The Bon Homme County independent. [volume] (Tabor, S.D.) 1904-1913, 1911-02-09

press. But the histrionic in the man
craved, perhaps a more spectacular
stage setting as well as surer mark.
1t was passing fact which at the time
stirred no second thought but which In
| the relation of things to come, doomed
| full of tragic rapport.
John Wilkes Booth struck a far more
disastrous blow at the south than at the
north when he shot down the man who,
alone of his generation, could have
brought the sections together In heart
felt reunion, without the strife and
tragedy, the dishonor and abasement
which attended reconstruction. So far
as Lincoln gave indications of his pur-
pose and plans for bringing the van
quished south back to loyalty and fra
ternity, and binding the nations
wounds" there is ground for believing
that his policy would not have been
different in any essential degree from
that of Andrew Johnson. But the great
and signal difference would have d.
rected the restoration of peace and
unity with all the prestige, the hold on
the popular heart amounting almost to
idolatry that Lincoln possessed and
johnson did not. That which in john
son seemed encroachment and usurpa-
ton, in Lincoln would have been ac-
cepted as the natural and logical exer-
else of judgment tried and tempered
eIhu puiiheu III TIC merry CTuClDle OF a
four-years' struggle to save the ma
tons very life. Johnson, the petty
white of border state, vainly attempt
ed to wear Lincoln's boots and clothes
1t was as IL Richard Cromwell, instead
of seeking the retirement for which he
was best fitted, had sought to com.
mand the Ironsides.
Johnson meant well. Looking back
at his course from the clearer atmos-
phere Of today it Is easy to perceive
that Johnson was animated by the best
motives In his attitude toward the tre-
mendous problems which confronted
him, and that the success Of
the Impeachment proceedings would
have been a blot upon our national
history. The problems and the position
were too big for him-like the sword
Of Wallace in the hands of an aver
age man.
1t may be added that John Wilkes
Booth represented class with whom
the real fighters Of the south had no
fellow-feeling-the "copperheals" who
had not the courage to risk their lives
for the cause with which they professed
sympathy; who set fire to hotels and
spread contagion, who shot and stabbed
in the dark. That the former confed-
crates had no responsibility for the
crime of Booth and that they were
overwhelmed with horror and dismay
when they heard of 1t is an undisputed
fact, and 1t is also we'll known that
Abraham Lincoln has today no warmer
admirers than the survivors and de-
scendants of those who, so years ago,
hated his very name.
The spectacle witnessed In Washing
ton, in December, when Edward Doug
lass White, a former confederate soil
der was sworn in as chief justice Of
the United States by his associate JUS
tice, John Marshall Harlan, a former
colonel in the Union army, was typical
Of the effacement Of civil war animos-
tiles and of the spirit, of harmony
which prevails among the citizens of
our common country. That complete
reunion is the greatest monument to
the labors, sacrifices and achievements,
life and death of Abraham Lincoln. :