The New Orleans crescent. [volume] (New Orleans, La.) 1866-1869, 1868-10-03
PHILLIPS ON THE PRESIDENTIAL QUESTION


The secret workings of the Radical mind
are infallibly revealed whenever Wendell
Phillips descants on pending politics. He is
its most unerring exponent, its boldest ex-
plorer. And though as leader he is often
far in advance of his party, and may some
times seem far astray from its orthodox
policy, it always, sooner or later, comes up to
the farthest mark which he sets up. Hence
the importance of those brief political essays
which from time to time he publishes in the
Anti-Slavery Standard over his own signature.
Egotistical, vainglorious, selfobtrusive and
insolent as they invariably are in tone and
temper; wild, visionary and reckless as they
frequently are in counsel, suggestion and
prediction it is not safe to depreciate on
these accounts their weight and significance.
Though they may appear to be the emanations
of a crazed intellect as obdurate in consist
ency of error as the hate of the fallen Luci-
fer, il must be remembered that they are
addressed to sympathetic natures, which, if
intellectually weaker, are quite as morbid as
his own.
All this should be taken into consideration
in order to properly estimate the salient re-
marks of Wendell Phillips in a recent article
on the presidential canvass. There, in the
third sentence, he declares that "the re-elec-
ton of Mr.. Lincoln was grave mistake, from
the worst consequences of which a kind
Providence saved us by his death"
Thus the foremost and truest leader of
Radicalism, be who pronounces the day ac-
cursed that saw the failure of the Radical con-
spiracy against the official life of Mr.. john
son, thanks God for the assassination OF the
preceding President What are the Southern
freedmen to think of this? They have been
taught by minor Radical agitators to regard
Mr.. Lincoln as the Moses who delivered them
from bondage, as the supreme benefactor of
their race; and yet the most frank and most
infallible representative of the Radical party
rejoices that the career of Mr.. Lincoln was
cut short by violent and horrid death, SO
that he could not carry out in peace the policy
to which he pledged himself during the war.
1t is plain from this testimony of Wendell
Phillips that if Mr.. Lincoln had lived, he
would have encountered as fierce a hostility
from Radicalism as that which Nh. johnson
has undergone. 1t is plain that the Radicals
were ali along opposed to the war as a means
of simply restoring the Union and maintain
ing the constitutional integrity of the federal
authority. 1t is plain that they did not exult
at emancipation for its own sake, but that
they hailed it as step which seemed to make
easier the subversion of constitutional gov
eminent, the destruction of the federal
Union, the suppression of States, the obliter-
alton of all the guarantees necessary to both
personal and political freedom, to the indie
pendence of the laborer, to the protection
of the taxpayer, and the final concentra-
ton of all powers in the hands of a
central, heartless and grinding oligarchy.
What Wendell Phillips says about the ad-
mission, or pretended admission, of the re-
constructed States. is also worth noting:
"Our latest criticism on the Republican par
ty," he says, sis that they, by sheer incapa-
city, have put the nation into unnecessary
peril" meaning that they have imperiled the
Radical scheme of despotism. "When the
impeachment failed" he continues, sit was
madness to 60 on and admit the rebel States
to their old places. Without land, without
arms, with but little organization, the loyal
vote lies at the mercy of rebels" And such
doubtless is the pervading thought among the
Radical reconstructors, who had hoped to turn
the Southern States into so many political
plantations where the negroes, changed from
industrial slaves to voting chattels, would
plant votes under Radical taskmasters as for
merly they planted cotton or sugar under
white overseers and black drivers. The col
ored voters do not address themselves with
the expected alacrity to the work assigned
them, and hence "it was madness to admit
the rebel States to their old places"
And the opinion of Grant expressed by this
pre-eminent exponent of Radicalism is well
worth considering. After remarking that the
people, meaning the Radicals, cleaned with
far too much trust on MIR. Lincoln's supposed
craftsmanship and honesty" he adds: "Now
the case is different The people have been
largely educated to the nations necessity and
duty, and do not even affect to put off any
share of it on the shoulders of Grant, or fancy
that he can or will lead anybody, or in any,
thing. They see in him tool, not leader"
Still more significant are the following de-
tached passages:
"Our king log is not imposed on us; we
select him ourselves"
"Grant is only the almost invisible point
of the broad, and everyday broadening mass
of purpose and resolve and necessity behind |
him"
Grants election melts the millions into |
one indissoluble whole, calling us to stamp |
on it what legend God wills"
Thus. according to Wendell Phillips, the
most candid revealer of Radical thought and |
purpose, Grant is expected, if he become
president, to be a skiing log" tool"
pivot about which revolutionary
Violence may whirl until Radicalism shall have
stamped its will on the Iacked, PROSTATE and
country.
Wendell Phillips does not believe that
Grants election would mean peace-thats
lear.
Democrats, register at once. Lose no time.