Clinch Valley news. [volume] (Jeffersonville, Va.) 18??-2019, 1920-03-26


has dwindled from power to dictate
law and the policy of the Government
to commission to audit accounts
and to appropriate moneys to enable
the Executive to execute his will and
not ours"
Senator Ben Wade of Ohio said
about the same time:
i when the foundation of this gov
eminent is sought to be swept away
by Executive usurpation, it will not
do to turn around to me and say that
this comes from President whom I
helped to elect"
| Gen. ]. w. Cox recalled years
aftorward that In that Same month
he dined in Washington with Henry
Winter Davis and General Schenck.
"The berating of Lincolnjp by these
two, wrote Cox. twas something to
take ones breath away. was utter
~ dismayed."
Even in the darkest days of the
military operations of the Civil War,
Lincoln was criticized and abused no
more savagely than in the last
months of his life when the down.
fall of the Confederacy was assured.
He was headed straight for COLI
sion with the Republican Congress
ional leaders when he died. Lincoln
wanted his own way in bringing the
Southern States back into the Union;
the Republican Congressional leaders
wanted another way. Lincoln's policy
was founded on the constitutional
theory which had so strengthened his
hands when the Civil War began,
that n State could not secede. Con-
scquently, when the Confederacy col
lapsed, the rebellious States were
still in the Union, but in the position
OF territory under temporary mill
tary rule. 1t followed, according to
Iincoln's theory that reconstruction
was the business of the Executive
and that the Southern States could
be reorganized by military order.
Lodges Prototypes.
The Republican leaders in Com
gress, Sumner, Wade, Stevens anu
Davis, bitterly contested Lincolns
policy, holding that the Southern.
States were really out of the Union
although they had hitherto denie>
their constitutional right to seced-
This new position was taken in orue
that Congress might dictate tn,
terms of the Southern States re-ao-
mission into the Union. The questio.
of immediate negro suffrage was, Oh
course, one of the chief differences
between Congress and the President.
But Lincoln's policy exposed him t.
the charge of autocracy and ignoring
Congress, just as Wilson's policy i'll
negotiating the peace treaty at Yer
saiiIes has exposed him to the charge
of autocracy and ignoring the Sen
ate" Ben Wade said of Lincoln:
"If the President of the United
States, operating through his major
generals can initiate q state govern
ment, and can bring it here and force
US to receive Us associates on
this floor these mere mockeries, these
men of straw who represent nobody,
your republic is at an end"
Striking Parallel.
A parallel wonderfully striking i'll
some ways can now be drawn be-
tween Lincoln and Wilson. At the
close of great victorious war, Lin
coin sought alone to reconstruct til.
Union; Wilson, at the end of anothe.
great and victorious war, sought t.
reconstruct the world. Lincoln aoher-
ed strictly to his constitutional con.
ception of Executive power in
reconstruction, yet he bitterly offend
ed the Congressional politicians who
demanded for themselves control OF
the reconstruction process; Wilson
has adhered strictly to his constitu-
tional rights as Chief Executive, in
treaty making, yet he too offended
Senators and came into collision with
Senatorial pride and power. Both
Presidents were denounced, probably
with equal severity, as autocrats and
usurpers for attempting to impose
their will upon the country regard
less of division in public sentiment
and of Congressional opposition.
The sequel in Lincoin's case is a
matter of historical record. His OPP
ponents-Sumner, Stevens, Wade,
triumphed the moment the
President was struck down by Wilkes
Booths bullet. In President Andrew
Johnson they met weak antagonist,
IN the battle for the support of public
opinion in the North, although john
sons reconstruction policy was essen
IL Al I'll