Clarksville weekly chronicle. (Clarksville, Tenn.) 1873-1890, 1879-07-12
THE LINE OF BATTLE.


and Ligny, by which each grand !
army gains the position from which /
it is deemed most advantageous to
fight, and the skill and bOldness
with which these preliminary ope-
rations are conducted exercises a |
potential influence upon the results
of the main conflict.
The United States are now pre-
pairing for a Waterloo which is des-
tined, as far as human foresight can
discern, to determine the fate of one
of the two great parties which are
now struggling for supremacy, and,
more than that, which is destined
to determine for ages the principles
on which this Government is to be
conducted. For this Waterloo, the
extra session just concluded has
been a series of maneuvreS for posi-
ton, and the election now so keenly
canvassed in Ohio will be a Quartre
Bras determining the central post of
vantage for the conflicting hosts
the Waterloo itself will be the Pres
idential election of 1880.
Our present purpose, then, is to
study the results of the extra session
as bearing upon the great conflict
for which it was evidently a prepa-
ration, with the.view of determin-
ing who has gained and who lost
and what are the lines covered by
the conflicting hosts on which the
final battle is to be fought. In the
first place, the enemy have certainly
left some of their heavy artillery
within our lines. The various meth
DDS which have been devised for
giving the Federal Executive con-
troll of Congressional and Presiden-
tial elections have been materially
hampered and crippled, if not
entirely set aside. The amended
judiciary bill has rendered it impos-
sible for Republican judges to con-
Wet Democrats of charges under the
election laws by the aid of Republic
can juries deciding upon Republican
evidence of subOrned negroes. The
military bill, if it failed to forbid
the presence of troops at elections,
at least forbids their being paid,
provisioned or transported at the
national expense for such purposes.
The Federal Marshals are left in
office, but no provision is made for
their pay, and they know that none
will be made while they are en-
ployed in handling elections in the
interest of their employers, and the
employment of Deputy Marshals
for that purpose is absolutely for
hidden; and it was the unlimited
creation of election agents under
this title which in New Orleans, in
New York and in Philadelphia and
other great cities enabled the Gov
eminent to convert Democratic con-
stituencies into supporters of a Rad
zeal administration.
But the advantage gained by
these provisions as directly affecting
elections is problematical, and we
have yet to see how far an unscru-
pulous Executive will be able to
evade them. On the other hand,
the position the Republican debaters
and the President himself were
compelled to take in resisting them
is an immense gain to the party
which is engaged in resisting Exec
utive entertainments. Hayes, Gar
field, Forster, and all but the most
rabid Of the stalwarts in the Repub-
lican ranks had come to the cOnclu-
sion that the ways of qFantism in
election matters would ne longer
do. Garfield had condemned the
use of the troops at the polls; both
Houses of Congress had sanctioned
the abolition of the test oath for
iurymen, and the President even
had signed a bill to that effect,
which, however, was like many
other good measures nullitied upon
revision, and universal sentiment
had prevailed in the early days of
the Hayes administration that the
Grant methods must be abandoned
as being no longer practicable, no
longer defensible before the people;
when 10! rs soon Us measures are
introduced to make these things
the crack of the staIwart
whip is heard. 1t is loudly pro-
claimed that without this apparatus
for everything the will of the people
RepubliOapism can never win again,
and the ablest and Wisest leaders of
the party are forced back on the
ground which they had themselves
as untenable, and told |
that they must fight there where |
there is neither forage nor subsist- /
ence to be found ,on the old burnt-Out |
ground which had been losing
ground to them before, and there /
conquer or perish. And the battle /
in Ohio, desperate as the chance (
may be, is to be fought out on that /
ground. Under the guidance of /
Sherman they would yet make
flank march to occupy other ground
the financial question, for instance; I,
but it has been decided that on that
ground they would have to epooun-
ter a united Democracy with their
own forces divided, and moreover,
the record of the extra session for
bids any such motion. With that
record the Democracy can force
them back on the position 50 fatally
taken; they must fight there, and