Public ledger. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1865-1893, 1868-04-23
MOTIFS ON THE IMPEACHMENT.
Correspondence Cincinnati Commercially

WASHINGTON, April l4-The great trial
is now nearly dead lock. The court is
unwieldy, its presiding officer fettered by
the Howard rules, and every question has
to be put to vote. The more of dead
lock the trial gets to be, the more exact
ing it grows Yesterday and the day
before the illustrious hero of the great
march was haggled over by the lawyers
as if he had been the corpse of q man
found dead and examined by coroner's 8
inquest. Reverdy johnson arose in his
Cesarian majesty and cut friend Benja-
min Butler through the skull, figuratively
speaking. All the lesser birds cackled,
crowed or fed.
General Sherman testified that Mr..
johnson promised to him that Stanton
was cowardly. This fact is very patent
here. To those persons whom he can
overawe, Stanton is q roaring lion. He
is meek as ring-dove to people who
can put him upon any equality. During
this long ad interim season he has been
afraid to quit the War Department,
sleeping there of nights to the amusement
Of men of ell opinions. Even old Gen.
Thomas said:
"No man but one who would do q
mean thing himself would act as Stanton
expects me to act. He thinks | would
slip in there in the night and seize his
Office. A politician might do this, not
soldier. 0 "a 81
Mr. Stanton's cowardice has beer
tested here very often. One of his rea-
sons for keeping General" Detective
Baker in his employment was to watch
his house and keep assassins, imagined
or supposed, away. During much of the
war he lived a haunted existence, re-
lieved by spasmodic clustering. Indeed,
the advance characters in the impc ach'
ment trial are gooddoal like FaIstat 8
band. Stanton is Nym, Wade is Pistol,
Howard, with his re nose, is Bardolph,
Butler is Falstaff, with his eye in mourn
ing. Bingham is old Mistress Quickley
and Forney is the convenient young wo-
man of the play, q camp follower, who
will sleep anywhere.
Lest you might imagine by the fire.
quent repetition of Forney's name, that
he was person of fany significance here,
must tell you that his eminence in syco-
phancy has now passed contempt and is
now one of the humors of Washington.
Jerry Black said to Republican Con.
gresham the other day:
"That's a pretty crowd that lodges
with you fellows. I'll tell you about one
| of the most precious ones of them-For-
new. After he had abused Mr.. Buchanan
inhis new paper in Philadelphia, he came
| to see me one day, with his face white.
livered as usual, and said: Mr.. Black !
make me territorial governorl lwill
put my paper at your feet There shall
! not an article of any kind appear in it
which has not first been submitted to you.
He retired unsatisfed, and wrste letter
upon letter, praying to be appointed
something. Those letters are now in my
possession, and Forney knows it, while
| he prints his TRADES upon me. And why
does he dare to do it2 Because he has
no shame, and because he knows that old
Jerry Black never showed private let
terp
Black has had good chance to see
the Characteristic malice and treachery
| of johnson. Having tried hard to get
Black to conduct his case in the impeach-
ment trial, and failed, johnson got the
correspondent Data," who is his phono-
graphic reporter, to attack Black in the
| Baltimore Sun.
If Andrew johnson is convicted, 1t
will be chiefly because he lost the aid of
Jerry Black, who would have met Butler
point by point in the cross-examination,
and laid him out in the early stage OF his
audscity. Black is q very curious char
acter, full of idosyncrssies. He pre-
pares most Of his arguments at home,
walking up and down the floor at night,
where he would walk the whole night
long il his wife did not appear along
toward one o'clock and lead him TO bed.
II is related that on one occasion be had
bought bran new hat, which had been
laid on the floor BY some mistake. Jerry
mistook it in the imperfect light OF his
parlor for a spittoon, and next morning
the bat looked like q great quid OF to-
bscco. he had spit il nearly even full.
nris reluctantly admitted that Mr..
staubery, conductor Of Mr.. johnson .
case. iss failure. Hehas been found too
much Of student, and his experience is
too contracted in ready debate. His
tsrnper IL irritable and his face is almost
transparent, so that all Butler has 10 do
h 40 watch S,anbery's countsnAnee TO
Lnou where 70 bit his next This the
8 rlut.ouous old fiber, as the prize
sshtsrs say, does with kind OF harai
rrin. Which poisons while Il vcunds Be
yond this, stanbsry's Judgment is bad