Perrysburg journal. (Perrysburg, Wood Co., O. [Ohio]) 186?-1965, 1880-08-13
HancOck's Letter ofAcceptance.

The letter of General Hancock ac-
cepting the Democratic nomination for
the Presidency is published. The
brevity would be commendable were
there not painful consciousness on the
part both of the reader and the writer
that the resort to glittering generalities
is caused by General Hancock's almost
total want of acquaintance with the
political questions now at issue before
the country.
The ostentations declaration that the
amendments to the Constitution are
parts of that instrument, and as such are
inviolable, the reader will understand,
has been forced as a necessity upon
General Hancock by the recent publica-
ton of his letterto Mr.. Glover, in which
he cordially approved the Democratic
platform of 1868, in which those amend
ments and the whole series of Recon-
struction acts were declared to be un-
constitutional and void. The publca-
cation of that letter has compelled the
General to make this declaration that
the three amendments are part of the
supreme law of the land. His previous
affirmance of the unconstitutionality of
the Reconstruction acts he permits to
stand. To do otherwise would be to
stamp his own record at New Orleans
with the hand ofresistance and violation
of the law of the land.
General Hancock avoids, ignores, the
great question at issue between the
Republican and Democratic parties, rs
to the Nationality of the United States.
He carefully refuses to recognize such
Nationality, or to even admit that If
elected he will be the Executive of a
National Government. His theory that
the Government of the United States
is made up in part by the local Govern
ments of the States is an attempt to
give the doctrine of State-supremacy,
as opposed to National sovereignty, a
new application. The Governments of
the States have no central or directing
authority, in any form, as part of the
Government of the United States.
They exist and exercise all their pow
ers in subOrdination to the National
authority. They are purely local Gov
ernments of purely local political cor
porations, and when the exercise of
powers by the State Governments and
by the National Government clash or
come in conflict the State authority,
being of necessity the inferior, must,
from like necessity, be subordinate,
and must be silent. Where General
Hancock got his idea that the
State Governments are part of
the Government of the United
States we do not know; but the
use of such language looks like
an attempt to assert the pernicious
doctrine of State-supremacy, and that
the Union exists by the permission of
the States, and that it is the creature
of the States. The Union is National
Union; it has a National Government,
and General Hancock cannot by any
form of words obscure that fact, nor
divert the attention of the country
from the other fact that the Democratic
party deny the Nationality of the
Union and the supreme National char
acter of the Government. The Nation
ality is the main pillar in the edifice of
American Independence, and on the
preservation of that Nationality expe-
rience has shown depends the National
safety, not only against foreign foes,
but also against domestic insurrection,
rebellion and the cost and horrors of
civil war.
General Hancock will find that he
cannot, though at the head of the solid
Confederate States, safely ignore the
Nationality of the Union in the presence
of the American people.
His reference to the reformation of
the civil-service is, in plain English, a
declaration that, if all the elective Offices
be filled with Democrats, those elected
will find Democrats 10 fill all the APP
pointive places.
The reference TO "fraud, violence
and incompeteney" is little obscure.
Whether it has reference TO the whole
sale election frauds recently exposed in
New York City, or TO the brutal yio-