New-York tribune., 1871-03-24
CAN THE REPUBLICAAS DISBAND,

! iilt Eltdt bohl VI iHc thuV Pe''J ''''''
be safely disbanded. Nay: it can hardly
escape disintegratOn and dissolution by the
impact of living ideas against its honeyoombed
deCaying organization.
! The Republican party, we hear IL undergo
ing dissolution. Sundry ambitious coterleS OF
politicians stand ready to certify iCs ueccaSo
and proceed to administer on Its estate GER
tain of its lifelong enemies are willing 10 ad-
nit that it has had abundant reason to exist
has passed triumphantly through trying or
deals. and has achieved an honorable place IN
our countrys history-provided 1t VIII there
unon get into its coffin and ask the pal-Dear-
ers to move on. Nay: if this point be con
ceded they are willing to bo generous, ana
conccde that Lincoln was not an ape, Stanton
time-serving ruflian, and Andrew WINDY
dcmagogue. They might even stretch point,
and admit that Thomas was a soldier ana no
traitor and that Grant got rather the better
of his adversaries at DODclsOn. Nicksburg,
Mission Ridge, and Appomattox.
Can the country yet spare the Republican
party2 In other words Arc the great princi-
pies for which it has struggled accepted as In
contestable by those who so stOuty resisted
them? Those principles all eliminate in a
broad affirmation that the Political and Civil
Rights of all born on the soil or legally natu-
rallied in the courts of our country are of right
equal before the law, and have been placed
under the protecting shield Of the Federal
Constitution. If that is no longer contested,
then the Republican organization may properly
be given up, and those who have hitherto
sustained it may severally be absorbed into
new parties, as questions of Finance, Political
Economy, or practical Administration, shall
impel them.
| The Republicans organized in 1854, fought
their first National battle in '58, and triumphed
in 1861 upon the broad ground of hostility to
any further diffusion of Human Slavery under
the flag of our Union. Thenceforward, they
upheld, through a bloody, devastating struggle,
the integrity and paramount authority of that
! Union, and in "a triumphed in affirming that
| Slavery, having assailed the National life,
should die. In 1868, they appealed again to
the People ON platform affirming that the
National Debt incurred in resisting and over
coming the Shareholders Rebellion should be
paid exactly as both parties understood that it
should be when it was contracted, and that
the States lately in revolt should recognize
and respect the Equal Rights of their ColOrcd
people, as affirmed by the Reconstruction acts !
of Congress
But eur adversaries especially at the South |
assailed us throughout that canvass rs partial !
and inconsistent "YOu impose Negro Suf-
" frage on the South" they urged, while you
"leave the North free to reject it," The
criticism was just and we deferred to it by
proposing and carrying a XVIII Amendment
to the Constitution, which prescribes that
"Sl The right of citizens of the United States to vote
oil ahri1e NV fhn
by any State account of race color, previous con-
ditiOn Of seryitude
s2 Congress shall have power to enforce this Article
by appropriate legislation"
This Article having passed both Houses of
Congress by an ample vote, has been ratified
by the Legislatures of thirty-One States, not
counting New York. which first ratified, and
ther (On the accession of the Democrats to
pOwer) rescinded that ratification. New-Jersey
rejected it by party vote, but has since (On
the accession Of the Republicans to power
recOnsidered and ratified it. Indiana ratified
by a clear majority of all the members chosen
(27 out of 80 Senator's and "a out of 100 Repre-
sentatives) but the Democratic minority ran
out of the House, and thus (they say destroyed
the quorum which is twO-thirds of "A full House.
But the Article is abundantly ratified without
her-an the nOn-ratifying States, even with
her. being California, Delaware, Indiana, Ken
tucky, Maryland, Ne,c- York, Oregon and Ten
nessee-S; whereas the ratifying States with
out counting Indiana or New-York, number
81, or nearly four-fifths of the whole, while
only three-fourths are required.
This XVth Article is as much o part of the
Constitution as the Ist, and those vino swear
TO support the Constitution swear fidelity to
every part of it. The Democrats may disin-
tegrate the Republican party at any time by
simple loyalty to the Constitution and fidelity
to their oath to support it,
But this is exactly what they refuse to ac-
cord. The controlling dninluS of that party is
negro-hate and stubborn resolve to subveTt
the XVIII Article of the Federal Constitution.
That party is now an organized and fOrmld-
able conspiracy to nullify the Article in queS-
ton. 1t is quite aware that there is no pres
ent ground of hope or expectation that the
Article may be rescinded so it is banded to
defy or treat said Article as a nullity. 1t
means to carry nearly every Southern State
for President in 1872 by frightening the Blacks
away from the polls, or compelling them to
vote the ticket of the implacable enemies Of
their manhood ard their political rights
Such is the paramount desire, such the ami
mating purpose, of the Democratic party to-
day.
But how does it expect to win victOry7
Largely, by means of deliberate, systematic |
Wholesale suppression of the truth Wherever
the ku-klux organization and Outrages are !
unpopular or likely to incite odium, there their
very existence is secuted as a Republican fab
rcatlon! Witness the following relative to
nTfh oil. e..