New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1880-08-11
TILE RESnLLS or TILE WAR.

1t is worth noting that General Hancock
| took care to "revive the issues of the war y
| by calling attention, in the very opening of his
| letter of acceptance, to what was fought for
and won. 1t may be that General Hancock
was moved to this course because he had on
| a capital occasion abused his official position
| by taking sides with President Johnson and
| the South against Congress and the party who
were endeavoring To reconstruct the rebellious
States upon the principles which were uti-
mately imbedded in the fundamental law Of
the land. The XlYth Amendment had not yet
been declared in force, although it had been
proposed in Congress, when he was making his
record as a military governor, and the fact
that he then declared himself, by word and
deed, in full sympathy with the party which
was striving to defeat its ratification may
have suggested to him the propriety of con-
Tossing that he had finally concluded to &C
"cept" 1t. However this may be, General
Hancock, for some cause, felt that it was ne
cessary for him to begin his letter by saying
chat the XIIIth, XIYth and XVIII Amend
"ments, cmbodying the results Of the war for
" the Union, are inyiolable.n
No doubt one portion of the Constitution is
quite rs "inviolabler as another; but it is
unfortunate Tor the Democratic candidate
that he felt compelled to utter this trusm,
and thus invite attention to his own effort
and that OF his party to prevent the country
from securing what he properly styles "the
results Of the war" OF course the great
bulk Of his support is to come from voters
who fought for "rcsults" which never
CHANGED to be "embodied" in any amend
md IL hat
papers of influence are to-day charactcrizing |
the amendments actually adopted as "revo- |
" lulOnary," conspracies against libertvr |
and all that. Nor is it to be wondered Mt |
that Southern Democrats in Congress threaten
to sweep away all the laws which have been
enacted to make these amendments operative. !
But General Hancock's Northern supporters
have manifested hostility to these "results
- OF the war" no less bitter and persistent
than that of the men lately in arms
against the Union. Not a single State
with a Democratic Legislature and hardly
a single Democratic legislator in the
North. voted to ratfy the amendments, while
N New-Jersey and Ohio Democratic Legisla-
1res voted to rescind such ratification after if
rad been passed.
The logic of the situation, then, is this :; If
General Hancock is to be made President it
= because he represents certain principles,
md because he and his party will be more
likely to maintain these principles than the
andidate and party opposed to him. General
Hancock undertakes to set forth these prin-
iples in his formal letter of acceptance, and
he very first and presumably the fundamental
rnciplo enunciated is loyalty to the results
f war successfully waged against the great
ulk of his supporters, and adhesion to con-
titutional amendments which his entire party
truggled to defeat at every stage of their
rogress The Democratic candidate revives
he memories of the war to urge the support
measures inaugurated aud adopted by Re-
ublicans, and by implication he utters the
mazing proposition that the amendments are
lore likely to remain "nviolableu under the !
administration of a party which was united
gainst their adoption than under the admin
tratiOn of the men whose courage and
atesmanship embodied them in the organic
w of the Nation.