Democratic Sentinel, Volume 4, Number 5, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 March 1880 — UDGE BLACK ON THE THIRD TERM. [ARTICLE]

UDGE BLACK ON THE THIRD TERM.

The Argument ot a Statesman and Patriot. fFrom the North America i Review.] Resolved, That in the opinion of this House the precedent established by Washington and other Presidents of tlie United States, in retiri g from the Presidential office after their second term, has become, by universal consent, a part of our republican system of government, and that any departure from this time-lionored custom would be unwise, unpatriotic, and fraught with peril to our free institutions. This is a resolution passed by the House of Representatives on the 15th day of December, 1875. It was offered by Mr. Spriuger, of Illinois, after consultation with leading friends of the principle, and was carried immediately and almost unanimously, being opposed by the votes of only eighteen members out of 251. It received the support and approbation of all parties. Men who quarreled bitterly upon all other political subjects were of one heart and one mind, when it came to be a question whether the custom established by Washington and other Presidents of retiring after their seoond term ought to be respected or could be safely departed from. And now here, to wit, in the pages of this Review, comes Mr. Howe, of Wisconsin, and on the part of Gen. Grant, for whom lie appears, denounces the resolution aforesaid, imrugns the doctrine embodied in it, and assails the integrity of its supporters in the most viol nt minner. I am asked, “ Under which King, Bc-zoniau?” Do I give in my concurrence? If not, what grounds of opposition can I presume to stand on? Believing in the it solution of the Representatives, and dissenting from Mr. Howe’s article, the readers of the Review shall have the why and the wherefore; not because my individual opinions are worth a rush, but because, on a subject so important, truth is entitled to every man’s defence: because this faith is shared, in our time, by tho most respectable citizens of all classes, and because it is delivered to us from a past generation strongly stamped with tho approbation of the best men that have lived in ail the Bges. A President of tho United Stales may legally be elected and re-elseted for an indefinite number cf terms: there is nothing in the constitution to forbid it; but tho two-term precedent Bit by Washington, followed by his successors, consecrated by lime, and approve I by all the public men of the country, ripened into a rule as efficient in its operation as if it bad been a part of the organic law. A distinguished and very able Senator of the Grant party, who carefully inquired into the state of popular feeling, tola me in 1875 that the sentiment which opposed a third term was stronger than a consiiiutional interdict; the people would more roidiiy assent to a breach of positive law' textually inserted into the constitution than to any disturbance of an unwritten rule which they regarded as sacred. Certainly it was adhered to by all parties, with a fidelity which some of them did not show to the constitution itself, down to 1875, wriier. the first attempt was made to contravene it by putting,up Gen. Grant for a third eleclion. This was everywhere received by the rank and file with mutterings of mutiny, and the "met devoted partisans responded with curses which if not lend wero deep! Tho movement, as Mr. Howe tells u*, was met by solemn warnings from tho newspaper press, by strong protests fron political conventions, and finally by the resold ion quoted at the head of this article, which was a rebuke so overwhelming that the supporters of the third-term candidate lied, from h m in fear, deserted him utterly, ana left him without a single vote in the nominating convention of his own party. Mr. Howe Las no doubt that this resolution was the sole cause of Grant’s defeat in 1870. He is equally certain that it was all wrong. However that may bo, the present intent of Mr. Howe is to rally the routed third-termers and restore the courage of the recreants by the as surancos that the jobs and offices are safe, after all. Popular veneration for tho men who built up our institutions is the strongest support for the institutions themselves. It is not only a great good intrinsically, but also the motive principle to other virtues which are indispensable in a Government like ours. Anything, therefore, which unjustly detracts from their reputation is a grievous public injury. This applies most especially to Washington, who is acknowledged, noc only by us, but by every nation, tongue and kindred under heaven, to have been incomparably the greatest man that any country ever produced. Au indecent criticism upou him shocks and shames us like blasphemy. Noverthcdess, we would not abridge the liberty of speech. A raging third-termer has as good a right to sneer at the Father of his Country as an independent Hottentot has to b j, .