Knoxville weekly chronicle. [volume] (Knoxville, Tenn.) 1870-1875, 1872-05-29
THE GREELEY MOVEMENT REVIEWED.


There are few public men in this coun-
try whose personal influence is great
enough to carry away from principle and
party any considerable number of voters.
We have had remarkable instances to
prove this. President johnson with the
immense patronage of the government at
his back was never able to make any de-
fiction OF note in the Republican party,
with which he had been so prominently
identified during the war. William III.
Seward and Salmon Z. Chase, men who
were foremost in forming the Republican
party and for many years very prominent
leaders in it, went off in their time, but
their apostacy never made any impression
upon its ranks.
Fremont, Doolitle, Dixon and many
others in their day made some noise as
they left the party and predicted its early
disintegration, but they have been almost
forgotten and the party still lives more
compact and stronger than when they as
sailed it. Now comes another bolt-anoth-
er attempt to take away its life and as
cendancy. This time Horace Greeley is
the leader, and great predictions are made
as to the strength he will carry with him.
His nomination to begin WITH lost the
Cincinnati movement almost all its orig
inal strength. No fair minded man will
dispute this. Cox, Mathews, Hoadley
and Stallo, of Ohio, and almost the
entire German element of the country
abandoned the movement as soon as
Frank Blairs bargain and sale became APP
parent. The New York Ercning Post and
the Nation, influential papers that sup
ported the movement, refuse to support
Greeley. The newspaper junta that as
sumed to control the Presidential election,
but that could not influence their own
Convention to nominate such statesman
as Adams as against an eXperimentalist
like Greeley, have since, half apologetical-
ly, supported Mr.. Greeley, but instead of
being aggressive, as leaders of q. reform
movement should be, they are and have
been from the start, completely on the de-
fenSiUe.
The Cincinnati movement, burjened
with Greeley and Brown, lost almost all
its vim and power at the first, and has,
in our judgment, not yet recovered from
its first blow. Looking calmly over the
field, we can see but little evidence that
Greeley has made any division in the
Republican party. Here and there he has
his friends, we admit, but active newspa-
per supporters have long since multiplied
these about as many times as a credulous
public will tolerate. Without organiza-
ton worthy of notice, and without any
enthusiasm or confidence of success, the
Liberal Republican movement per sc is
certainly overrated and is one of the most
slgnlhcant failures of the age.
The hope of the movement, therefore,
centers entirely in the Democracy. Will
this party openly abandon its convictions
and organization to take up Greeley with
his Insignificant following? We think
not. The trade would be so shameless and
ridiculous that it would carry no enthusi-
asm or force with it. We do not believe
the transfer can be consummated by the
few leaders that favor it. If it is done,
however, we look upon it as virtual dis
organization of the party. If the Balti-
more convention endorses Greeley, it will
make him the Democratic candidate; it
will drive from him some of his present
Republican support, and it will drive to
Grants support more honest, indignant
Democrats than there will be Republicans
who will adhere TO Greeley. In either
event. the present uncertainty is O daily
advantage TO Grant and disadvantage to
Greeley. A political combination that
throws aside all principle and VIGOROUSLY
unites solely for place and power, can new
er inspire confidence or enthusiasm enough
to defeat Grant, standing on the record of
his administration, and of the party sup
porting him. We care not, therefore, what
the Baltimore convention does. Grants
reelection seems 90 us as certain now, as
his triumph was in 1868, or in 1864, before
Richmond.