Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1879-10-16

gress and every Northern State, and OmnlpO-
tent to fix the status of its defeated enemies
the Government, with a magnanimity for which
the history of the world furnishes no parallel,
treating the contest as one of principle, and
not of personal hatred, and lifting itself above
the low level of mere personal triumph, had
condoned the crime of treason and rebellion,
ard actually reinvested traitors and rebels with
the rights they had forfeited, and made them
equal participants in the privileges they had
insolently cast off in their mad purpose to de-
stroy the national authority. This magnanim-
ity has been supplemented by every possible
effort to establish in the Southern section of
this country a substantial era of reconciliation
and peace. Military garrisons have been with
drawn, al alleged national interference hereto
fore complained Of discontinued, and, contrary
TO all political precedent, appointments to Of
fee have been given to those who few years
since were moving heaven and earth to pros
trate the Government and Union. To-day we
are here confronting the consequences
of the magnanimity of the Government
and of its wasted and despised efforts to con-
ciliate It's late armed assailants. In the Eghtof
recent events it is not hyperbole to inquire,
Was the surrender of Appomattox wretched
hollow truce, patched up to enable the rebellion
TO choose new line OF assault upon the new
Union and was the mushroom Confederacy
proclaimed at Montgomery really failure, or
are the founders and ideas to become the liv-
ing, controlling forces of the country? The
spirit which defied the authority and sought to
destroy the unity of the republic has again taken
living form in solid South, supported by the
whole power of the party North, which
in 1861 declared that the constitution had
left the Government powerlsss. in the
valorous spirit but fainting flesh, pledged
itself to resist coercion unto blood; and
which, when our victorious legions had pre-
pared the winding sheet of the rebellion, in its
National Convention assembled resolved the
war failure.
STATE RIGHTS AND MULTIPLICATION
Stripped of all guise, the two great parties of
the country are again ranged on either side of
the HRe of demarkation of the powers of the
National Government and the States Wherein
now differs the issue from that nlau5 up in
1861? Then, the Democratic party demanded
of President Lincoln that he should periure
himself in his official oath or they would over
throw the Government by armed force. Lin
coin answered, IN his inaugural: You have
no oath registered in heaven to destroy the
Government, while have the most solemn one
to preserve, protect and defend it" This
demand was referred to the last dread court of
srbitrament, where for four years, in the white
heat Of fearful war, the great argument pro-
ceeded, until at last, st AppomattoX, the YER
dict was delivered to the matchless soldier
whose marshaling of the Union forces had
brought rebel traitors to submission and
avenged an outraged nation. That verdict was
that the constitution of the United States was
not compact entered into by the States, but
was ordained and established by the people
Of the United States for themselves and their
posterity; that no State or combination of States
can nullify the constitution; that the Union is
family of States, independent of each other for
local concerns, but united under one Govern
nent for the management of common interests
and the preservation of the general peace-a
plan, to borrow the language of another
most hopeful for combining the home-bred
blessings of a small State with the stability and
power of great empire" In short, that YER
dict was that the nationality proclaimed by our
fathers shall stand until justice, domestic tran
quillity, the common defense, the general well
fare, and the blessings of liberty shall In Gods
own good time, under the stars and stripes, be
the lasting heritage of all who may be dwelling
upon the face of this entire continent And the
Republican party of the Empire State, remem-
bering that the great charter of our nationality
was enacted upon her soil, and recalling the
heroic Deeds the sacrifices and the fidelity Of
the almost half million of her sons who partici-
pated in that bloody assize, pledges itself here
anew to stand by the verdict
In this year of grace the same Democratic
party which sought to coerce President Lincoln
from his official duty has demanded of Presi-
dent Hayes that he should perjure himself in
his official oath; that he should surrender a
prerogative given him by the constitution, so
that Congress alone might become the law
making power, and that the party might, by
Congressional enactment, strip the Government
of the power to protect its citizens, to enforce
Its laws for the preservation of the peace and
for the security of the ballOtbox, tothe end that
the palladium of our liberties might be left
prey to fraud and violence in the South and
swindling repeaters in the North. This revo-
lutionary demand was accompanied by the
menace that, the President refusing, the
whole machinery Of the Government should
be brought to a standstill by Withholding
the supplies which constitute its very life
currents. This new assault upon the con-
stitution, differing in form only from that
made by the same party in 1861, was met with
a firmness, dignity and patriotism which make
Rutherford B. Hayes illustrious in his high
Office, and worthy successor of him who, for
twelve years. in field and Cabinet stood against
every such assault as wall of adamant From
the decision of President Hayes, as from that
of Lincoln, the Democratic party takes its ap-
peal; not this time to wager of battle, for the
msurrectlonary States, the great factor OF the
party, have not yet forgotten the tramp of the
armed legions of the Union who bore upon
their banners into the heart Of its strongholds
the death warrant of slavery, nor the old in
spring notes of "Glory Halleluiahi" rung out
by those legions, as they swept by the gallows
of John Brown, carrying the daystar of the
morning of liberty to those who sat in the night
of bondage. The appeal is now taken to the
ballot-box, which itself is made the brunt of
the assault of the Democratic party, because
through its position alone lies it's only hope of
success. 1 make no apology for putting the
perilous national issue now joined above all
State issues. The Republican party be-
lieves, first of all things, in the abso-
lutte supremacy of the constitution and
the laws of the nation. We are thus
early, by the action of the Democratic party at
the last session of Congress, forced upon the
first line of the Presidential canvass of next
year. The rebuke of that revolutionary action
by majority of the people of this State
speaking through their ballot-boxes in Novem-
Der next, will be the assurance of the complete
overthrow OF this new attempt to subvert the
constitution The Democratic party lacks now
only the executive department to control the
Government The Congress has already passed to
the absolute rule of that over mastering South
ern section of the party which, by more than
two-thirds ma ority, chosen always for its con-
To- polo l.