-r hj’g mother. Jefferson also comes under review. His precedent, whether good or evil, is at least “to the purpose.” In letiers addressed to the Legislatures of Vermont, New Jersey and Pennsylvania, dated on tho lOcli of December, 1807, and printed in the A urora, at Philadelphia, on tlie 19 li of the same mouth, he solemnly and publicly announced to the country that lie would not disregard tlie precedent of his illustrious predecessor by accepting another election. His reasons are brief, simple and clear, like all the productioosof that master hand, and expressed iu language so transparently truthful and dignified that no man of rightly constituted mind can read the paper without being stirred by too strongest emotions of respect and admiration for its author. It compresses into a few' sentences all that needs to lie said in favor of the two-term limitation, and is at tlie same time a perfect answer to all objections. Mr. Howe is fair enough to take a passage from it and incorporate it with Ins article; it shines there like a piece of solid gold set in a shapeless mass of lead. In these times, when the subject is up for renewed consideration, this letter should be read again and again; every citizen ought to have it by heart and teach it to his children, write it on tho lintels of his door, bind it as a froutlet between his eyes, and make it the subject of his meditation day and night. Dec. 10,1807. To the Legislature of Vermont: I received in clue season tlio address of the Legislature of Vermont, bearing date tlie stli of November, 1806,‘in which, with’heir approbation of the general course ot my a ministration, they wero to good as to express their desire that I would consent to be proposed again to tho iiublic voice on the expiration of my present term of office. Entertaining as I do for tie Legislature of Vermont those sentiments of high respect which would have prompted an immediate answer, I was certain, nevertheless, they would approve a delay which had for its object to avoid a premature agiiatiou of the.public mind on a subject so’ inleresting as the election of a Chief Magistrate. That I should lay down my charge at a propel period is as much a duty as to have borne it faithfully. If some termination to the services of a Chief Magistrate be not fixed liy the constitution, or supplied by practice, his office, nominally for years, will in fact become for life; and history show's how easily that degenerates into an inherit ance. Believing that a representative government responsible at short periods of election is lliat which produces the greatest sum of happiness lo mankind. I feel it a duty to do uo act which shall essemially impair that principle; and I should unwillingly be tho person who, disregarding the soundurecedent set by an illustrious predecessor, should furnish the first example of xirolongation beyond the second term of office. Truth also requires me to add that I am sensible of that decline which advancing years bring on, and, feeling their physical, I ought not to doubt their mental, effect. Happy if I am the first to perceive and to obey this admonition cf nature, and to solicit a retreat from cares too great for the wearied faculties of age. * For the approbation which the Legislature of Vermont has been pleased to express of the principles and measure s pursued in the management of their affairs, I am sincerely thankful; and, should I he so fortunate as to carry into retirement the equal approbation and good will of my fellowcitizens generally, it will he the comfort of my future days, and will close a service of forty years with the only reward it ever wished. Similar expressions are scattered all through bis correspondence as long as he remained iu office, and after he retired to Monlicello lie continued to repeat them. His conviction deepened, as the years rolled on, that the principle of two terms was the only safe one, and he constantly expressed his gratitude for tne universal approval of his conduct in adopting it. But Madison also adopted the principle of his two predecessors, and retired at the end of his second term. Can nothing be urged ■against the father of the constitution to depreciate his authority or make his example worthless ? Was not he also unpatriotic and selfishly fond of his farm? This could be as easily said, and is not harder to believe, of him than of Washington. And there was Monroe, apparently so clear m his great office “that rivalry itself shrunk from his presence, and he was elected a second time without effort, without opposition, without ore vote against him. Is it nothing to the purpose that he acknowledged the value of the Washington precedent? Concede that he, the most popular of all Presidents, except the first one, could not have got a third term if he had asked for it, then his retirement proves not only that the two-term practice was right in his individual opinion, but that the general judgment of the nation was in its favor.

