The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1872-10-09
Henry A. Wises or Virginia, ON the
Presidential Question.

Henry A. wise. or Virginia. ON the
Presidential Question.
The venerable Henry A. Wise. of Virginia,
is one of the most remarkable men in this
country. He was prominent Southern wing
leader in Congress some forty years ago. On
the slavery question he welded the strongest
Southern lance in the House of Representa-
tives against that trenchant champion of sin
alienable rights" ex-President John Quincy
Adams. He was the author Of the famous
wing motto Of 1910. 'The Union of the
Wings for the Sake of the Union" with which.
in that memorable campaign Of "Tippecanoe
and Tyler. too" they swept the country like
whirlwind. 1t was Henry A. Wise who, on
the stump In his Virginia campaign of 1866,
for Governor, gave the deathblow to Know
Nothingism. and it was Governor Wise who
pursued to the death "Old John Brown" and
his confederates of that momentous abolition
raid upon Harper's Ferry which finally
brought the slavery agitation to settlement
by fire and sword In 1865 it was Governor
Wise who threatened q Southern raid upon
Washington and the capture of the govern
ment archives in the event of the election
of Fremont as President, and in 1861 it was
Henry A. Wise who did more. perhaps, than
any other man to push Virginia into secession
and the Southern rebellion. Figuring as
General in the war, he came ont of it dis
tinguished moro for his defeats than his sue
cesses, but wholly unreconstructed and COM
pletely adrift.
This is the venerable and crotchety Henry
A. Wise whose opinions on this Presidential
contest we published yesterday. He belongs
to the implacable old-line Southern Bourbon
democracy. He prefers Grant to Greeley, but
will support neither. He thinks the people
who sold out to Greeley sold out for mess of
pottage which they will never get; that the
Virginia conservatives have done more for the
radicals than the radicals have done for them
selves. And he don't like these new amend
ments to the constitution. And he intends to
raise up new party to overthrow them-a
bold undertaking for threescore years and ten.
He thinks Greeley's signature to the bail bond
of jeff Davis was an electioneering device;
and the Ex-Governor has a crow to pick with
Jubal Early for declaring for Greeley and with
Mosby for stamping the State for Grant. He
did not like the idea of his comrades in arms
joining Greeley s'who was the prime cause Of
the war by seii; ding John Brown down to vir-
ginia to commence it, and if he could have
got hold Of Greeley, Phillips and Garrison
about the time he had Brown he would have
hanged them all as high as Hannah. Finally
this old-line Bourbon declares that the colored
people had acted nobly, and he honored them,
and, as their friend, he advised them all to
vote for Grant.
These are the views of General Wise on the
Presidential question, and if the reader can
make neither head nor tail of them the diff
Guilty is precisely the difficulty in which Gen
eral Wise has been left by the war. 1t is the
most remarkable case of hostility to Greeley
and neutrality in regard to Grant Of all the
Bourbon catalogue. This venerable Virginia
politician, in short has outlived his day and
generation. There has been q deluge, but he
cannot understand it. He is living in a new
world, but he cannot realize it. The South
has been turned inside out and upside down,
but he is bewildered with the idea that it is not
according to the Constitution. And SO, among
the ruins of his Southern Confederacy, like
Marius among the ruins of Carthage, sits this
venerable Ex-Governor Of Virginia, the picture
of despair. 1t is sorrowful spectacle but it
is only one among the many wrecks of the
slost cause