The Donaldsonville chief. [volume] (Donaldsonville, La.) 1871-current, 1877-03-03
Our Washington Letter.
a SedfffOlls Editor-IsnpendinE
Democratic SpIit-PrOEressO of
the COunt-Cabfnet RumOrs.

tlRe COElnt-CabTnet RumROrs.
WASHINGTON, D. G., Feb. %, 1877.
EDITOR CHIEF:
A more fagrant outrage against
the sentiments of civilized humanity,
to say nothing of Christianity and
decency, has not occurred for many a
year than that perpetrated by Don
Piatt, andiappearing This :paper, the
Capital, on Sunday, the 18th inst, and
no single incident of the past decade
has produced such universal indigna-
ti0n as his murderous utterances of
that date have done. The feeling
against him is one amounting to ab-
solute detestatiOn and abhorrence.
For years he has allowed his paper
to be made the vehicle for gross per-
sonalities and alleged libelous state
ments against those who have pro-
voked his hostility by personal or po
| litical differences of opinion. For
| some months sitter he commenced its
publication, it played the role of an
! independent political and social news
1 paper; but it rapidly drifted into
! Democracy of q kind typified by Brick
Pomeroy's Democrat Republican Of
| ficials, particularly President Grant,
have been pursued with q purpose as
! malignant as it was indecent, and Mrs.
Grant has not always escaped the kind
of distinction he sought to force on
her husband. 1t was for some unfeel-
ing structures upon the propriety of
her conduct, when she WAS mourning
| the death ot her father, that Fred
Grant sought to iutlict corporeal pun
ishment. Piatt's attempt to turn that
circumstance to account to extricate
himself from his ugly position, by in
| timnting that Young Grant intended
| to assnsrinate him, provokes smile of
derision with these conyersant with
all the facts. The Grand Jury of this
District has indicted Piatt, and the
feeling is 80 intense against him that
I there is little room ful sympathy. The
article in question WAS long ono of
| the same general tenor as is indicated
by the extract in his card, which ap-
peared in the Ecening Star of the goth
inst, aud is IN follows:
Editor Star As my paper is not issued
until next Sunday permit mo to say IA word
in rtsponse to the torrent of abuse that has
fallen un my head.
TO those who know me it is not necessary
for me to say that nothing WAS further from
my thoughts in penning the editorial of last
Sunday than tho horrible crime of assass-
nation. Open resistance to u revolutionary
wrong. for which thore seams no other re-
! sistance, is one thing assassination is an
other. In the sentence so strongly" COM
nlented upon and denounced, it will appear,
when taken in connection with what pre-
ceies and follows, that my appeal is made to
the people and not to the assassin. The
American people are not assassins, nor will
they submit tamely to wrong. Here is what
said and again repeat:
AS We said a week since, this is not law ;
it is revolution, and if the people tamely
submit we may bid IA long farewell to con-
stitutional government. Fraud no longer
| Titiates, u corrupt administration has only,
| by its bayOnets, to hold u State usIrpation
| long enough in power for "a corrupt returning
| board to do its vile task, and the work is
DONE Ii !. man thus returned tn power can
ride in safety from the Executive Mansion
to the Capitol to be inaugurated, we are
| fitted for the slavery that will follow the
! inauguration. We do not believe the people
| of the United States are of this seryile sort.
| We do not believe that they nre prepared,
without "a blow, to part with their hard
earned bloo.l-stained possessions"
When the time comes that any other SEN
tiInent than the above can be felt and ut
| tered L, for one. shall feel ashamed of my
country. Rob the people of the ballot, an
these conspirators in power intend, and what
have we left In the above, however, l
have only put i'll words what the President
has embodied in acts. In gathering troops
Mt the National Capital for the first time III
| the history of the Republic to enforce an in
| auguration, he indicated the danger. Then,
to make the act the more significant, when
| it was apparent that Tilden was to be in
stalled he ordered his troops away. Mr..
| Tilden, it seems, would need no armed sup
| port. Then after Justice Davis declined
and Bradley's appointment revived the hopes
of Hayes, the order was counternanded and
additional troops summoned to Washington.
| If there is assassination in my suggestion,
there is assassination in the Presidents acts.
He appeals to his army, appeal to the peo-
pie.
Let me in this suggestion. recall to the hor-
ror stricken minds of these gentlemen an
event they seem to have forgotten. When
the Presidents son and brother-in.law Casey