Jackson doe 3 not get oft easily. We are told that “there is ground for believing that, if Mr. Van Buren had not secured the succession to Gen. Jackson, the latter would have been retained for another term.” This is like the account we have of Jefferson’s boom. If there was any practice of Jackson’s great predecessors in which he acquiesced with more deference than another, it was their voluntary retirement after a proper period of service. He was wholly opposed to ttie indefinite continuance of power in the 8. me hand, and he expressed his opinions on that, as on other subjects, with an emphasis which left no chance for misapprehension. The ground for believing that “in a certain contingency he would have been retained another term” is not anything he ever did or forebore to do—nothing tliatTie ever wrote or spoke—nothing that ever was authorized by him or by the party which supported him, or by any representative of either. Such is the outcome of Mr. Howe’s assault upon the line of our great retiring Presidents, from Washington to Jackson inclusive It must be admitted that, if the predetermined object of theattack was to make himself ridiculous, it is a marked success; but, if it was an effort in real earnest to diminish their fame, lower their standing, or shake the confidence of the country in their virtue, then it is the flattest failure in his essay—and that is saying a great deal. I think it may be affirmed with some confidence that Washington was not unworthy of the profound veneration in wliich he is held in this country and throughout the world; fliat succeeding Presidents, when they followed his footsteps, not only acknowle Iged his wisdom and patriotism but showed tlitir own; that the American people of our day, when they refused a third term to a candidate who had alic&dy served for two, were not behaving like cowards scared by a senseless clamor, but doing what a prudent regard for their true interests required; that when the House of Repreeentatives, in obedience to the universal sentiment of its constituents, unanimously and without distinction of party, put upon its records aud published to the world its solemn declaration that the example of Washington must be adhered to in the future as in the past, tlio.v did not enact charlatanism or repeat a vociferation, or issue a straia/c fuhniuation, or impeach the constitution, or libel its framers, cr counterfeit history, or insult commou sense, but spoke what they at least believed to bo the words of truth "aud soberness. We are not to set up political dogmas or invoke a blind faith even in the founders of the Re üblic. The mere authority of names, however great, ought not to command our assent. But a fundamental doctrine, self-evi-dently true, though easy to defend, is the hardest of all things to support by affirmative argument. We cannot help but sympathize nidi tlie indignation of Pitt when lie thundered out lib refusal to look at books or listen to logic in defense of English liberty. In the matter before us, it should be plain to every “reasonable creature in esse” that long continuance of supreme executive power in one hand is not only perilous to free institutions, but perfectly certain to destroy them. Sonic fixed time there ought to be when tho people will not only have the right, but exercisj it, to displace their Chief Magistrate and take an - other. If they do not possess this right, they are political boDd servants by law; if, holding it, they forego tho use of it,’ they make themselves, quoad hoe, voluntary slaves, and they soon come to be governed in all things by the will of their superior. A lease for years, renewable and always renewed, gives the tenant an estate without end, and makes him lord of the fee. Where the Chief Magistrate is vested, as ours is, with great power 1 able to gross abuse, if there is no law or practice which forbids him to be re-elected, he can remain in office for life as easily as for a term. He has the appointment of ail officers, the making of all public conti a-.-te, and a veto upon all legislation, besides the cimmandof tlio army and navy. By an unscrupulous use of these means ho can coerce notonly his horde of immediate elependeuis, but ho can conti ol the coipjrations and become the mis* r of all the rings, put tho business of all classes under 1 isfo t, con tut tho venal, frighten tlie timid, and check all ambitions but his own. He can force the elections of every State he de sires t > can y 1 y the bayonets of bis arir-y. If that fails, he can order a false return, aiid pay for it, out of the public treasury. The people would soon perce,ve opposition to be useless and ae, ept the situation; elections would be as mere a matter of form as they were in Rome when such Consuls as Mere and Domi ian were e'ected regularly every jear under the supervision of the Pi astor an guards. If these wore no more than remote possibilities, piudence should guard against them. But they are near probabilities; the signs of the times warn ub that the peril to our institutions is imminent; tlie danger is already cn tlie wir.