CHAPTER V.

HISTORY OF THE REPUBLICAN PARTY.

(CONTINUED.)

The Campaign of 1872-Action of the Forty-Second Congress at its Second Session-$60,000,000 Taxes Taken Off-Amnesty Extended GreatlyForce Bill Discontinued-The House Votes to Abolish the Franking Privilege-Everything Investigated-Call for a National ConventionSpirit of the Party-Unanimous for Grant-The Convention is HeldIts Doings in Detail-Harmony and Enthusiasm-Platform of 1872Grant's Letter Accepting the Nomination.

What are you going to do in Congress next winter?" the writer asked of one of the most distinguished Senators, nearly a year ago.

"O, make Presidents," was the answer.

Such being confessedly the main purpose of both political parties during the session next preceding each Presidential election, we may properly reckon the political campaign of 1872 as having commenced with the assembling of the second session of the Forty-second Congress, on the first Monday of December, 1871.

The meaning of the Senator's expression is obvious, viz that the Congressmen of each party would endeavor to shape legislation so as to secure the success of their party in the ensuing campaign; and this means, of course, where voters are as free and intelligent as in America, that the dominant party will endeavor to enact good and wholesome

laws, such as the people will approve, while the minority will strive, in the debates and in multitudinous investigations and newspaper attacks, Senatorial "philippics," etc., to create the impression among the people that all the virtue resides in their ranks, all the vice in that of the majority and in the existing administration.

ATTACKS ON THE ADMINISTRATION.

Of this sort of tactics were the attack on the Navy Department in the House, the tirade of Charles Sumner in the Senate and other similar demonstrations against the Executive and his cabinet, and against the majority party in Congress. No less than fifteen different investigations, founded on this or that man's allegations against the conduct of the Government, in one department or another, were asked by the Democrats or the disaffected Republicans during the session. These investigations were promptly ordered by the consent of the majority-the only case where any de-bate occurred being on the resolution concerning the sale of arms to French agents, introduced by Mr. Sumner in the Senate, and preceded by a preamble which contained a virulent attack on the administration, and which assumed as proven all the allegations made by the enemies of the Government. This the Senate would not pass, but it did order the investigation, and gave Mr. Schurz, the instigator of the charges, the privilege of examining or cross-examining all witnesses. The investi

gations were, for the most part, conducted openly, and all the testimony was published; and the results (which are given at some length in a subsequent chapter) were found to strengthen, rather than weaken the position of the administration in the hearts of the people. Never was there so cogent an illustration of the proverb, "great cry and little wool," as was furnished by these investigations and the clamors which preceded them.

ACTS OF CONGRESS.

The laws enacted by the Forty-Second Congress at this session were also of a nature to strengthen the dominant party. Among the most important of these were the act reducing the taxes, internal and import, by $53,000,000 a year, estimated upon the receipts of last year; the act conferring additional civil rights upon the colored class of citizens, hitherto discriminated against by society, in despite of the manifest spirit of the recent amendments to the national Constitution; the act granting complete amnesty to 25,000 rebels of the late war, who had hitherto labored under certain political disabilities; the act extending to soldiers, widows and orphans, the benefit of the bounty laws, and the act for facilitating the entry of land by soldiers entitled to bounty; all of which became law by the President's signature. Nor is the present Republican Congress less praiseworthy for what it has left undone than for what it has done. The still rampant spirit of outlawry in many sections of the South,

as proven before the Joint Committee on Southern Outrages, offered a great temptation (which was pressed by many Southern members) to continue the bill authorizing the suspension of the habeas corpus by the President—a privilege which terminated by limitation with the expiration of the late session. The enemies of the Republican party would have liked very much to see the majority vote to continue this law, so that an outcry against federal usurpation" could be made. They would also have liked to see the majority committed to a bill for the federal regulation of the Southern elections, with the authorization of such measures of enforcement as should furnish grounds for some clamor about "bayonet rule." But the party refused to commit itself to such acts, and also refrained in a provoking way from doing much that was indiscreet in the way of land grants and private appropriations, out of which the Opposition orators and journals could forge any effective weapons for the campaign. In short, the freshest acts of the Republican party, even as shown in its representation in Congress the place where, if anywhere, vulnerable points may usually be found are probably less partisan, and no less just, moderate and virtuous than those of any political party, similarly represented, in any previous period of our history—even in the "good old days" of Andrew Jackson, or any other canonized politician whom we are accustomed to laud in our allusions. Such a record of course fortifies a party, and should always be striven after,

not only before, but after national elections; and nothing will tend so strongly towards it as the principle of progressiveness and catholicity of opinion which has come to prevail among Republican statesmen, (especially in the journalistic estate and in the lower house of Congress) and which is now recognized as one of the quickening elements of the Republican creed.

THE PHILADELPHIA CONVENTION.

Still fresher than the acts of Congress, however, and perhaps more authoritative, as being the more direct expression of the popular sentiments of the party, are the acts and declarations of the National Republican Convention of 1872, held at Philadelphia, on the 5th and 6th of June. And the proceedings of this body we must now record.

The Philadelphia Convention was called by the National Republican Committee, in accordance with party usages, after a prolonged session of the Committee at Washington. The call bears date January 11th, 1872. It enumerates the achievements and the leading present tenets of the Republican party, and closes with this invitation:

"To continue and firmly establish its fundamental principles, we invite the co-operation of all citizens of the United States."

The National Committee, in a special resolution, sent by telegraph to all parts of the country, urged all holders of office under the national administration to abstain from participating in local conventions, or officiating as delegates; and the injunction was