of blood spent in the war. (Ap-
plause.) .''N
But the Republican party had not tho wisdom
or patriotism to accept this submission Of tie
oouthern people, and promptly restore the Union
~ reco!Iected that before the war 1t was minor
Ity party, and came into power in 1861, through
division of the Democratic party, by much less
thah nan the popular vote. Yet, with the pres
flge and moral power resulting from successful
prosecution OF the war, and II prompt and cordisl
restoration of the Union, it could have retained
power until this generation of voters had passed
away or had forgotten the ant-war folies of the
Democratic party But it took counsel of its
tears, doubted its own destiny, forgot the mex
tinguishable love in the hearts of the Northern
people for the Constitution and the Union, and
therefore refused to take what the war was alone
waged to get-a prompt and cordial pacifcation
and reunion under the Constitution. 1t did this