Public ledger. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1865-1893, 1868-05-20
THE IMPEACHMENT FIZzLE.
From the New York World. May isth.l

The Radical party resembles
Hamau, who built a gsllows fifty feet 10
hight, and found, at last, that he had to
swing from it ct last Vaunting revenge
has "o'erleaped itself and fallen on
tother side" This impeachment, which
was to have removed an obstacle and an
enemy, will, in the event, disintegrate
and destroy the Republican party. The
maledictions which are hesped upon
Chief Justice Chase, and upon such SEN
ators as Fessenden, Trumbull, Sherman,
Grimes, and Henderson, will render il
impossible that they and the millions ol
Republicans who respect and honor them,
should ever again act with the party from
which they are to be ostracised. The
Republicans who disapprove Of impeach'
ment comprise the soundest and clearest
heads, the best regulations for probity,
and the ripest craftsmanship 10 be found
in the party. The shafts of calumny will
fall harmless at their feet. The foul asper-
sions with which they are assailed will
simply sunder their connection with the
party, but cannot shake the confidence oi
the country in their integrity, fairness
and independence. They will still be
followed as trusted guides, and wherever
they lead, multitudes of honest Republi-
cans will follow. The Buffers, the Sum-
ners, the Logsns, the /Stevenses, the
Greeleys, who denounce and villify them,
have always been looked upon as set OF
crotchetty, extravagant, Unbalanced par.
tisans, on whose judgment no man OF
sound understanding would choose to
lean. This impeachment trial will make
a separation-betwee the sheep and the
goats. The day of judgment has come,
and the Republican party will presently
20 to its own place. They have strained
the bow until it has snapped in their
hands. The party has estranged and os.
tracised its ablest statesmen, outraged
the public sense of justice, and commit
ted stupen1ous blunder, from the
effects of which it can never recover.
1t will require some time for all the
consequences of this act of folly to be de-
veloped; but before the Presidential
election it will lead to fresh political
combinations and open new era in the
history of the country. Some ofits minor
consequences will be more immediate.
Old Ben Wade, for example, will realize
the truth of the adage that there's many
slip betwixt the cup and the lip. Hisin-
auguration as President of the United
States does not take place to-day accord
ing to the programme His swarm ofex
pectant parasites will get no Offices His
anticipated influence at Chicago next
week has suddenly burst, like An over
blown bubble. His chances of supplant
ing Grant, or at least of securing the
second place on the ticket, have all van
ished ere one can say it lightens," and
are like the remembrance of dream
The visions in which his imagina ton and
that of his friends have reveled for the
last five weeks, the Cabinet he had Sc
lected, his expected residence in the
White House, the throngs of hatterers
and solicitors, the receptions and state
dinners, the Difference and consideration,
the ten months salary ofa Pres idcnt,
with all the pride, and pomp, and circum-
stance of that dazzling position,
"Are melted into air. into thin air,
And, like the baseless fabric of q vision,
Or, like an unsubstantial pageant faded,
Leave not a rack behind"
The gorgeous bubble, which glittered
before his eyes with the resplendent hues
of the rainbow, has collapsed into few
drops of dirty soapy water. The Presi-
dent is nobody but coarse old Ben. Wade.
"Ob, what a falling off is here, my
coun trymen !"
Another swift coming consequence of
the break down of the impeachers will be
great wrangle and fierce reciprocation
of recrimnations at the Chicago Con-
vention. Party feeling runs so high on
this subject, and the indignation of the
discomGted impeachers blazes into such
intolerance, and the discontinue will
next week be so fresh, that all words ex-
changed between the sbettors and oppo-
nents of impeachment will be words
spoken in anger. 1t is certain that in
| Chicago Mr.. Trumhull and the rest will
not lack intrepid defenders. When men
are deeply moved they are likely to fall
into some extravaganza, and it is not
| improbable that the convention may
perpetrate some folly even more sense
less and imprudent than impeachment
itself The course of the conservative
Senators is a 6re-brand flung into heap
| OIL
what explosions may follow.
Stanton will of course stick until
the vote is taken, but he must by this
time see that he holds his Office by frail
and brief tenure. he will retire when
the President is acquitted, and will be
the most mmiliated man concerned in
these disgraceful proceedings. To sup
port him in his unparalleled audacity
and insolenc0, the Republicans have
sacrificed all the hopes of their party.
They are justly punished, and one of
their most mortifying reflections must
be, that they stumbled to their ruin by
their attempt to bear upon their shoul-
ders so vile political carcass. No man
with spark of personal honor could
have consented to occupy his position.
He is damned to everlasting fame " for
having first betrayed and de6sd the Pres
ident, and then shipwrecked the Presi-
dents enemies. There is no part of the
/ rasnlt in which honest men will more