The Cecil Whig. [volume] (Elkton, Md.) 1841-current, 1880-09-18
NATIONAL POLITICS.
PROGRESS OF THE PRESIDENTIAL
CANVASS.
Fr0M The .itlantic MOnthIu.

not been very animated. The Democrat
avoided at the outset raising any ISSUE
which would take strong hold upon the
public mind and stimulate active discus
sion and earnest controversy. Their nomi
nation signifies nothing. They might have
raised the whole question of the fairnes.
and legality Of the Electoral Commission
settlement of 1877 by the choice of Mr.
Tilden as their candidate. They might
have brought prominently forward the
old question, recently revived in Con
gress, of the relative powers of the State
and National governments by the nomi
nation of conspicuous States Right.
champion like Mr.. Bayard. They might
have adopted the Western crusade against
the national banks by nominating Mr.
Thurman. They did neither. To the
surprise of their adversaries and of most
of their own people, they pushed aside
all candidates representing issues pend
ing before the public mind, and took ur
mere soldier without political record
and without known opinions upon any
subject likely to come before the admin
istration during the next Presidential
term. Perhaps this was shrewd, but il
was confession of weakness. The party
virtually acknowledged that it feared to
go to the country upon any of the issues
which its representatives in Congress
have been holding up for the past four
years rs of vital Importance. 1t said in
effect, LET us drop all this talk about
the Electoral Commission. and the re-
turning boards, and the federal election
law, and Capitalization, and the banks
and the currency, and let us hurrah for
the hero of Gettysburg who helped put
down the rebellion
By the nomination of Hancock, the
Democratic canvass has become point
less and illogical. During the eight years
of General Grants administration the
Democrats constantly inveighed against
the military spirit which controlled the
government, and declared that success
| i'Ai SoioiSi "o', ~ VIC VI
his training and mode of thought, high
ly unfit man to make good President.
Now they nominate man who is moth
ing but soldier; who never broke the
continuity of his military career, as Gen.
Grant did, by a long period of civil life,
but who has Worn a uniform ever since
he went as lad, to the West Point
Academy. General Uancock's nomina-
ton might reasonably be taken to mean
that the Democrats want to recant all
they have said about the danger of the
soldier in politics, of a military admins
tration, and of bayonet rule" and that
they desire to assure the country that
they have changed their views about the
Importance of craftsmanship, and have
concluded that brilliant corps COM
mander makes the best Chief Executive
for the nation. OF course this is not what
the Democrats wish the nomination to
signify. They would like to escape from
the logic of their position. They want
Hancock to signify all things to all classes
of men in their ranks-State' Rights to
the South, nationality to the North, hard
money to the East, soft money to the
West. projection to Pennsylvania, free
trade to Illinois, and so on through the
whole list of questions upon which their
party is not agreed; and they hope that
his colorless record will serve as blank
sheet which every Democrat can fill up
with the ideas that he desires carried out
in case the party is successful. Never
theless, they cannot escape the appear
loudly declared, up to the day of the
Cincinnati Convention, to be of vital i'm
portance.
On only one point has General Han
cack record touching political issues.
While in command of a military district
under the reconstruction acts, he issued
an order and wrote letter in which he
spoke of the supremacy of the civil law
over military authority. But there is
nothing here to run campaign upon.
On this very question General Garfield
has much broader and clearer record,
made in his argument before the supreme
court in the Indiana conspiracy cases, in
which he defended the right of persons
accused of reasonable acts in time of
war to jury trial, when the territory
where the acts were alleged to be COM
mitted was not the theater of the opera
tons of contending armies. The whole
question of the relations of military CON-
manders and courts martial to the civil
law was very fully discussed in that argyll
ment. General Hancock's New Orleans
order deals with different case. The
| Southern States were placed under mill
tary government by express acts of Con-
gress pending the processes of the resto-
ration of civil authority under the provi-
sions of the reconstruction laws. Civil
law was not supreme in General Han
cocks military district when he issued
his New Orleans order. On the contrary.
the military power was the higher legal
authority. and the effect of his order was
only to raise a question as to the right OF
Congress to provide temporary military
governments for the rebel States, and tC
set up his opinion against the laws of the
land. The claim of craftsmanship made
by the Democrats for their nominee by
reason of that order will not bear scru
tiny. Whether he wrote it or it was writ
ten for him by a Democratic politician
DESTROYS of making him a candidate fol
the Presidential nomination in 1868, il
was neither statesman-like nor soldierly
1t did not lie in the mouth of Il military
commander, sent to the States just con
quered by the national authority for the
purpose of executing the laws of Con
gress, to lecture the people on the dan
GERS of military power and the import
ance of the supremacy of civil authority
In the absence of any record on the
part of the Democratic nominee on the
controverted questions of current poll
ties, we turn to the Democratic platform
to find the principles upon which the
campaign is to be fought, but disappoint
ment awaits us there. The theories upon
which the party has been making its figh
in Congress of late years and i'll recent
State canvasses are not clearly set forth
Some of them are avoided altogether
| NOTHING is said of the right of Congress.