The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1872-08-31
On to Richmond
To the People at Large.

A word with you, my friends. What is
treason? Under American law it is Glowing
war against the State, adherng to its enc
mics, and giving them aid and comfort'
1t matters not how honest men may be,
how conscientious, nor how sincere, being
insurgents, they are rebels and traitors,
whenever they levy war upon the State, until
they succeed; and are to be treated accord
ingly. Else there could be no such thing as
government.
In treason, too, all who cooperate with,
and all who adhere to the enemies of the
State, or give them aid and comfort are guilty
as traitors and rebels, though here a guilty
knowledge, without active participation, by
levying war, may be only misprision of
treason. Allow me, therefore, fellow country
men, to PROFOUND for your consideration two
or three interrosatories, upon points gener-
ally overlooked in the tremendous controyer-
sy just opening upon us.
Although somewhat advanced in life, be-
ing in my eightieth year, am neither blind
nor deaf; and while 1 believe in my heart.
upon evidence not to be misunderstood, that
President Grant will be reelected, and that
''Uncle Horace" will be forgotten after a
few months, or only remembered for hi, pre-
posterous ambition, and his miserable sub
serviency to gross and shameless fatterers,
yet, inasmuch as incredible and astonishing
results are sometimes possible, owing to
over confidence, or neglect, or to the habit,
always inexcusable, and sometimes dangerous,
OF leaving Others to do what is properly our
work, and forgetting what we owe to our
selves, would have you prepared for what
must happen, if your adversaries are allowed
to triumph.
Let me say first, however, that I am no
politican-as the world goes, that 1 am
neither an ofice-holder nor an office
seeker-never having held office in all
my life; that have no respect for hermaph-
rodite politicians who, like the bat in the
fable, are neither bird nor beast, till the bat
tie is ended, and as little for hermaphrodite
newspapers like the Herald and Tribune, and
some others l could mention, which, happen
what may, are everything by turns and
nothing long, and never trustworthy.
What have to say therefore, shall be said
plainly, however it may be relshed by the
gentlemen of neither sex.
And now, to the point: Allow me to ask
you, fellow-countrymen, if you believe in the
right OF secession as understood by our breth-
rem of the South?
And next, whether you think they were
right in opening fire upon Fort Sumter, as a
preliminary suggestion, before they entered
with thunder-burst, half million strong
upon the terrible controversy, out of which
but we have just emerged?
And then-whether, in your Judgment the
war they waged upon our beloved country
was, or was not Rebellion?
And if rebellion, whether it was, or was
not an act of treason, however conscientious
they may have been, or however mistaken?
And finally, whether ''adhering to our
enemies"-and such enemies !-t'and qirinq
them aid and comfort" did not render ali
who did so, willie owing allegiance to our
government, rebels and traitors?
l have no idea of being mealy-mouthed, as
you see. But l beg of you to answer for your
selves, man by man, leaving me to answer
for myself here and hereafter.
And now to apply all this: At the very
outbreak of the rebellion, did not Mr.. Greeley
-"Uncle Horace"-openly justify secession?
Did he not allege that the Southern rebels
were only re-enacting the rebellion of our
fathers in the revolutionary war? Overlook
ing, or dsregarding the great essential dis
tlnctions that existed taxation without repre-
seHtation, while our fathers were not allowed
to make laws for themselves to chose their
rulers, nor even to manufacture hob nail or
a jaek-knite. And this, while our Southern
chivalry, who regarded our non-slaveholding
population as an abject and inferior race, like
the Helots OF Sparta, whom it were dishonor
to approach with any weapon but a whip,
were allowed to make their own laws, choose
their own rulers, tax themselves, and manu-
facture hob-nails or thunderbolts at pleasure?
Did he not say "Let them 90 in peaee?'
taking with them their millions of hereditary
bondmen, and laying the foundations of a
slave Oligarchy that should overshadov all
this part OF the world, with Mexico and the
West Indies, according to the published visions
of Mr.. Jefferson Davis and all the Southern
leaders.
And was not this. "Adhering to our enc
mtesg' apd ''giuing aid and comfort to
MeHl?"
Yet more: Did be not say and publish to
the world, over his own signature, in his
american Conflict" IF the cotton States
shall insist that they can do better out of the
Union than in it, aee insist on letting them 90
in peace?"
Was not this adhering TO the enemy? And
giving aid and comfort to him? And if so,
what was Mr. Greeleys
And why did he say this? Was he can
vassi G for the Presidency, or only election
eering for the Iri5une'
But furthermore: Did he not urge Presi-
dent Lincoln to accept dishonofable terms
from Davis, to buy peace, by paying for the
slaves, and then publish the following mani
festo in that same "Confict ?"
HWhenever considerable section of our
Union shall deliberately resolve to go out, we
that is, Horace Greeley-Uncle Horace
Honest Horace-the Philosopher Sage
of Chappaqua-the second Franklin-':ace
shall resist all coercive measures designed to
keep it, in other words, if any considerable
section of our Union shall choose to make
war upon the rest of us, Uncle Horace will be
,,,;+J, tlorn hort and coul and ssros;ef nH co-