Dodgeville chronicle. [volume] (Dodgeville, Wis.) 1862-current, 1874-08-07
REPUBLICANISM VS.. DEMOCRACY.
Address by the Union Republican Con-
@resSiOnaI Committee.

mittee has recently issued an address TO tne
people of the United States, from WHICH Tic
following excerpts are taken
DEMOCRATIC DIPLOMACY.
1t is thirteen wears since the Republican party
was first called to the administration OF the Ma
tional Government. For more than thirty years
previously the Government had been almost I'M
interruptedly under Democratic control VI that
c )ntro there is hardly memory left at which the
nation should not blush. Seemingly, it was in
spired by but one ambiton-the bad ambition to
make our foreign policy as ignoble as our home
policy was shameless. Our intercourse with pow
ers weaker than ourselves spirited enough.
We bulled Austria out of Hungarian refugee.
We despoled Mexico of portion of her terri
tory. We demolished Greytown. We jingled
millions in the ears of Spain as lure for Cuba,
and the bride was spurned
In 1854 three of our Ministers abroad assembled
at Ostend, and issued manifesto in which they
declared after we shall have offered Spain
price for Cuba far beyond it's present value, and
this shall have been refused, then it will be time
to consider the question:: Does Cuba IN the pos
session of Spain seriously endanger our Mtern0t
peace and the existence of oar cherSShed UnS0n?
Should this question be answered in the affrma-
tive, then, by every law, human and divine, we
shall be justified in wrestling 1t from Spaln IL we
possess the power"
1t adds piquancy to that extract to know that
two of the ambassadors who in 1854 could think
of no way of saving "Our cherished Union" but
to wrest Cuba from Spain were Pierre Soule
and John Y. Mason The third was James Blu
chanan.
But during all that time and in spite of all that
gasconade, there was not single naturalized citi-
Zen who could safely revisit his birthplace, for
there one whose citizenship was not abb
sOlutely denied by the sovereign under whose do
miniOn he was born.
No American native or naturalized, could send
letter abroad except upon Onerous conditions
We had then formed postal conventions with but
seven foreign countries.
The lowest rate of postage stipulated in those
conventions ten cents for letter weighing
not more than One-half ounce. The highest rate
of postage on the same letter was thirty cents.
We tamey relinquished to Great Britain por-
ton of our territory in the Northeast; another
and larger portion in the Northwest. We de-
scribed the line agreed upon in the NorthWest so
loosely that Great Britain Immediately laid claim
to the large islands on our side OF It, That in
sulting claim was neither resisted nor admitted.
1t was compromised by permitting the claimant
to hold armed possession of one end Of San Juan,
the most valuable of those islands, while we
quietly squatted on the other end. And while, by
successive concessions, we were adding to the
area of the Canadas, we stupidity relinquished to
their products free access to our markets, as the
equivalent of being allowed to send similar prod
uCts from the Northwest, through Canadian
channels, to such precarious markets as they
could find on the other side of the Atlantic.
Such were the achievements OF our diplomacy
during those wears of Democratic supremacy.
DEMOCRATIC HOME RULE.
1t has been loudly Wanted that those were
cheap administrations! Compared with the ex-
penditures of these times, they were cheap, very
cheap. Compared with their worth to the coun-
try, they were probably the most profit gate the
world ever saw. They cost the people from
fifty to seventy five millions per annum. Those
millions maintained for us the empty pageant
we CalledgOVernment There was
constant succession of Congresses Presidents,
and courts. The courts of course were useful in
hearing and determining private controversies.
But what is there to show from the labOrs of the
political departments? 1t seemed to be the sole
end, if not the sole aim of Government to collect
money enough yearly to pay USeT. 1t did not
always succeed in doing that, as many loan bills
enacted i'll times of profound peace still bear
witness.
