Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1879-05-14

lne reDel yell-tle Nduutlug DOdsl1
saw the mounds of patrat dead;
| what made you go?" my Jennie said.
MY dear said but nothing more,
| For, gancing through the Senate walls,
The rebel generals had the floor,
And ruled the nations council halls,
| Papa" she urged why did you go?"
MY child" 1 said. " do not know"
In the light of current political events,
and carefully noting the political tenden-
cies Of the hour, how many veterans can
answer MY Chid's Question to their
own satisfaction? For fourteen years a
continuous note of warning has been
sounded in the ears of the republican
north against the advisability of advanc-
| ing ex.Union soldiers to prominent posi-
tions in the national government. 1t has
been persistently held out that such Il
course would be rightfully regarded an
unnecessary and irritating menace to the
tender sensibilities OF the southern heart
This argument has prevailed, and the
spirit of conciliation has demanded and
accomplished the retirement of many of
these men from prominent positions in the
national government. The result, if not
pleasing, is certainly instructive.
In the Senate of the forty-sixth con-
gress we see nineteen ex-rebcl soldiers
against four ex-Union soldiers. | am no
advocate of nor believer in prescription for
past political offences when properlyatoned.
| care not if the whole southern delegation
| in congress consists Of cX-rebel generals,
if they come there in the right spirit, ac-
knowledging and confirming the result of
the war, us the whole country viewed that
result after AppomatoX; but | affirm my
honest belief that the whole southern dele
CATION in the forty-sixth congress regret
nothing of the war but its failure to estab-
lish the confederacy, and l ask any candid,
thinking person-lirst laying aside all
secondary consideratons-.o closely and
carefully review the course of the south
ern delegation in the forty y-lilth congress,
and tell me if he can find by any act or
word of theirs one particle Of evidence
that they, as one of the combatants in a
terrible civil war, look upon themselves as
the defeated party, who are, by the liber-
ality and sufferancc only-of the loyal
north-holding their present positions? ]
say every word and act of theirs in the
forty-fifth congress has been as of victors,
and not of vanquished.
In this place | will not raise the ques-
tion of the purity of their motives in pre-
cipitating bloody and devastating civil
war, but merely take the facts as they
stand known to the world.
In 1861 the south found it could nc
longer absolutely control the national gov
ernment, and therefore, true to the spirit
of their own peculiar institutions, they
determined to destroy it, and to erect upon
its ruins government of race arstocracy,
as suited to their tastes.
For reasons not necessary to dctail-but
which most eX-Union soldiers are likely tc
remem bcr-they failed of their purpose
and to that failure they owe their present
position of almost absolute control in the
present national government. Certainly
in reunited country north and south in
respect Of equality of rights are on the
same plane, SO far us each respects and
boeys the constitution and the laws. Utter
disregard Of these conditions places the
south-for the time being-in the ascend.
ency in the national government. TC
right this wrong by peaceful and lawful
methods is now the duty of republicans
and now submit the question-In whose
hands are the best interests of our govern
ment and people likely to be safest? Those
who have attempted to destroy that gov.
ernment and failed, and whose only mani
fest regard at present is for that failure, OF
those who in the hour of the country's
greatest pelil prevented its destruction
and preserved the government, not only
for its friends and defenders, but equally
for its enemies. and for all mankind who
choose TO come under its protection? Fol
my own part | will never fail to protest
both by voice and vote, against permitting
the control of the government to pass into
the hands of unrepentant rebels.
Although then but mere boy, remem
ber we'll the echoes that reached my ear!
) in far-of Vermont, from the thirty-sixtl
congress. They are simply being repro
dnced to-day in the forty-sixth congress
and many of the words come from tn,
same southern lips, and evnce the sam,
staggering, domineering spirit; and thi
very day the president and republican
minority are warned that they must sur
render their convictions and constitutions
rights to the south, and permit reactionary
and vicious legislation, or by the adoption
of revolutionary methods the wheels O
government will be stopped. and th
whole country must suffer the conse
quences. | don't speak Of the northern
wing of the democracy, for they have NJ
D voice in the matter They have only II
vote as they are told, and they will do it
If republican perchance protests agains
this miserable farce, and mayhap TRACED
Y of legislation, here is his answer:
, You are set of crazy fanatics, alway
g interfering to stir up sectional strife an
hatred. Why don't you attend to you
own affairs and let the south alone? The
t are able to and capable of govcrnin;
t themselves, and it is their right. Yo
4 have enough to do 10 take care of you
n side Of tho house.
This is the same familiar cry we hav
| heard at any time this last thirty years
e And now we will go back eighteen o
= twenty years.
a So long as the north consented to b
= wholly subservicnt-slave catchers an
general scavengers for the south-all wa
we'll When it at last rose to protest il
: earnest. and the south found the control c
!, the national government was surely los
Co them, what happened? There wa
; promptness and decision for you. TIL
e south said: Our mission is to govern, an
= if we can rule the Union as it is. we wi
e destroy it, and have government we ca
rule. The history of tho years that TO
> lowed is either stupendous farce, a
illusion, or it is the record of mos
Bloody civil war, the history of which
branded in letters of fire upon the memor
Of every man who passed through its tel