New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1872-02-16
THE NCAYUNE AND TEE PEOPLE.

THE NCAIUNE ANU LII IhoA LIZ
Let us hope that the efforts OF our IN
quisitorial Committee of Fifity-one will be
productive of happier results to our city
and State than We're those Of a certain cit
liens representative body in the year
| 1861, and that a few irresponsible or mis-
| guided agitators in the name OF reform,
NAV not be as successful in talsifying our
sentiments toward the nation as were
| those Adventures whose proud shibboleth
was rebellion. And while the same agen-
cies are covertly at work to-day to lntlame
and influence the public mind, which rep
resented loyal people in armed hostility
to the government, let us hope that the
popular will shall be regarded, and that in
the interest of law and order like causes
shall not always be followed by like effects.
The effort to overthrow the State govern
ment today is but repetition of that
whose design was to dismember the nation
| a few Yeas ago The elements which an
| tagoniZed in the one are the same which
are employed in the other. There are the
same leaders, and there are the same
serried hosts who followed them. What
they failed to accomplish by rebellion
they hope to achieve by revolution. To
disguise their purposes, they change their
base of operations, and by striking down
! its faithful defenders, strike indirectly at
the heart of the nation, to which their sub
mission is more an acknowledgement Of
defeat than a declaration of allegiance.
The infammatory appeals of portion
Of the press of this city to the prejudices
of those OF our citizens who manifested
their disaffect;on to the federal govern
ment with arms in their hands, show
recklessness of disregard for the public
peace which should convict their authors
Of the highest crime which may be COM
mitted against society. Their clamorous
demands for the abolition of laws the Of
! police are solely made in the interest and
/ at the instigation of riotous mobs and
! their more riotOus abettOrs and counselors.
The high and sacred cause Of public in
dtlstry must be sacrificed IN the violent
interruption of the channels OF trade, that
, the unholy aspirations of few ambitious
men may be gratiied. The safeguards
which protect the weak and virtuous must
be removed that violence may have I'M
bridled sway. The time-hOnOred and
peaceable remedies provided for the re-
dress of public grievances are to be sub
stituted by revolutionary measures, whose
success should be dependent upon rash
outlay of human life. And all of these
assaults upon assured rights are in perfect
| keeping with that benign reformation
which promises to change curses into
blessings and cheerless hearths into happy
homes. But let it be remembered that
the wolf in Sleeps clothing is again
among us, and that while he retains his
disguise the security of the fold is I'M
periled.
The power Of the Pic0ylae for mischief
would be greatly lessened, and its two
hundred and fifty editors would be est
mated at their proper worth if that incen-
diary sheet had the honesty to go IN
masked, and by declaring itself the organ
! of the mob, abandon its false claim of the
peoples paper. But like all those obscure
and bad men, whose star is in the ascend
/ ent in revolutionary times, the Ptcnytlpe
will foster and perpetuate with its full
best that spirit TO which it owes its noto-
riety as well as its origin. To make its
teachings profitable to itself, though at
! the cost of untold thousands Of it's dupes,
is tie single thought by which it is i'm
PEELED IN its violent attempt to break
down the barriers which the law has
erected in the way OF those.who would
override its limitations.
Are there public wrongs which should
be redressed, and are the pacific methods
prescribed for attaining that end ex-
hausted: To avenge the real Or imaginary
injuries OF few demaGogues, are the
rights and liberties Of the thousandssen-
titled to no consideration? Shall the con-
stituted authorities be denounced and the
laws be derided that hirelings and assas-
sins may be in high demand: And shall
the refrain of discomfort raised by few
malcontents and their blind sdherents be
taken for the deliberate judgment Of a
free, patriotic and intelligent people?
Nor less pertinent is it to ask whether
! those who fddled while Rome was burn
ing were ever noble Romans at all?