New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1872-08-04

We reproduce the following letter from
che New York Tribune:
The Hor Frederick Douglass:
DEAR SIR-For nearly twenty years /
have sat at your feet to learn the duties of
a black man toward his race. ! think you
win bear me witness that have paid you
the worship which an ordinary mind owes
to genius, and that in all public gatherings
my enthusiasm has been contagious, so that
on three several occasions / have been an
assistant Of those who lifted you to the
highest hOnOrs the negro race had in its
gift-the presidency of three national CON
ventions If, therefore, / differ from you
now, our past relations will absolve me
from the apparent sins of egOtism and sell
fishness mean selfishness, because / find
the following paragraph in the Mem M
tjOna Erd. In speaking OF Mr. Greeley,
you say
He has united his fortune with party,
based npon personal grievances, and not
upon broad grounds of national good. Per
s0nal dieappointments, personal envy. per-
Bonal Teeentments, personal AMBITIONS.
have united in personal opposition to Grant
and in personal favor of Horace Greeley.
Nov, we are utterly opposed to this sort Of
personal politics. A man who abandOns
party because bis party has not the same
sense Of his personal merits that he has
himself, and who joins another, hoping for
better luck with the new than with the old,
NAV be courageous as we'll as cunning, but
It is impossible to commend such one for
political wisdom or virtue. He acts upon
the principle that what is good for him
must be good TO the country, and makes
himself greater than the nation, and affirms
that a part is more than the whole. He
puts himself first and country last. He
may not always do this consciously, but,
whether Intentionally or not, the thing IS
done; and the whole Cincinnati movement
has its foundation, its starting point and
handspring in This sort of personal politics.
They accuse General Grant of personal
government, while every department Of it
Is as independent to-day of the executive
as under any administration since Wash,
ington.
Now, sir, think / understand your per-
sonal feelings and your political ethics, and
honor them when seen from your stand
point. A long life of usefulness and the
Outgrowth Of a competency in your ripened
wears give you an exalted look and serene
spirit. But we were not all born Fred.
Douglasses, and those who may yet rival
you have got to stand on their lot and
master TIN IT surroundings, as you mastered
yours, before they can attain to the disin-
terested plane upon which your powers and
Your experience have lifted you.
/ think you are mistaken in estimating
the Cincinnati convention by your abOmi-
nation Of personalities. Men as strong in
moral convictions and as sinterested as
yourself, were there. / have not time, nor
would the journals grant space to say all ]
desired about personal disappOintments,"
Hpersonal envy personal ambition" etc,
but a word in passing may be useful in re-
I1indng you that Grant and his friends have
set the examples in christening the person
alties Won denOunce. When q neral Grant
tried to have At Stewart made Secretary
sngf Ith V'Vna nd ia
personal disappointment by ignoring those
who pointed ont the law fUrbidding it, he
showed his personal resentment toward Mr..
Sumner especially, by recalling Mr.. Motley
from the Court of St. James, He exhibited
his personal enmity of Mr.. Summers
popularity as chairman Of the Com
mittee on Foreign Relations and had
him removed by an unconstitutional
interference with a co ordinate branch of
the government, though he knew he was de-
grading the best foreign Secretary the ma
ton ever had to put in his place the worst
it was possible to get. His personal resent
ments are too numerous to mention, while
his personal ambition to be renOminated
gave the Cincinnati movement its strongest
hold upon the people. When he insultcd
and, through his minions, degraded Mr..
Sumner the hilltOps OF New England began
to grow gray with his political destiny;
when his ambition led him into an unCOnsti-
tutional interference with San Domingo the
nation became alarmed at his usurpatiOns,
and when be cut off the official heads of all
but sycOphants and deceivers the people be-
gan TO practice the personalities he had
taught them. Then personalities returned
TO plague the inventor.
Let me illustrate as to his ambition.
When a minister finds One-tbird Of his
church opposed to him be ought to resign,
II he is right his church will find it out and
he n.eo back if he likes. If he is wrong
1t is difficult for him to find it out under the
daily reports and OfiiciOusness of his heated
partisaus. So he is likely to plunge deeper
into wrong. A government IS much more
sacred than. a church. 1t cOnserves the
institutions of country, the churches IN
Cluded IT, therefore, the people saw one
third of the Republican party SO far dissat-
isfied at Cincinnati as to nominate a Repub-
Iican ticket for the purpose of putting an
other man in the Presidents seat, ought
not this third of the party 80 be credited
with as much unselishness in trying to get
one man out as he is credited for trying to
stay in, especially if, when You come to
canvass their moral and mental makeup,
you find as many original AbolitiOnists and
clear headed men at Cincinnati as you
find advocating the denomination and re-
election Of Grant
The nation knows how his brother in-law,
under Pacllards dissection, mObbed the col
Orleans last August, tlanked us with United
States soldiers and bearded us with United
States bayOnets. But it may not know that
at Baton Rouge, q few weeks aGO-a place
to which the convention adjourned from
New Orleans because there was a garrison
of soldiers there-cOl1red men were denied
their seats in the convention where they
were known 10 be intelligent and indie
pendent and other colOred men, the seTvile
tools of the Customhouse were seated in
the places of delegates from the country
parishes was one of these delegates. 1t
was admitted that had a right to my seat,
and the president invited me to the stand
TO explain, when Packard sent the presi-
dent-a supplemented young cOlOred
man word, and was dragged from the
hall because | persisted ia asserting my
rights in n Republican meeting. When
Grant retains such men he becomes respOn-
sible for their conduct.
Now sir, the colored people know Gree
lev as an original Abolitonist In the
North they know him to be a stauuch Re
publican and an honest man, They know
That General Grant knows nothing about
abolition except as he opposed it in the
Deuncrafic ranks lie knows nothing
about our great men or he would have
been "a obstinate in trying to send Fred
erick Douglass as a minister to some great
power as he was in trying to make A. I.
Stewart Secretary of the Treasury.
Neither is he a Republican. Bought as a
mig in the bag, the Republicans never had
any claim upon him, and he never paid any.
With the same selfish Indifference that he
sacri feed Vice President COltaX to rebuke
Senator Sumner, and to gain New England
-fbrouGh Wilson, he will sacrifice the negro
through his relatives and friends here, and
in other Southern States: was for Grant