Norfolk day book. [volume] (Norfolk and Portsmouth Va.) 1868-1880, 1869-05-28
WHAT is LOYALTY 3?

There is supreme and intensely re-
freshing impudence in the air with
which we hear the members of that
self-righteous, but actually rotten or
ganization, the Radical party, pirate of
"loyalty," fealty to the Government
which they alone claim to possess. We
hear them ask every hour in the day,
says the National Intelligencer, and
yet do SO continually as formerly, is So
and-so "loyal ?" Was he Loyal
during the war? Is this wife Or that
the wife of Loyal living husband,
and this widow or that the widow Of
"loyal" dead one? IL all cases they
speak downward, as from pinnacle of
superiority, the self-conssisuted judges
of what loyalty is, and the self-ap-
pointed censoIs and condemnors of what,
in their bigotry, intolerance, and inso-
lent pretensions, it is not. If the future
historian, when he comes to set forth
the characteristics of these times, and
to draw the moral lineaments of the
Radical party, looks about him for a
name by which to characterize it, he
might most aptly describe and baptize
it as the party of the Pbarisees. Moth
ing so pharisaical in politics, and MOTH
ing more pharisaical in anything else
has ever existed since the time when
| the self-righteous Pharisees of old, as
the self-righteous Radical party do now,
thanked God that they were not as
other men. There is no liberation in
them for difference of opinion. Every
one who does not think as they do is a fit
subject for the stake, the cross, the
prison-house, or scourginys of any kind.
Had they lived when St. Stephen was
stoned to death, they would have been
in their element among the stoners.
Had they been by at the court of Plate
among the Jews, when the Holy One
was given over to crucifxion, aud a
malefactor was spared because he agreed
with the Jews in opinion, they would
have done as the Jews did, and been
among those who shouted and tore
themselves, and cried, cruelty him
for opinions sake-and let loose a
thousand malefactors, for no other rea>
son than that they thought as they did.
What is loyalty and what does true
loyalty mean ? The highest notion
that these men can get of it is loyalty
to every idea, new or old, false or true,
and every scheme, however wild. or
revolutionary, or wrong, of the Radicnl
patty. This is their test and definition
of loyalty; and all who do not come up
to it are, according to them, disloyal.
When we contrast this difnition with
the true definition, nothing can be more
odious, and usurpatious, and abomina-
bic than the light in which the Radical
party appears. l,.
What, then, does loyalty really signi-
fly among us? To what are we required
as good and faithful citizens of one COM
mon country, to be loyal? Certainly
not to any political party, good or bad
for this would lead inevitably to the
conclusion, as we have always at least
two parties among us, that all the MEM
bers of at least one of them must be
disloyal-a gross absurdIty, though no
more gross than the now domip ant par
/ ty have been guilty Of Certainly not
to any one man, for that would be an
autocratical despotism-a something to
which we have not, thus far, claimed to
owe allegiance. If, then, it is not to one
man, nor to many men, what is it that
we are bound to be loyal to To this
the Government of the United States,
as defined and limited ip the Constitu-
ton of the United States. To this or
nothing. This is. our political solar
system. If we maintain it, we maintain
that round which our duties, by the law
of our political existence, revolve, and
/ by which the machinery of our institu-
tons is kept in its place. If we do not
maintain 1t, we are recreant to our duty,
essentially disoyal to the Government,
| no matter to what party we may belong,
and though we may shout our own 10y
atty from all the hill tops. and grow
! black in the face in denunciatory decls-
rations of the disloyalty of our neigh
bors. By this, the only true criterion,
do the Radical party the party of the
Pharisees-stand condemned. notwith-
standing their loud and Iabored preten-
sions 10 loyalty and virtue. BY this, too,
do all who have upheld the Constitu-
ton, though scourged for political opin-
ions sake stand justified, and will appear
so in due time, Notwithstanding the OBJ
loquy which they have been obliged to
endure.
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A parcel of beautiful, rich, golden
hued tobacco, grown by Mr.. Kennedy,
of Bedford county, was put up at auc-