The Portland daily press., 1872-08-20
TERMS ss. 90 PER ANNUM IN ADVANCE.

iis SERVICES 10 the fifteenth amendment L
snal never forget. When some, even of the
FOREMOST FOREMOST aDolltionists, doubted and were
lukewarm, L wrote to Senator Wilson asking
him to urge Gen. Grant to put three lines
INTO MS nrst message, commencing that
measure to congress and the country The
answer came back, ''You are too late Cen
Grants message was finished before vour
note arrived; and the recommendation Won
wish is in it," it still re mains lamentablv
true that the colored man has no full recog-
milton at the moth and no adequate protec-
tion in the south-shame to the administra-
ton and to the republican partyl But their
friends may fairly claim that during the last
three years the negro has steadily gained in
the safe exercise and quiet enjoyment of his
rights.
/ know the defects of Gen. Grants admin
istration as well as any man. / think, dis
trustful as l was of him, am able to see the
good service he has unexpectedly rendered
the nation. But no matter for those defects
AT the most they are not fatal; and events
have lifted President Grant into being to-day
the symbol and representative of loyalty
The conspiracy between southern secession
lists and northern copperheads-of which,
very naturally, Mr.. Greeley is the tool, and,
unfortunately, Mr.. Sumner is the indOrser,
and, think, the dupe-leayes room but for
two parties; those who are for the nation
and those who are against it. L bate no jot
of my brotherly regard and sincere esteem
for Mr.. Sumner in thus holding him deceived.
The entire faith have in his honesty of pur-
pose obliges me to think him duped. The
only wonder is how this is possible when the
south is so insolent and shameless in pro-
claiming her intentions. The south has long
seen her mistake and often confessed it, The
Tribune itself makes this statement as late as
June, 1871. That mistake was to contend
for her ideas with muskets and outside the
Union, leaving us the government and taking
herself the part of rebel. She has often
announced-in the last instance by the lips
OF Jefferson Davis-that the cause was not
lost, and must be won by getting possession
of the government and leaving us in the op-
position. Such is the present plot. That
| Mr.. Greeley sees it would never prevent his
aiding it. That Mr.. Sumner does not see it
is to me matter of profound astonishment.
At such a moment the regular republican
party becomes again the accepted and only
instrument of resistance, and Grant repre-
sents loyalty as Lincoln did in 1861. do
not care for his defects, were they ten times
greater. Chatham and Junius riGhtfully for
got even the infamy of Wilkes when he stood
the representative and symbol of the rights of
British subject. Even if L accepted Mr.. Sum-
ner's portrait of President Grant-which in
some sense is true, but in no sense is the whole
a
rebellion at the ballot box, to which disloyal-
| ty gives all the strength and childish credulity
| all the character.
To stop now for criticism of such faults as
| those of Gen. Grant is like blaming mans
| awkwardnes. when he is defending you
| against an assassin.
| In proof that the conspiracy 1 charge is
| real and no fiction, need not cite Jefferson
| Davis late speech, or the confession of Mr..
IaUySa 49, al
| who comes to us from the south bears witness
| that t. mass of southern whites are wholly
unchanged in opinion and ready for another
| revolt whenever the way opens. The wide
spread organization of the kuklux shows the
| same thing. The organization existed only
because public opinion tn re cheered it on,
| and in suppressing it our government had no
| title of help from the former rebels. All this
was to be expected. 1t would be contrary to
history and experience were it otherwise.
! To put the slightest faith in the protestations
of copperheads and secessionists, made only
| to get office, is building on a quicksand.
| With the exception OF Mr.. Sumner, nO
leading liberal republican does really
put any faith in those protestations.
Theirs is not a case of delusion.
They are hypocrites, not dupes. They know
well the plot, and for the sake of office
are willing to help it and risk the consequent
ces They know that Mr.. Greeley's election
| means the negro surrendered to the hate OF
| southern states, with no interference from
| the nation in its behalf; that it means the
| constitutional amendments neutraliZed by a
copperhead congress, our debt tampered with,
and our bonds falling twenty per cent. in
every market. The Democratic millionaire
who is willing to risk this, has already
'.hedged." He holds millions of confederate
| bonds, and is plotting to make on them more
than enough to pay four times over for all he
1 loses on the national securities, and then
safely laugh at the small bondholders he has
duped.
Observe that count as Mr. Greeleys allies
| only the copperheads of the Democratic party.
1t is loose talk to say he has joined the Dem
| Gratis. Such a statement is an insult to the
Democracy. The exact truth is, he has joined
| the copperhead wing of the Democracy-its
| worst element. They are his reliance.
| know some honest war Democrats wish to
| change their base and accept heartily the re-
| result of the war. All honor to them. But
their place is not with Greeley, but with
Grant They fought at his side; there they
should stand to-day. / know it is hard to
confess mistakes; but l practice what l
preach.
If Gen. Grant is set aside, who is offered
us in his place? Horace Greeley. need
| not tell you, my friends, what Horace Greeley
| is. We abolitionists knew him only too well
in the weary years of our struggle. He had
enough of clear moral vision to see the justice
of our cause. But he never had courage
| enough to confess his faith. If events had
ever given him the courage, he never would
have had principle enough to risk anything
for an idea A trimmer by nature and pnR-
| pose, he has abused even an American poll
-tician's privilege of trading principles for
success. But for lack of ability he would have
been the chief timeserver of his age. never
! knew till now any of his eulogists so needless
| and undscriminating as even TO claim that
he was a sincere man. As for his honesty
| for twenty years it has been byword with
| us, that it would be safe to leave your open
| purse in the same room with him; but as foI
any other honesty, no one was ever witless
enough to connect the idea with his name.
Mr.. Sumner trusts him as "a lifetime aboli-
tionst" This is certainly news to you and
me. You and L know well, when abolitiOniSt
was term of reproach, how timidly he held
up his skirts about him, careful to put wide
distance between himself and us. You will
find few working abolitionists who stood in
the trenches from 1910 to 1860, willing to
trust the negro race to Horace Greeley.
can remember the day when he and his fel-
low Republicans quoted our criticisms upon
them as certificates that they were no abOli-
tIonists. We can give him just such a certifi-
cate now with clear conscience. Judge by
| the files of the Tribune itself, there never
was an hour when Horace Greeley could have
been trusted with the care of the black mans
| rights.
No man has known better than he how to
manufacture political and pecuniary success
out of the convictions of other men. For him.
self, he never had conviction. Men con-
trast his former praise of Gen, Grant with
his fault-fnding now. Neither his praise mol
his blape is of any account Neither comes
from the heart. Both are measured and
weighed out with shrewd calculation fol
effect. Examine the files of the Tribune and
you will see that whenever mems convictions
on any subject got keen edge, Mr.. Greeley
was always ready to blunt them with a COM
promise. He is only acting now the part he
has always played. Men laugh when some
stirring and loyal sentence is quoted from the
Tribune of 1862 or 1864, and Horace Greeley
Immediately proves that he did not write IT..
But you and always knew that three-quar-
tiers of the loyalty of the Tribune was SNUG
gled into it in his absence, or in spite of him.
II his letters and communications to Lincoln,
during the dark years of 1862 and 1858, are
ever published, the world will see what you
and have already known, that he could
hardly have aided the confederacy more, un.
less he had enlisted in its ranks or taken
seat in its cabinet.
II, as MIR. Sumner says, Mr.. Greeley is a
''life-time aboltionist," how comes it that
till within three years, Mr.. Sumner hardly