The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1868-08-14
The Presidential Campaign.
Fron, the ~ y Herald.


The Presidential Campaign.
Front the ~ Y. Herald.
Two points in the canvass are more import
ant than all others-the history of the radical
party and the Niger vote. For eight years
the Republican party has been in power, and
the final results, as seen by the people, are
the arrangement of all the machinery of gov
eminent, an almost incredible corruption in
Office, and weight in taxes that bears COM
merce and labor TO the earth. viii the people
longer have patience with party that has
such a history This is the question of the
hour. Is there any fear in our future that
should move the people to trust this party
again, even despite the fearful chance that it
may continue the same destructive career that
has already been so disastrous to the national
prosperity Can any other party iniict upon
us evils worse than those we now suffer as the
consequence of radical misrule Reconstruc-
ton by system of legislation that delibe-
rately forges calamity for whole people and
prepares the social ruin of ten States to secure
power to a coterie of politcians-this is the
political crime that stamps the radical faction
as utterly damnable before the people. Men
inquire what the faction would stop at that
would purchase such an end by such means
and they know that it will not stop at any
thing sacred in the law and will respect the
rights OF the people in the North as little as il
has done in the South. Does the name of
Grant furnish any guarantee for the future of
the radicals The people are lot ready to
believe it. Grant is politically only promise
and a possibility. Respectable men are not
willing to doubt his honesty or his upright
purpose; but these do not always qualify for
success in such a strife as he must
control to save the people from his party.
He may prove capable; he may not, and
it is time when the people cannot trust
their future to such a chance. Therefore the
of rod fo ha inf
the popular brain, and on such reasoning as
we have limited the people appear to drift
toward what they regard as the least of two
evils, without faith in the Republicans and
little hope in the Democrats. Men on either
side count for little; it is the history of the
radical party that condemns it. Democracy
has bad history, too, but its sins are trivial
by comparison. If this faction ever desired to
reconstruct society it was in the interest of the
white man. The word taxation hardly occurs
in its history, and it never aimed a blow at the
Supreme Court or sough- to cripple the Gov
ernment in the person of the Executive. 1t
sympathized with the South in the war, and
that can be forgiven by people who are at
last coming to look upon the Republicans as
the South looked upon them when the war
began. If, therefore, the history of the De-
mocracy were darker than it is the history of
radicalism would be infinitely beyond it in
infamy. 1t is upon these broad views and
judgments of parties that the people move.
The common mind averages great results by
processes of its own. Isolated facts are for
| gotten, this or that virtue or vice seems to
pass away; but the balance of history is made
up at the polls, and Kentucky indicates the
| tendency.
If the reaction of the public mind stimulated
by the history of the radical party does not
sweep the whole North the negro vote will be
OF the first Importance in the struggle. 1t may
save the South to the radicals, but it may give
it to the Democrats, and, regarding the possi-
bility of a fairly divided North, Sambo may
finally hold the balance of power. Some facts
indicate that the negroes may go very largely
with the Democrats. Dull as we may con-
slider the whole race, they have seen enough
! to be disgusted with radical friendship,
and are certainly seeking political allies out
side that party. Negroes from the beginning
had determined upon their part of the alliance
with the radicals, and thus formed expecta,
! tiOns that the latter could not meet. COntsca-
tiOn tells the story in word. Northern re-
straint on the dominant party, even in its worst
moments rendered 1t impossible for it to carry
out the virtual compact; but the negroes will
not understand that. They only cherish re-
sentiment at the men who promised, but did
not perform. COntscatiOn, by giving the ne
groes real as well as a political independence,
might have made it possible that they could
sustain political opposition in the Southern
States; but without hold on the land this
was not possible. Without the power, there
fore, to make their political independence
effective, with social facts, more cogent than
radical orators, forcing upon them that their
interests were identical with the interests Of
the people among whom they must live; with
heart-breaking disappointment in view Of
this and bitter readiness to visit their resent
ment on those who had raised such high hopes
| only to betray them the niggers inevitably &c
over to the other side. There is nothing
strange in this. 1t would be strange if it were
otherwise, for they achieve political revenge
and act on the best view they can take oftheir
own welfare.
The case of the Presidency, therefore,
judged by the main facts seems to stand thus:
The history of the radical party is such
that the people will not trust it again on any
terms, aud this conviction Threatens to give