-g. It is vain to lemincl us that the President swears to pre B( rvo, protect and defend the constitution, and see the laws faithiully executed, This is true; and it is also true that, if there be uo perjuiy in the case, tlie constitution, laws and liberties of the country are safe. But the last twenty years have given us ample preof that ah oath"is not much r< strain! upon a President who is incited by ambition, rapacity or strong party feeling to break it. It is true that this presupposes a peop'e much degenera ed and a magistrate animated mainly by the vulgar love of power for its own sake; but exactly such a conjunction of things has always been feared with good reason, and hence comes the deVito to put every check on that tendency to “strong Government” which is Dow- mani'otting itself in many quarters. What is the icnied--? Bow shall we avert the dire calamities with which we are threatened V The answer comes from the graves of our fathers; By the frequent election of new men. Odit-r h=ip or hope for the salvation of free government there is none under heaven. If history does not teach this, we have readiall wrong. In the republics of ancient and modern times, tlie chief magistrate was intrusted wit i only temporary power, and always went out of office at the end of a short period, fixed and prescribed by law or custom. It was this, indeed, which made the substantial distinction between them and the monarchies around them. An unpunished transgression of the customary limitation was uniformly followed by destruction. Everywhere and always it was the fatal symptom of decay—the sure forerunner of rum. When Caesar refused to lay down bis Consulship, aa his predecessors had done, at the end of a year, and was re-elected time after time with the" acquiescence of the Senate and the people, all that was real in Reman freedom ceased to exist. Two republics in France were brought to an end in the same way. Napoleon began by being Consul for a term, then was elected for life, and finally became Emperor, with the powers of an absolute despot. Tho last Bonaparte was President for four years, was re-elected for ten, and ended, like bis uncle, in grasping the imperial crown. “ May this be washed in the Lethe and forgotten V” Shall these lessons be lost? Shall the lamp which guided our forefathers be extinguished? Shall the broad daylight of all human experience be closed up in a little dark lantern manufactured at Milwaukee? I think this cannot be done; “ the eternal verities ” are against it The most powerful third-termer may as well try to blow out the sun. as lie would a tallow candle, with the breath of his mouth. Moreover, the two-term principle ought to bo adhered to by us and by those who come after us (if there were no other reason), simply because it was the practice of those who went before us. It is to tho traditions of the fathers that we owe our civilization. Ido not expect anything I can gay to be received as a vindication of the two-term rule. Nor is it necessary. Alt the support it requires was long ago furnished by another, the latchet of whose shoes I am not worlhy to stoop down and unloose. Jefferson, the stainless citizen, the sterling patriot, ti.e unequaled statesman —at once the greatest apostle and truest prophet that freedom ever had—gave his judgment, not only at tho time he acted upon the rule, but expressed his convictions after they were strengthened by many years of later reflection. The practical object of Mr. Howe’s article is to make Gen. Grant President for another term. It is not for au abstraction that he denounces the two-term precedent and vilifies the Springer resolution. The rule might stand if Grant could be elected without breaking it down. But Mr. Howe thinks tnat the superiority of his candidate is so very great that all authorities which oppose him should be disregarded, and he supports this opinion by assertions so extravagant that wo only wonder how any man in his sober senses could have made them. A third term for Grant does not mean a third term only, but any number of terms that be chooses to demand. The imperial method of carrying all elections by corruption or force, or of declaring them to be carried when they are not, is to bo permanently substituted for the svstem of free popular choice The figure of Grant standing with the seal of primacy on the mountain top, 'and looking down on the inhabitants of the plain below, gives a measure of the elevation which his sycophants flatter him with the hope of attaining. They urge the necessity of a strong gov-

