Year: 1873

A Law-Abiding President.


General Stewart L. Woodford, in re.
spending for the President at the annual
dinner of the officers of the New York
Mercantile Library Association Monday
evening of last week, paid an eloquent
tribute to the Chief Magistrate. as being
clear-headed, law-abiding citizen. We
give portion OF the Generals remarks


l have come to pay no special tribute
to the President as man but, standing
among those who are the representatives
of the mercantile classes of the nation,
among the young men who are to be the
merchants of the future, let me say that
We may be grateful that we have Pres
ident who, amid the storm and the clam
or of the financial revulsions of the past
ninety days, has kept his head (applause) ;
who has been conscientious enough to
seek resolutely to obey the law, and who
has taught US lesson of steadiness and
resolute faith which was needed to place
us on prosperous plane for the future.
(Applause.) You can recollect the day,
not many weeks past, when there swept
upon us panic like those we sometimes
had in the old days in the Army of the
Potomac, aud we begged the President
to lend his torty-four millions of reserve
to the New York banks to preserve the
financial integrity and good name of our
city. The urgency was natural but
now, when the storm is passing, believe
there is hardly man in the country, /
care not what may be his political party,
who is not grateful to the common sense,
the steadiness, and the resolute will of
the President in determining to keep
back the reserve from being loaned, and
in holding it to meet the Indebtedness of
the Government. (Applause.) There
would be manifest indelicacy in my
saying nothing tonight of the abstract
right of the Government to issue its re-
serve, because it has fallen to my lot to
have been elected member of the Ma
tional Legislature. | conceive it TO be
the duty of legislator to vote not from
partisanship, but from personal sense
of duty. (Great applause.) And, there
fore, | frankly say that | express no
opinion here, and at such an hour as
this, upon the right TO issue the reserve
(Applause.). Still it is but just for us to
remember that from the hour when the
reserve was first drawn in all those who
have been connected with the Treasury
Department, the President, Secretary
Boutwell, and Secretary Richardson have
uniformly held it to be legal and right to
draw upon the reserve to pay the obliga-
tioDs of the Government. But the
thoughtful citizen must feel that we owe
largely to the calm common sense and
resolute will that steadily kept in the
straight path of duty, as duty was un-
derstood, and of obedience to the con-
servative demands of a law-abiding and
honest people. (Cheers.) Let us deal
justly. (Applause.) We honor him for
the Christian craftsmanship which bade
us stretch our hand in the moderation of
wisdom to the mother country. Cap
plause.) But we glory in this above all
things, that though President, he is as
amenable to the law as the com monest
citizen /; that the law is above the Presi-
dent and above the people and that ev-
en- the President, in such fearful times as
these, seeks for his guide and counselor
in the law common to us all"


The VALUE OF NEwsPAPER.-The
following is the experience of mechan-
ic concerning the benefit of newspa-
per:


Ten years ago | lived in town in
Indiana. On returning home one night,
for l am carpenter by trade, saw
little girl leave my door, and l asked
my wife who she was. She said Mrs.
Harris had sent after their newspaper,
which my wife had borrowed. As we
sat down to tea my wife said to me, by
name:


wish you would subscribe for the
newspaper; it is such comfort to me
when you are away from home"


i would like to do SC" said /, but
you know | owe payment ON the house
and lot. 1t will be all l can do to meet
it."


She replied: "If you will take The
paper, l will sew for the tailor to pay for
it."


subscribed for the paper; it came in
due time to the shop. While resting one
noon .and looking over it, saw an ad-
vertisement of the county commissioners
to let bridge that was to be built.
put in bid for the bridge, and the job
was awarded to me, on which / cleared
$500, which enabled me to pay for my
house and lot easily, and for the news
paper. If had not subscribed for the
newspaper l should not have known any.