New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1876-11-24
WILL THE UNION STAND TT

We occasionally hear very violent PEI
sons swear they had rather live under
king than under this republic. Thes
persons have rarely other literary knowl
edge than may be found in Last Ditcl
leader, or inscribed on a Democratic
ticket with q Republican heading. Sucl
persons do not, Of course, know that thi
Union has now endured longer thar
many of those kingly dynasties of which
the disafected might like to be courtier
The Kingdoms of France, Spain, Ger
many and Italy have all gone through
radical and bloody revolutions since thil
Union has been formed. From all thos(
countries and from England millions O
people have renounced their allegiance Il
the kings and migrated under THU
Union, while very few have renowned
American citizenship to become subjects
of king. A poet, who in that character
may be regarded prophet, said fifty
years since: "The king times are fast
finishing. There ought to be universal
republic, and there will be-" Thomas
Jefferson had said long before: "They
say the people are incapable of governing
themselves. Are, then kings capable Of
governing them? Let history answer.
Those who have the knowledge and
wisdom to prefer this Union; even unde,
an administrat ton from which they can
expect no Office, need not, however, be
alarmed that a few enraged aristocrats
and monarchists predict the overthrow Of
the Union from the discussions which
they have themselves fomented. This
Union has sustained the shock of two for.
eign wars for it's overthrow. It has
withstood the insidious efforts Of foreign
forms of government to sow or foster
seeds Of political and industrial discon-
tent. It has mas tered war which loaded
one half the nation with an immense
debt and subjected the other to unparal-
leled devastation. All this has been re-
paired and reinstated, and to-day the
financial credit and national integrity
stand higher than they have ever stood
at home and abroad. Somehow the world
has heard SO much and so often
about the overthrow Of the Union,
that they have come to regard
the nation as bearing "a charmed
life." They seem of opinion that ''trea-
son hath done its worst, malice domes-
tic-foreign nothing" can touch it
further. The Union, as the agency of q
confederacy of States, might have been
alone sundered by secession. As the ma
tional representative of nearly half
hundred million of people, it can not be
destroyed, since there will always be more
reasonable and fighting men, who derive
advantage from the Union, than who can
possibly suffer from any temporary NAL
of its government. AS for
the Union going to pieces because of any
quarrel about that grand almoner of
Office known as President, men ignorant
Of history and impatient Of reason, do
not, perhaps, know that President is
the agent and not the master of the peo-
Pile; that he is merely necessary to exc
cute the laws, as the sheriff of all national
process, and that if the present and con-
aHSnio0c ~.
he nation could repair the mishap,
Without the disturbance of any one of
he Federal functions, or without jar
n the legal machinery of the Federal
government. This the monarchists are
1nable to comprehend. They have al.
Ways heard that the king can never do
wrong or die. The Union has precisely
his royal prerogative of truth and i'm
mortality. Kings have been chased out
# their kingdoms and taken refuge in
England or in the United States, and
With this abdication their government
las gone into political liquidation. The
Union, which makes and directs its own
can never suffer from any such |
occidental lapse of administration, since
alike gives and takes away from the
ne man all the power which the people
lay have confided to his agency and to
is obedience.
When, therefore, the alarmists or enc
hes of republican form of popular
overnment ask, will the Union stand this
citation? We answer, yes; and any
mount Of agitation from the same cause,
r from any other. 1t is not in the power
any malcontent minority to dissolve
le Union, because the majority in num-
srs and interest can always suppress the
surrectionists and reform the abuses
ithout the aid of the kings, priests or
istocrats of the old world, or of their
herents here. The friends of the Union
n say to arrogant assailants or timid
ends as the countryman responded to
inquiry how he could stand chewing
e cheese mites, "Well, if they can stand
1 can" So with the. Union and those
10 may administer it. 1t can stand any
obable or possible consequences its
en- or covert assailants can.