Spirit of the age. [volume] (Woodstock, Vt.) 1845-1913, 1877-04-11
"RightfuIIy Theirs"

A single expression dropped IN an
article Of warning, by the New York
Times, is sufficient to explain the
whole purpose OF Radicalism, which
through Wendell Phillips, Blaine, a
few ministers, and their more discreet
coadjulors, is preparing for It's final
struggle for the control Of the Repub-
lican party. The Times observes, in
reference to the state Of public opinion
on the withdrawal af the troops from
South Carolina, that "languor should
not be contounded with acquiescence {;
and we suspect that the business and
Industrial Istagnation that is visible
everywhere has much to do with the
absence of excitement in connection
with the change which has taken place
in the attitude of the Govrrnmenttow-
ard States avhich the Republicans be-
ltere to be riyhVuly THEIRS. The
italicised phrase contains the whole
secret, not only Of the rising hostility
to Hayes within the Republican party,
but of the spirit and conduct Of the
Republican policy toward the South.
The party leaders have assumed since
the war that certain Southern States
were "righlfully theils,' and they have
shaped Legislation and administered
the Government in obedience to this
assumption. England, whose course
Wendell Phillips processes TO antag-
onize, never followed moe arbitrary
courses in trying to force The Estab-
lished Church upon Catholic Ireland
than the Republican party has, through
the Federal Government, in its deal
ings with the South. The traditions
ard practice OF local selfgoycrnment
it believed TO have been wholly swept
away by war, and IN the name of pro,
lection and equality for the freedmen
it has steadily striven to subject the
South to its political conhol. 1t is
the votes Of the Southern States that
it wanted, and it could conceive OF no
other way of securing them than by
holding the white population in mill
tary subsection and conducting the
blacks to the polls by its carpat-bag
agents aud officers.
1t is because such plan could not
work in an age aud country like ours,
much asst might obstruct the currents
of the common peace and prosperity,
that these proofs Of an inhamed cha
grin and irritated disappointment ire
beginning to manifest themselves. 1t
would be as sensible to try to make
water resist the law of its level as to
expect that any such policy Of conjoint
force and fraud would supply the
foundation for successful political
party in States even nominally free.
According to Republican theories the
only way to build up a living party is
to base it on the voluntary action Of a
portion of the people. The experiment
of keeping down one-half of them,
however, and leading and driving the
other half, mean while shouting all the
stock phrases about equal rights before
the law and the rest of the virtues OF
Republican existence, was DIES tined to
be a failure from the frs! and Mr.
Wendell Phillips, Mr.. Blaine aud the
rest OF that school have gone mad on q
sudden over it, not because it has
proved to be a failure, but because
President Hayes has sagaciously
chosen to express his real opinion Of
it. The Radicals are not done with
this old volume of political thunder
They have seen what power there il
in the flag of the bloody shirt. They
realize their utterly lost condition i
this emblem is wrested from theil
hands. They have thriven by civil
commotion until they have come tt
believe that their gain is the Nationa
prosperity. Therefore Wendell Phil
lips RACES in red rhetoric, and the New
York Times lumbers up behind witt
its more sullen battery. 1t all means
war on Hayes, but inasmuch as it il
war on the best interests of the coun
try it will prove impotent and aimless
This nation cannot exist by continue
turmoil. IT must have rest. Agita
ton has had its destructive riot, ant
now it is time for term of that Sian
guor" which hot partisanship deplores
-Boston Post.