The Portland daily press., 1875-12-14
Our New York Letter.
tion.-The Case of Gen. Babcock.-Mis-
representation and Falseh Ood.

any tnlng cneer1ul IN the p0lltlcal SltuaLlOD.
They are at present overwhelmed with grief,
because the Attorney..Generala acting under the
instructions of the President-the entire cabi-
net heartily concurring-has ordered the dis
charge of John B. Henderson whom the Dis
trict Attorney of st. Louis had employed to
assist in the prosecution against the parties in
dcted for revenue frauds. Henderson's offence
waslthe commission of a ''gross outrage on Of
fetal propriety" in weaving into his speech a
gratuitous and impertnent reflection upon the
Executive without shadow of reason.'
In this matter the President has acted with
his usual manliness and courage. Nothing has
been done hastily or petulantly. Care was ta-
ken to procure certified report of the obnox-
ious remarks, to guard against any possible
misconception of their purport. When that
was furnished no doubt remained of the necessi-
ty of substituting dispassionate advocate for
a splenetic partisan. The object of the prose-
cution was to elicit facts tending to show the
completely of government officials in a con
spiracy to evade the tax on whiskey The ln-
PRODUCTION of extraneous matters of gossip and
insinuation was alike violatve of judicial dig
nifty and impartial justice The newspapers
have shown a characteristic propensity to
transfer these state trials from the courts to
their columns. For the furtherance of this OBJ.
ject, Mr.. Henderson has been their faithful
and Jealous ally The public has been ur-
feited with sensational telegraphc rumors day
by day most Of them false aud all of them ex-
aggerated. This superserviceable attorney has
continually fashioned his addresses for the ears
of the reporters and the people rather than for
the jury and the bench. The whole perform
anee was fast growing to be declamatory and
theatrical.
Mr.. Henderson it will be remembered was
the predecessor of Carl Schurz in the q. S.
Senate, sat at the impeachment trial of An
drew johnson, and was one of the seven who
voted against attaining him. Gen. Grant al
ways believed that johnson deserved to be de-
posed. He knew him thoroughly and was OF
the opinion that from the time he exchanged
the role of Moses for the character of Pharaoh
he nourished reasonable design of restoring
the conquered states to the exclusive control of
the rebels Consequently it was not to be ex-
pected that he would look with any great degree
of favor upon the senators who disagreed with
hih upOu oo fAedi q pOiuuy do gum VI COuu-
son. Henderson's senatorial career closed
with the beginning of Grants administration
As matter of course changes were made in
the federal officials of Missouri, for Carl
Schurz had a remarkably keen scent for pat
ronage and wanted all he could get and more
too Henderson became disaffected early and
has remained so ever since. His employment
in this prosecution gave him the coveted chance
to 'sget square" with the President, and that is
six weeks with mysterious hints that some
dreadful revelations were in prospect, tracing
fellowship with the whiskey ring to the very
corridors of the white house.
If the President had not been one of the
most magnanimous of men, he would have put
an instant stop to this proclamation of the tenn
pie of justice by turning it into theatre for
the display of clap-trap and buncombe. He
waited however with his accustomed equa-
nimity until all the testimony was before him,
and then he disposed of the case with that
supreme Indifference to clamor which has
characterized every act of his eminent public
life. He knew. of course, that the Organs
would forthwith play an inky chorus Of objur-
gat.on in every key from the whine of the
hypocrite to the menace of the bully, but the
hero who faced the rebel artillery on hundred
battle fields Is not likely to be scared at paper
guns. There is something exquisitely charm
ing to me in the good natured contempt with
which this grand soldier treats the whole tribe
of newspaper assailants who buzz around him
so incessantly. His disdain of their clatter
must be admitted to have an aggravating
quality about it. And yet, somehow or other.
it has not diminished the confidence and es-
TEEN in which he is held by the people. In
fact, it seems thing too palpable to be dis.
puted that his sturdy refusal to play the dema-
gogue or to turn by so much as hairs breadth
from the straight line of duty to woo popular
applause or to avert offensive crticismihas er-
hanced the respect and deepened the admira
ton with which the mass of his countrymen
regard him.
Myideas about the third term conceit have
already been fully expressed in your columns,
Nothing has occurred to change or modify
them. Gen. Grant, never has seriously enter.
tained the thought Of being candidate again,
and would not accept a denomination if it
were rendered him. But what compliment
it is to him that so many people will persist in
thinking otherwise. 1t appears to be gener-
ally taken for granted that if ne does wish to
run, his denomination is perfectly certain, aud
his reelection extremely probable. Only two
Presidents have ever been earnestly talked
about in this way, the earliest and the latest
WASHINGTON and GRANT. Nor is this the
only parallel between these exalted types of
American greatness. The one achieved the
independence. the other the freedom of the
Republic. The transfer of the one from the
field to the executive chair was necessary to
the establishment of the confederacy, of the
other to the restoration of the dismembered
states to their places in the Union Both in
their turn have been objects Of rancorous villi-
ication; neither was ever seriously harmed by
it. The resemblance holds good equally in
respect of blameessness of life, serenity of
temper, tenacity of opinion and firmness OF
character. And when the fctions of partisan
ship have given place to the truths of history,
posterity will select the self-s,me laurels to
wreath around their busts, the self-same mar
BILE on which to inscribe their virtues.
As an example of the kind of incoherent
gabble, which is current just now, may be
cited the'ahuse heaped upon the President, be-
cause he will not PREJUDICE the case of his Sec
retary while it is pending lin the courts. There
is no doubt whatever that Gen. Grant believes
in the innocence of Gen. Babcock. Honest
men are proverbially the least suspicious aud it
is especially true of the President that he does
not hold honesty to be so rare or so striking a
virtue that the mass of men do not possess it.
But even if he had the slightest misgiving on
the subject, the old common law maxim that
"every one is presumed to be innocent until he
is proved to be guilty" has not become obso-
lete-except among journalists. There is moth
ing incumbent upon the President. ther efoIe'
except what he has already done.
AS to the indictment found in st. Louis, it
may be we'll to consider before condemning a
man on the strength of it, how far the same
influences which appear to have operated on
Mr.. Henderson may have been brought to bear
upon the grand Jury. Prosecuting officers often
exercise potential voice in the deliberations
of such bodies. The number of times the pro-