The Wheeling daily register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1864-1878, 1868-09-03

umphed in the war, had sought to heal
the wounds it had made, to give COM
fort to the breken-hearted, and above
all things tending to the blessed con-
summation, to bind up the broken
members of the Union. General Grant
at the crisis when the junto in Con-
gress who opened against Lincoln, per-
sonally, the war they now prosecute
with fiendish malice against his policy
did not countenance, as he does now,
their destructive measures. On the
contrary, he allied himself with his
counsels, which Mr.. Lincoln, in his last
speech, tells his countrymen, "every
member of the Cabinet fully approved"
What could have drawn General
Grants fealty from the patriotic cause
of restoration, as inaugurated by Mr..
Lincoln's reelection 1t was so fully
approved by the voice of the nation
that the great body of the Republicans
who had supported the Wade-Davis bill
the antagonist scheme-gave 1t up.
1t was based on denial of the people
of the South of the right to make their
own constitutions, assuming 1t for the.
rump Congrsss-the Representatives, OF
another section. Lincoln would rccog-
nize no scheme for the reorganization OF
the State government, unless the peo-
pie chose to adopt it.
This was the diveIging point between
the President and his Radical opponents
in Congress. The overwhelming voice
of the nation for time induced the
mass of that party to resign their oppo-
sition to his principles and measures.
On his death their hostility revived,
but it did not manifest itself until the
meeting of Congress after the inaugura-
ton of Mr.. johnson. His message ex-
hibitiny the acquiescence Of the whole
South in his predecessors policy gave
universal satisfaction. The press OF
home and abroad were full of cengratu-
latious on its happy auguries.
But the maleontents in Congress who
had enioyed during the war unlimited
power-who had rioted on public plum
der-quickly saw that if the happy in
tercourse between the North and South
was restored, and with it law and order
and regular business, enormous issues
of paper money would cease, enormous
contracts and jobs would no more be
put up as national stakes to be gambled
for-cotton speculations would escape
from legislative and judicial manipula-
ton and become business transactions,
and our billions of taxation would
shrink to modest millions.
The regulated Government that once
made our country so prosperous IS III
suited to the genius of public men who
before the war felt that nothing but
bare boarding could be made by Con-
pressional labor, but who now find
themselves living in magnificent pala-
ces of their Own-discussing openly and
complacently the proper moment for
changing the Government into one in
which the President and Senate shall
be chosen for lfe-while their friends,
the contractors in their respective
States, are erecting villas, manufactur.
ing monopolies, banking establish
ments and other grand privileged IN
strumentalities of wealth that dwarf all
that the best directed individual indus
try can do in competition.
Unsettled times suit political opera
tors and adventurers, whose skill is
their only capital. When such men
reach place in legislative bodies, con,
stitutional rule is to them like sheep.
fold against wolves. Hence the eager.
ness with which they seek to throw
them down. The death of Mr.. Lincols
was for these wolves like the death OF
the shepherd. From that moment their
homes revived. During his life they
had been driven in despair to tillbuster-
inc to keep the South out of the fold
now they saw the ten States exposed
only protected by the strength of one
man Of the section already vanqulshed
| by arms.
Lincolns power was derived from his
popularity in the victorious States. The
men whom Lincoln had kept at bay
were themselves the leaders in that
section, aud against them the Vice
President could no. maintain tho mas
terry rs the President himself had in the
region that elected him to power
Hence the men who seized the oppOrtu.
nifty of Lincoln's death, rejoicing in il
as opening the way to make spoil OF
the uuresisting States of the South, tt
use them for the purposes of their am
bitiOn and ayarice, were glad, as dIs
scmbling mourners, to follow the hearsC
of the dead President throughout the
North, pretending homage TO the states
man whose whole policy they had at
tempted to thwart.
They had been defeated and robuked
for it by his reelection, and by that re
election were called back to accom-
plish it, in spite of their reluctance. The
revenge they dared not try TO wreak on
the principal by whom they were once
repulsed, they resolved to take of his
successor, the Vice President. The ac
claim he received for his message
adopting Mr.. LincOln's Union pro-
pramme had hardly ceased to ring in
his ears when old Thad. Stevens and his
subterranean caucus broke their cell
and denounced the Presidential plan
repulsed the Southern States which
had adopted it, and sent their rep
resentatives home from the Capitol
From that day to this Mr.. johnson
ceased to be President. even de Jacto
A part of Lincoln's Cabinet, which ht
retained, always at heart hostile tC
Lincoln's policy, betrayed johnson tC
the Rump Congress, and used the pow
er of his administration to destroy him
The impeachment now is necessary only
to satisfy the malice which would have
the qualification of formal removal
Thad. Stevens threatened it against
Lincoln to accomplish what is already
practically against johnson. The RumI
have exerted almost despotic power
from the death of Mr.. Lincoln. They
have complete command of the army,
all orders to be obeyed being derived
through Grant and Sherman issuing
them, aud the civil departments are
with their patronage, almost entirel.
at their devotion throughout the coun
try as we'll as in Washington.
The laws are made over the Presi
dent. johnson could do nothing bu
illuminate vetoes to make their daring
acts in defiance Of the Constitution tn
more conspicuous. They fell ON th'
bronze of Thaddeus and his comrade
as Priam's darts from the brazon shield
of Pybrrus. All the miseries OF tn
couHtry for the last three years are at
tributed to the Jacobins and their com
-,;..aoa that have trayersed and wOr