The Wellington enterprise. [volume] (Wellington, Ohio) 1867-188?, 1883-10-10
Judge Their Future by Their Past.

oOulu GRITTY the next freSlQentlal elec-
tonP This question is best answered by
another, namely: What has the country
been hearing from them of their desires
and aspirations during the last twenty
yearsa Can any man recall any COM
plant of wrong or advocacy of right by
them within that periodp Twenty years
ago. when the Confederacy was in its
last ditch, the Democratic party, which
had been as clamorous at the North for
peace toward the rebellion as it was at
the South for war against the Nation,
assembled in its National Convention
and deliberately demanded that the
Government should give up the contest,
alleging as reason the patent false
hood that the war was q failure. Its
|tandidate General cClelIan, made his
own platform in bis letter of accept
ance, thereby condemning the treason
able utterances of the Democratic party
Of the North. He made himself the
war candidate of peace party, the
members of which moaned over the
shedding of the blood of our Southern
brethren, while gloating with ll-con-
cealed glee over the shedding of the
blood OF the soldiers of the Union. The
tate of the Confederacy was decided at
the ballot boxes in November, 1864.
The Democracy fought and lost the de-
eisive battle of the rebellion on that
day. A Democratic success would have
ended the war upon terms dictated by
Davis and Lee.
Upon the collapse of the Rebellion the
following spring the Northern Democ-
racy continued TO be simply an annex
to those of the Confederates who were
impractical enough to suppose that they
could by such aid rule the country they
had failed to dismember. Indeed the
existence of such party at the North,
filed with intense bitterness toward the
Government simply because it was in
Republican hands, was probably the
sole cause for the formation of the
party in the South bent upon ignoring
The results of the war. But for Northern
Democratic Scalawagism, there would
have been no considerable Southern
Bourbonism. 80
The assassination of Lincoln and the
course pursued by his successor gave
the Democracy the administration of
the Federal Government for the four
years Immediately following the war,
and they improved the opportunity as
became them. A'large proportion Of
the Federal officers who had been ap-
pointed by Mr.. Lincoln were badgered
into the service of the Bourbon cause of
the South or into resignation. Those
whose appointment was dependent
upon the President, without the consent
Of the Senate, were mere political
slaves, driven to their tasks like field
hands, and were finally degraded and
aumiliated by being huddled together in
grand round up, better known as the
Bread and Butter National johnson Con-
vention at Philadelphia. The Democratic
party thus organized bent all its infer
nal energies toward the prevention of
the protection of the emancipated
blacks--Thc Southcrn-S States were
turned over to the more violent and inn
placable of their people, with an injunc-
ton by the President to defeat the Fif-
teenth Amendment to the Constitution
then pending before the States. That
amendment, which merely guarantees
equal civil rights, and which every
Democrat now pretends fidelity to, was
opposed then by the Democrats North
and South with as much ferocity and
avowed hatred of the negro as was ex-
hibited later against conferring upon
him the right to vote.
The violence of Democratic hatred
against the black friends of the Union
was less the result of race prejudice
than of bitter hostility to the cause
itself. This was made evident by the
equally fierce attack made on the cred
itors of the Government whose faith in
its power had induced them to loan the
money with which the war had been
carried on. These were soon made as
odious as the negroes, and were known
only as s'bloated bondholders, whose
pockets must be rified of the profits they
had made through their willingness to
trust their fortunes on the result of the
war.
Was not this Democracy from 1865 to
1869? What has it been since but a
continued resistance to the DEGREES of
fate and to the amendments to the Con-
stitutionp 1t has not had and has not
now q pulsation that was not born of
hatred Of all that the American people
have done as Nation since 1861.
The Democracy went down in 1868,
Notwithstanding its possession. through
assassination, Of all the power of Fed
eral patronage and plumber, and despite
the theft of the Electoral Vote of New
York through the crimes of the Tweed
machine, afterward abundantly proven
and confessed by Tweed himself.
During the five years following the
Inauguration of Grant the exploits of
the Democracy were confined to the
Southern States, where the property
class, acting under Northern Democrat
ic inspiration, had refused to participate
in reconstruction in order that carpet bag
leadership might serve as an excuse for
whatever violence might be necessary
for its overthrow. The Southern
white people could have made
carpet-bag rule impossible had they
not listened to their old tempters,
the Northern Democrats, for they could
have honestly prevailed in every cleo
ton in the South under the Reconstruc-
ton act. 1t was only because they alb
stained from voting, and refused to
counsel and direct the ex-slaves, that
the Northern men just located among
them were enabled to take the lead of
the negro. What woe ought to be pro-
nounced against the fire-eating dema-
gogues who first made Mr.. Lincoln's s
election possible by dividing the Demo-
cratic party for the purpose of precip-
itating civil war; and on the Northern
Democratic demagogues who made Sc
cession possible by promising that
they would prevent any resistance to it
by the NorthP And what additional
woe should be pronounced against the
new crop of Northern demagogues who
would not let the war end with Lees
surrender, but kept the South
ern people heated and excited with
false hopes that they could win by po-
htical maneuvring what they had lost in
the field. And these are the men who
talk about turning the rascals out, in
order that they may again confuse and
debauch the politics of the country.
They have put on veneering of rev.
enue reform and Civil-service Reform
and ask to have their real character
forgotten. But the people win not
judge them by their cheap pretensions
or their promises SO prodigally made
for the purpose of obtaining power. A