The address then examines the action of
the Democratic party in relation to sundry
works projected by its predecessors, notably
the Cumberland Road and the Louisville
Canal, showing how, under Democratic man
agcmcnt, the Government had been Outra-
gcously defrauded:
That party did not ovcrturn our land system,
notwithstanding 1t was a very good one. During
the year 1841 the system was much improved;
that must be confessed. But the Democratic
party was not in power that year. We ought
also gratefully to remember that the grants of
land made for educational purposes were not re-
peaed. The fact furnishes a striking ilustra-
ton of sparing mercy. But the phenomenon is
only to States in which the lands were. Such
lands were found for the most part only in new
States. The new States were very unanimously
Democratic in politics. The States receiving the
grants could alone administer them, and the
party seems to have felt confident that grants so
administered would not promote the cause of
education more than money had promoted the
cause Of commerce. All who are familiar with
the early experiences of the school funds in the
need no other assurance that that confidence was
not misplaced.
The capital was not transplanted. But when
the Democratic party retired from control, in
1861, scarcely building belonging to the Gov
eminent was finished Perhaps, however, the
party would have avoided that cause of rcproach
if hey had earlier formed the design of transfer
ring those buildings to the use of another Gov
eminent
Armies were then maintained. Their ranks
were thin, but they were sumptuOusly Oticered-
ofliCered far too largely by those who had been
educated i'll every soldiery grace save that of ale
glance.
A navy was suffered to exist. But as it was
found little too loyal to desert its flag, and a
little too gallant to surrender it when the hour of
national peril arrived, that navy was scattered in
remote seas The Presidents of those
halfforgotten years were as diligent, by annual
and special messages, to explain why the Federal
Government could do nothing as the Congresses
were to do nothing. Like the two brothers en-
gagged in the temperance cause, one of
whom leCtured on the evils of intern
perance while the other furnished shock
ing example, Democratic Presidents were
perennially eloquent in eXpOunding the i'm
potency of the National Government while
Democratic Congresses were persistent in illus
trating it. That is the party which, on
the 18th of September, 1850, wrote the Fugitive
Slave act in the statute book. BY that act the
United States commanded the Federal courts to
multiply court commissioners without limit BY
that act the United States offered such commits
sioners a clean bounty of five dollars each for
certificates that residents of Massachusetts or of
any other State were fugitves from Texas or
some other State; and when such certificate
was obtained, pledged all its forces to remove
such resident to the State wherein he was
claimed; which made that certificate so pur-
chased of such hucksters conclusive evidence OF
the right to remove, and commanded every tri-
bunal within the insuted State to be still and all
its citizens to aid the outrage-a statute the very
first victim of which was free man from Penn
sylvania who, being declared a fugitive by a S.
commissioner, was transported to Virginia by
the United States, and, finding no man
there base enough to claim him, he was
allowed to get back at his own expense. y
DEMOCRATIC IMPOTENCY.
A government which denied its right to aid
commerce over the Des Moines Rapids and
which advertised its impotcncy to control its OWL
flibusters, could hardly be expected to make {
becoming figure when confronted with war
When, therefore, in 1861 the standard of rebellion
was raised and State after State wheeled defantly
into the ranks of revolt, it was perhaps not sc
very surprising that one-half the Democratic
party joined the revolt, while the other half OK
claimed it could not be resisted-nOt so very sur
prising that the per cent, bonds issued in Feb
ruary, 1861, were sold at a discount of per cent.
and not so very surprising that Great Britain
should have proclaimed the rebels to be Lawful
belligerents before she knew gun had beer
fired.
But it was surprising that a President of th,
United States should address special message Il
Congress to persuade the public that, although
the rebellion illegal, yet the Government haC
no right to suppress it; for by that act he intro
duced to the world a government the like o
which had never before been seen--a government
against which it was unlawful to revolt, and b.
WHlCh IL was A"i W cuppIGSs revolt SuCl
government is described nowhere in politica
history save in the message of President Blu
Chanan.
Such was the style of administration to whicl
the Republican party succeeded the 4th O
March, 1861 That party instructed to bu
one duty. You simply commanded it to saw
your Territories from the detilement of slavery
that was all.
REPUBLICAN CRAFTSMANSHIP.
That command has been sulfilled, There is N
slavery in any of your Territories, and just as lii
tie slavery in any of the States.
AT home and abroad the Union was proclaimet
to be dissolved in 1861. The Union is restore