The New York herald., 1874-12-28
He Does Mean Something.

He Does Mean Something.
A correspondent reproaches US with making
the President ridiculous" in an article on
Saturday, asking what some parts of his re-
cent Message mean.
This writer does us great injustice. The
HERALD is serious journal, and it respects
the constituted authorities too highly to inter
.ere with their inalienable right to make them
selves ridiculous. As to the President in par
ticular, we mean always to uphold and defend
him, and if our correspondent had carefully
read the article Of which he complains he
would have seen that its plain scope and de-
sign were to support Mr.. Grant against the at
tacks of his enemies.
1t is is very commonly said of His Excel
lency, by republicans as we'll as democrats,
that he is dull of intellect and ignorant of the
plainest and best established principles of
government; that his recommendations on
public matters are confused and incongruous;
that many of his apparently profound utter
ances are meaningless, and others rank nom
sense It cannot be truthfully said that the
HERALD has ever made such assertions; and
we conceive that we do Hls Excellency and
the public service when we attempt to show,
by citations from his last Message--and if
necessary from others of his documents
that though in common with some other great
men he evidently does not and cannot mean
what he sometimes appears to say. he does
always mean something
For instance, to return for moment to one
of the most notable passages of the Message,
generalization of which, we dare to say, His
Excellency was very proud-his desire that
Congress shall "direct the employment" of
''the products of the soil" An enemy of Mr.
Grant would naturally say that in this instance
he had uttered rank and conspicuous non
sense. But we at once come to his defence.
Certainly, we admit, the words sound like non
sense for how can Congress ''drect the en-
ployment' of potatoes, turnips, carrots, onions,
beans, and other respectable vegetables? But
if taken in their accepted and. obvious mean
ing these would seem to be not the words of
| wisdom, but the canting utterancss Of slip
shod mink What follows? Why, that they
have some other, some abstruse, subliuNated,
refined recondite meaning, of course which
Mr.. Grants enemies are not capable of appre-
hending 1t is not our business to tell them
what His Excellency MEANS or to hint TO them
that this passage conceals his anxiety about
the condition of the Agricultural Department.
Our duty is done when we hasten to assure the
world that he does mean something
/. Again, speaking Of civil service reform, Mr..
Grant :-"Generally the support which
this reform receives is from those who give it
their support only to find fault when the rules
are apparently departed FROM Now, no
doubt His Excellency's enemies ehnnkled
when they read this passage. 'It sounds"
they said to each other, every much like
magniloquent announcement that twice two
makes four" Shall the friends of Mr.. Grant
stand by and hear his wisdom made the sport
Of malignant, not to say superficial minds?
By no means. We do not deny that this SEN
tence has ridiculous side to it, and that
hasty reader might ask with amazement who
else should complain of violations of the civil
service rules, if not the supporters Of this re-
form? But, we reply triumphantly, he means
something else, something beyond the COM
prehension of his enemies; something magnifi-
cent, noble, just, good. What he means we
do not pretend to say; but we are sure he
means something. This much follows as a
matter Of ''self-necessity, if we may for this
occasion borrow one of His Excellencys
words; for, as patriotic and truly loyal citi-
zens, it does not become us to allow the pro-
fame to go about asserting that Presidents
Message is filled with balderbash.