The Waynesburg Republican. [volume] (Waynesburg, Pa.) 1867-18??, 1868-02-12
imagined that they had his assent whel
he had said nothing at all.

iuaS ihcu s""t thc h'u his o>1che "hSh
he had said nothing at all.
Silence does not always give con-
sent, and this was one of the cases
where it did not. Grant understood
we'll enough what they wanted him to
do. But he was military officer, and
waited orders. lie received none.
The President would not assume the
responsibility Of ordering him in
writing to do what he expected him to
do without orders. Nor does it seem
that johnson gave him any verbal or
ders, As the constitutional Com
mander-in-Chief he was the only man
who could do 50. The Secretary of
State could not nor could the Score
tary ofthc Navy, nor of the Interior,
nor the Postmaster General, nor the
Attorney General, though all these
sat there and chartered about it as
though they supposed Grant did not
know that they had not q shadow of
authority to give him orders.
Now, in the absence of any such re-
sponsible ordcrs, what was Grants
proper coursco Clearly to obey the
laws, which is exactly what he did.
For this the World asserts that some
brave man in this Cabinet called him
Ulysses S. Grant "liar" and
"sneak." As regards the "sneak"
part of the business, the man who has
left upon our history such records as
Donelson, Shiloh, Vicksburg, Chat
tanooga, the Wilderness, Spottsylvania
and Richmond, must be very much
like onc-essentially so. Sneaks usu-
ally do those things. They do not
crawl into the confidence ofa great po-
litical party, obtain high Offices at their
hands and then bctray them-oh ! no.
They only fight battles and win victo-
ries. vi.
The question of veracity between the
twois ponderously on the side of Grant.
No man ofsense will hesitate which to
believe. The nod of Grant would be
sooner accepted by thepcople than the
oath of Andy Johnson--a man who
betrays himself as we'll as his friends.
We have, then, the declaration ofGrant
in his last letter to go by, and we be-
lieve him every worl-when he says:
The course you would have it un-
derstood l agreed to pursue was in
violation Of law and the orders from
you, while the course | did pursue, and
which | never doubted YOU fully un-
derstood, was in accordance with law,
and no! in disobedience to any orders
ofmy superior; aud now Mr.. President,
when my honor rs a soldier and in
tegrity as man have been so violently
assailed, pardon me for saying that |
can but regard this whole matter, from
beginning oend as an attempt to in
volve me in the resistance OF law for
which You hesitated to assume the
responsibility in orders, and thus to
destroy my character before the
country.
| am in measure confirmed in this
conclusion by your recent orders di-
recting me to disobey orders from the
Secretary of War, my superior and
your subordinate, without having
countcrmandM the authority l am to
disobev,
Our space will not permit US to
copy the letters entire, but careful
perusal has confirmed us in the facts
set forth as above. The correspond
encc throughout is distinguishable
for its arrogance and duplicity on
the part of johnson. Grants tone
is that of deep grievance and de-
sire that his character may remain
unsullied. 1t is the free energetic
outspoken language of the soldier and
if possible will cndear him more close
ly to the American heart.