Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1879-04-03
"Turn Back the Hands!o

Urn b8cA the 1auOSS
The party in power in the Legislative
Department of the Government has
served his notice upon the country. 1t
may as well be accepted at once. In the
Senate Mr.. Salisbury, for his party, ar
rogantly assumes the responsibilities of
power, and with resonant crack of the
whip that brings back the old days bids
the Republicans in that body be not only
patient, but silent and submissive, while
he and his political associates work their
own sweet will. Confederate generals
directs the cOunsels of the organization
that controls the Senate, apportiOn among
themselves the committees and among
their constituents the patronage, dictate
the course of legislation, and shape the
policy of the party. At the other end of
the Capitol Mr.. Stephens, late Vice
President of the Confederacy, Mr. Rea-
gan, late Postmaster-General of the Con-
federacy, Mr.. Chalmers, late Brigadier
General in the Confederate Army, with
others more or less prominently connect
ed with that disastrous political venture,
have given out that the people having
called the Democratic party back to
power to relieve the country from the
evil consequences of eighteen years of
Radical misrule, it is the duty of the
present Congress to enter Immediately
upon the task. In both Senate and
House there is uncommon anxiety on the
part of the gentlemen newly invested
with power to enter at once upon its ex-
ercise. Instead of shrinking from its
responsibilities, they are eager to assume
them. And we must give them credit
at least for apparent sincerity. They
certainly do act as though they fully be-
lieved in themselves, and believed that
they had actually been sent for in cri-
sis. In their expressions, their tone,
their manner, their whole behavior, they
indicate as plainly as possible their be-
lief that their reappearance in Congress
is the result, not of their own, but of the
country's confession of error and re-
pentance. They have come back, they
say, in so many words, to correct the
mistakes and sweep away the legisla-
tion of the past eighteen years. They
have confidence in themselves, to say the
least.
And who, pray, are the gentlemen
stepping so confidently to the front, and
bidding everybody else stand back while
they take the Government in hand :?
THAR unsparing condemnation of exist
ing laws and their startling proposals of
radical changes invite US to ascrutiny of
their record, and an inquiry as to their
fitness for the revolutionary proceedings
they have in contemplation. What is the
record of these men who assume respOn-
sibility with such iaunty self-confidenee :?
1t is not far to seek. In 1852 they were
intrusted with almost unquestiOned
power in all departments of the Govern
ment and nearly all the States. There
was scarcely an opposition. What was
their craftsmanship? In three years
they had set on foot an agitation which
cost them their majority in the House
and created sectional division in parties;
and this continued without their gaining
they set out for, until the Gov
ernment passed completely out of their
hands in 1860, and then they entered
upon conspiracy to break up and de-
stroy it. What fitness does the record of
those eight years show? They tried for
four years a government. Does that
record show such large capacity for
craftsmanship that we should send out
for them to come back and take the old
Union in charge? Here are financial
questions to be solved by legislation.
What certificate of fitness for this work
do they bring? Only this: that they
left the Government in 1861 i'm such
straitened circumstances and impaired
credit that its bonds were at discount,
and it could scarcely borrow money in
the markets of the world; and that in
their own experiment of Il confeferacy
they succeeded only in making currency
which was so worthless as to be source
of mirth among themselves. And they
have come back to government whose
credit has been raised by the legislation
of these eighteen years to a par with
that of the wealthiest nations in the
world; to government which the same
legislation has put in position to re-
deem its obligations in the money of the
world. This is the legislation they feel
called upon to sweep away, and this the
certificate of their fitness for financial
administration.