Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1870-03-27
HOW TT LOOKS ABROAD.

The reconstruction policyis beginning
TO wane as we confidently hope. 1t had
no real strength except such as Was based
upon the extraordinarily exaggerated re-
ports of terrible outrages upon the '4oyal'
people of the State. These reports, got
ten up in such style as to pass for testi-
mony before B. Buffers committee, have
been shorn of their strength by an expo
sure of their falsity. Gen. FL. v. Boyn-
ton, late of the Federal army and uncom-
promising in his Radicalism, writes from
Washington under date of the 2Sd, to
Cincinnati; go ~,
This week may serve to finish recon-
struction, so far as getting all the sway
ward sisters back again; but, horrible
to contemplate, even before these last
waiting ones are fairly in, numerous
party in the House is clamoring TO put
Tennessee out again, and to turn Virginia
adrift. The Reconstruction Committee in
the House are gravely considering how
the thing can best be forced through. Is
it not pleasant matter to contemplated
While the topstone of reconstruction is
just being swung into place in the Senate,
the House, with political pickaxes, crow
bars and gunpowder, is trying to dig Ten
nessee out of the foundation. If for no
other reason than The public dread of the
sad repetition of the whole reconstruction
debate, as it appears in the last twenty or
thirty volumes of the Globe, the matter
should be avoided, if possible. But the
matter is serious. The determination is a
fixed one on the part of the Tennessee
delegation, with Mr.. Stokes as its leading
spirit, to force Senter out of position by
Congressional interference. Even the
quiet Mr. Maynard has become an enthu
siast i'm the movement, and he and Gen.
Stokes and his followers, instead OF yield
ing when they found themselves beaten,
forced the division in the Republican
party of their State; and now they seek to
drive Congress to retrieve their mcrited
defeat.
Matters may be bad enough in Tennes-
see, but what promise has the country
of an improvement under the very men
who are making all this cutlery in Con
gress2 Every man of them knew that
Butler, of Tennessee, had sold his cadet
ship by a regular bargain, made In adj
vance of sale. And yet, with this knowl-
eye, every man in the Tennessee delega-
ton made himself Buffers special champ
ion, and some who claim to be the best
among them, lobbied the House over to
avert expulsion, and even refused to vote
for censure. Democrats from Tennessee |
would be an affliction it is true; but if |
they were honest men who believed, at
least, in outward honesty in public Of |
ficers, the country would be the gamer
by the change.
The interference asked for by the Ten |
nessce delegation is chiefly to secure their
own return. 1t is very doubtful whether |
honest people want them here. When an
entire State delegation upholds the doc
trine of open and deliberate barter of pub
lie officers, almost any change should
prove acceptable. And with the full |
knowledge which the Tennessee delegation
had that Butler had made premeditated |
sale, their action amounts to a deliberate |
of such acts as his. If such |
men are the fruits of reconstruction in |
the country may well be anx-
ious to try some other variety. And the
Republican party will suffer less by their
lefeat than bV their retention.