Year: 1860

mere is, however, a less trivial objection to


iI' l-incoih's s election to the Presidency the


1rce oi "hicn no candid man will dispute.


ne VIII be PRESIDENT without any party that


mas Voted ior INN IN nearly half the States.


He may, or he may not, encounter difficnlt;es


IN finding agents through whom to administer


the Government in the South; but it is certain


that his appointments TO office in that section


must deviate from the rules that have hereto


fore been observed by party administrations.


These rules are two: First, that the President
shall appoint men who belong to his own
party, and who participated in his election;
and secondly, that he select them from the


vicinage OF the places where the duties of the
Office are to be performed. If Mr.. Lincoln
should comply with the previous custom in
the first OF these particulars he would perforce
violate the second, for he cannot combine the
| two.


| lie will be reduced to the dilemma of either
sending Northern partisans to fill the South
ern otficrs, or of making his appointments at
the South from some other party than his
own. We pay him no compliment in express
sing the opinion that he is too discreet man
to attempt the former; for not only are most
OF the offices of too little value for any mans
acceptance, who clnnot combine them with
other business but there could be no so certain
method of rendering his administration uni
versally and intolerably odious to the people
OF the South, as the sending of men who
would be stigmatized as Abolition emissaries
to handle their correspondence, prosecute them
for offences against the Government. and to
collect customs for its support They would
look upon themselves as a subdued and de-
graded people, if they submitted to the impo-
sltion upon them of horde of hungry office
seekers from the North and it is certain that
Mr Lincoln, no more than any other man in
his senses, is capable Of perpetratinG such
folly.


Mr.. Lincoln, then, will find himself in the
novel predlcament Of party President who is
compelled either not to make any appoint-
ments IN nearly one half Of the country, or to
select his appOintees from other parties than
the one that elected him. This is. in itself
nothing very formidable--ifi it were the whole
extent OF the difficulty, it could easily be got
over 1t would merely place the President,
with reference to a part of the country, in the
envnblc position of being able to ask no other
questions, with reference to a proposed ap-
polntee, than the celebrated ones in Mr..
Jeiierson's first inaugural-"Ts Is he honest?
Is he capable? Is he faithful TO the Constitu-
ton?


The real difficulty arises out of an appress
henson that there may be portions of the
Southern States where the sentiment of hos
tliity to the Republican party is too strong to
allow any citizen to hold office under Re-
publican President II, for example, no per-
son IN the cotton or the gulf State would
accept the office OF District Attorney or Mar.
shal, how could offences against the Govern
ment be prosecuted and the offenders be
brought to justice? The government at the
South would be virtually dissolved, if no
agents for carrying it on would, in that section,
hold Office under it. We arc far from sup
posing that this contingency will arise and |
yet it must rot tn disguised, that the state of |
public feeling at the South is such as to make |
the most imperative duty Of the Republican |
party now, and of AIr. Lincoln when elected,
to give all suitable assurances of friendly and |
fraternal sentiments toward that section of |
the country.