people. On tho other hand, it is quite as sure that the false administration of a Government theoretically free, which acknowledges the rights ot the people and yet continually treads them under foot: which swears to save and perjuriously works to destroy; which receives and promises to execute a most sacred trust, according to tei ms prescribed with unmistakable clearness, and then dishonestly breaks the engagement—such a Government, so conducted, is an unspeakable curse. It is not only an oppression, but a most demoralizing cheat; a base imposture, more degrading to the nation which submits to it than the heaviest yoke that despotio tyranny can fasten on its neck. Iq therefore, a constitutional and legal administration of our national affairs be out of the - question our only choice lies between a perverted republic and a monarchy—then stop this hypocritical pretense of free government, and gi re us a King. Aud who shall be our royal master but Grant? That he will serve the turn as well as, if not better than, another, will, I think, bo admitted by all who attend to tho reasons now presently to be enumerated. In the first place, a new monarch (that is, one who has no hereditary claims) ought to be an approved good soldier, with skill to enforce obedience; otuerwise, his sway could not last long over people disposed to be turbulent All, or nearly all, the founders of royal lines have been military men, from Nimrod downward. It is vain to deny that Gen. Grant’s reputation tor military talent is well founded. It is more than doubtful if any officer of our army could have subjugated the South so completely, even with all Grant’s advantages, or taken so many defeats aud still won a complete victory in the end. It is not, however, what he has done, but what he has shown himself capable of doing, that gives him his leading qualification for masterdom now. The fear tnat goes before ernment almost in the very words used by the adherents of fassar and the two Napoleons. Strong government, in their sense, moans weak laws and a strong ruler; in oilier words, a substantial monarchy, powerful in its scorn of all legal restraints. A free democratic republican system of government honestly administered by agents of the people’s truo choice; a government such as ours was intended to be, with tlio power of the Federal Government, the rights of the Slates, and the liberties of the poople so harmoniously a> ljusted that each may check the excosses of the other—such a government, scrupulously administered within its constitutional limits, is, without doubt, the cli ficest blessing that God in His loving kindness ever vouchsafed to any him will make actual violence unnecessary. His strength of character will frighten his subject! into submission where a weaker man would be compelled to butcher them for insurrection.' Gen. Grant is a good hater of those who thwart him, which is natural, and not a serious fault; but he is not fiercely vindictive, and hiscareer has been marked by no act of savage cruelty. He could not be an Antonineor a Titus, but we eau trust him not to be a Nero. It may be objected that his moral behavior and mental acquirements do not bring him up to the mark wnich ought to be reached by the permanent ruler of a groat, intelligent, and highiy-crvilizsd nation; but in this respect he is as good as the average of sovereign Princes. The present reigning family in England has never had a male member who was his superior. For centuries past the potentates of continental Europe, with only a few exceptions, Lave had habits as coarse as his, and he is wholly free from some terrible vices to which many of them were addicted. It seems to me that lie will do well enough to “herd with vulgar Kings.” The nepotism from which our democratic faslcs revolt is virtue in a King. All monarchs are expected to look after their own families fiist, and all ha ve their m nions and favorites whom they fatten, spoil, and corrupt. Who among them has not given his protection to a worse set than Grant? The favor which Grant bestows upon corrupt rings is given for a purpose. As a candidate lie cannot bs elected, as President ho cannot sustain himself, without their support; but enthrone him and he can afford to dety them. What wo call tho greedieeis of Gen. Grant for tho wages of official iniquity would be entirely proper in the supreme ruler of an absolute Government. It is not bribery to buy the favor of a King with presents, and a King is not guilty of stealing when ho helps himself to public money without legal right. It looks to us like a terrible outrage for a President to have himself represented at a State election bv tho bayonets of liis standing army to install Governors that rvere rejected at the polls, to tumble the chosen Legislature of a free State out of its hall, to procure the fabrication of false returns and force them on the people. But Gen. Grant's lawlessness would bo lawful in a country governed by tlie moio will ol a personal sovereign. Where there is no law there can be no transgression. But, while Gen. Grant has some qualities which would make him a tolerable King, and none that would make him an unendurably bad one, bo is not at all the kind of person that is needed as President of the United States on the assumption that our system of Government is to bo continued, I think it is to be continued. UDliko Mr. O’Uonor, I believe that the struggle to get ic honestly administered is not hopeless. We are not yet reduced to tlie necessity of choosing between a republic wholly corrupt and a monarchy founded in pure force. Therefore I conclude with Jefferson that, if any man —Gen. Grant particularly—" consents to* he a candidate for a third election, I trust he will be rejected on this demonstration of ambitious views.”