Bellows Falls times. [volume] (Bellows Falls, Vt.) 1856-1965, 1874-01-23
gelluws falls Times,
BELLOWS FALLS, JAN. %, 1874
From the N, Y. Tribune.


Gushing, in whom the slaveholding par
ty had full confidence. 1t was not sure
that his successor would be so ready to
obey orders from that quarter, and it was
therefore desirable to get from Mr. Cush-
ing good strong opinion, authorizing
Southern postmasters to extroise an es-
pionage over the mails and to throw out
all political matter which did not suit
the dominant party of that section such
matter being invariably called "incen
diary aad tending to incite insurrection. !"
Mr.. Gushing justified the confidence re-
posed in him and wrote an elaborate
opinion, of which the gist is this: Ii
seems clear to me that deputy post
master or other officer of the United
Stares is not required by law to become
knowingly the enforced agent or instru-
ment of enemies Of the public peace to
disseminate in their behalf, within the
limits of any one of the States of the
Union, printed matter, the design and
tendency of which are to promote insur.
rection in such state" This of course
left the postmaster free to judge what
was the design and the intention of every
journal in the country, and to steal OF
destroy at his own sweet will any papers
he liked or disliked.
They went on in that course for year
or So One of them was not satisfied
with silently carrying out Mr. Cushing's
suggestions. The postmaster of Lynch
burg, Va, in 1859, wrote 6 letters to Mr..
Greeley the editor of the New York
Tribune, informing him that he would
not thereafter deliver that paper to its
subscribers in Lynchburg, holding it dan
gerous to the safety of society and sub
versive of the laws of the land, and d.
recting Mr.. Greeley to discontinue send
ing it. To that letter Mr.. Greeley re-
piled as follows:
New YORK, Dec. 9, 1856.
Mr. POSTMASTER OF LYNCHBUKG, VA
-SIR:-I beg leave to assure you that
| shall do nothing of the sort. The sub
scribers to the Tribune in Lynchburg
have paid for their papers; we have
taken their money, and shall fairly and
fully earn it, according to contract. Ii
they direct us to send their papers to
some other post Office we shall obey the
request; otherwise we shall send them as
originally ordered. If you and your
masters choose to steal and destroy them,
that is your affair-at all events, not
ours; and if there is no law in Virginia
to punish the larceny, SO much the worse
for her and our plundered subscribers.
If the Federal Administration whereof
you are the tool, after monopolizing the
business of mail-carrying, sees fit to be.
come the accomplice and patron of mail
robbery, l suppose the outrage must be
borne until more honest and less servile
rulers can be put into high places al
Washington, or till the people can re-
cover their natural right to carry each
others letters or printed matter, asking
no odds of the Government. Go aheaC
In your own base way. shall stan(
steadfast for human liberty and the pro
lection of all natural rights.
Yours shfiy, HORACE GREELEY.
A good many thousand Republican
thought in 1872, that if the man tina
wrote that letter, and who never, in hi
long and active life, uttered word o
conceived thought inconsistent with il
should be elected President, the Unio
would be betrayed and the principles Q
freedom fatally endangered. They there
fore voted for Gen. Grant, and he ha
shown them how sagacious they were b
nominating as the supreme expounde
of the law of the land the superservicei
BILE Attorney General who gave tt
Lynchburg Postmaster and his kind
cense to rifle the mails in the interest
S avery. All of which, if it proves not
inc else, proves that human judgment
fallible, even when it receives the san
ton of caucus of ofice-holders.
The oldest organ in the United Stat
is in the chapel of st. Johns Church,