The Cecil Whig. [volume] (Elkton, Md.) 1841-current, 1881-07-09
CRIMINAL PARTISANSHIP.

There is possibly no period when the
salutary influence of the newspaper press
can he measured by better results than
during times of unusual popular excite
ment, when mems passions are easily
aroused by injudicious and unworthy
appeals to their sympathies and preiu-
, dices. 1t is fact, however, and one of
! which every intelligent American ought
| to be heartily ashamed, that a number
of leading newspapers, among them no
ticeably the Baltimore 1meric"n, have,
! since the daStardly attempt to assassinate
the President. by intlammatory appeals
to the partisan preiudices of their read
! ers. been seeking to make personal po-
! litical capital out Of the infamous crime
/ of Guiteau. To such an extent has the
malignant partisanship of the Baltimore
| Americdn outrun all discretion. that he
unblushingly asserts that Mr.. Conklins 5
hatred is of the same relentless kind
delivered the blow That "Conkling
! and Arthur and Grant are guiltleSs Of
/ the actual crime but the ideas and prill-
/ ciples of which they are the chief expo
nents have. nevertheless. been the COM
polling cause Of this awful tragedy
! We fling in the face of this libelous
| traducer of three honored Americans.
upon whose high personal regulations the
| vilest partisan calumny has yet to leave
the trace of stain, the assertion that the
assassin of character and reputation is as
! despicable wretch morally. as the man
who, behind his back, attempts the muir
der of a defenseless President. Com
menting upon this base attempt to stig-
! Matte General Grant and his immediate
] political friends, a Baltimore daily sensi-
bly, and foreibly remarks:
/ Such a theory is too ridiculous to be
even seriously considered for a moment,
and if it were advanced by Journals othel
/ than the iEicrGcaH, whose animositv Is
manifest in the fight which has been so
| ing on between two factions, it might
! lead to results little less leplorable than
those over which we mourn 10 day, and
be attended by as important personal
/ consequences. There were fractional and
party strifes it is true, but the bitterness
engendered by them was not extraordi-
! nary, nor was it directed against the per
son of the President himself so much as
against those by whom he is surrounded
and by whom lie was supposed to be in
/ iluenced. The effort. therefore, to give
! the tragedy q political significance i'll
stead OF attributing it to the insane it,l-
| pulse Of an individual. IS an attempt 10
! arouse spirit against party faction which
has begotten one rebellion and created
relentless hatred that will end only in
! death. II our country were a despotisna
and the people We're ground under tile
heel of an implacable tyrant and had
been goaded to desperation by injustice
oppression. and wrong at the hands OF
| their chief ruler, CT if that ruler himself
had been man who had excited the
animosty and deadly passions 4f any
| particular party or faction. sucl, motives.
public Or private, as have been assigned
for his assassination might find place il
I the public mind; but &c such conditions
exist and there is nothing liz the charac-
ter Of our government OF any Of its sitL
zens to warrant such theory. The as
ISOLATION of the eoyardly murderer with
F! that of Arthur. GRAM. Conkling. Cam
eror and others shows to what depths
, political luminosity and disappointed an
bition can sink q mar. and how great
! journal may be Prosecuted and left with
: ouiy one remaining claim 10 respect-its
! great age-after this insui, to the .Ameri-
can people and those whom they have