Rensselaer Union, Volume 2, Number 46, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 11 August 1870 — The Work of the Republican Party. [ARTICLE]

The Work of the Republican Party.

Thb work accomplished by the Republican party during the war has been repeatedly sanctioned by the nation as eminently patriotic and tucceMful. Not less qualified has it shown itielf for the work of peace—not less successful has it proved in dealing with the legacies left by a revolutionary epoch. The one tested its capacity to meet the highest strain; the otner has subjected it to the no lees trying ordeal of sustaining, with Just measures, the relaxatioas of peace. It has shown tqbsl readiness for both. The latter test has been protracted through a period of five years. During all this time Congress has been dealing with its difficult and perplexing problems. Doubtless there have been moments when criticism found necessary scope for its exenolM. But, review tag the work as a whole, no party has ever presented a grander record of administrative capacity or success. The .close of the war left the Union preserved and a raxta dßtoelpated.from But the frtedteen Were still id' a ptwurious situation. They were in the midst «f an unfriendly people, whose passions had been, arodwd by War, and whose hearts had been envenomed by the failure of all their designs. Two dangers threatened them. The first was the apparently implacable resentment of the whites, Mianifesting itself in constant persecution and repeated outrages. The second was the want of preparations upon the part of the tlaoks themselves fortheir new cratic party, the latter especially was fraught with the gravest perils.- The blacks, according to .their statements, were lazy, indisposed to work, revengefill, full of animosity toward their matters, incapable of fulfilling the requirements oi freedom, equally certain to be in perpetual trouble with the whitey and to be an unceasing embarrassment to the Government These difficulties the Republican parly had to confront. It had to protect the freedmen from outrage and develop them into fitness for citizenship. How well both of these tasks have been fulfilled, the country now thoroughly understands. The threatened w*ar of races has nut occurred. Under judicious treatment, the antagonism has passed away. All the alarming cries which the Democratic party so sedulously and clamorously raised five years ago have been falsified, and the great problem of black citizenship has been successfully solved.

So with the restoration ot the rebellious States. The war left them suffering under nolitical as well as material desolation. They had no loyal or legitimate governments. The majority of the whites were adverse to the Union. The practical relotions with the government had been severed. It devolved upon the Republican party to evolve order out of this chaos •sad those disorganized and, embittered temimtanities to their places In the sisterhood of States. Under some circumstances this might not have been ap embarrassing work But with k perfidious President reviving the rebel spirit within the breasts ot the defeated section, with the results oLhe war not acqukscediq, W ith communities split into distrusting races instead of being a homogeneous people, it was a work of great difficulty and delicacy. Thanks, however, to the persistent courage and fidelity of the Republican party, it has been successfully accomplished. The States are again restored to their full political position. They are again blooming under a rich material prosperity. Thewaste of war is being rapidly repaired. The SjUth is entering upon a new career of industrial success, and her prospects were never as brilliant and promising as they are to-day. Still more perplexing, perhaps, were the financial problems bequeathed to us by the war. We were told that the debt could never be paid. We were told tiat the ba: den of taxation would weigh us down. We were told that the only way to endure these difficulties was the issue of an unlimited quantity of greenbacks—a course which would have entailed immediate and irretrievable ruin. The Republican party met these questions as boldly and intelligently as the others. It has already paid nine hundred millions of the debt since the close of the war. It found an-annual taxation of four hundred and fifty millions sis dollars, and it has reduced it a.third. No one now questions the possibility cf easily paying the debt. No one doubts the ability of tne country to sustain without difficulty all the taxation essential to the legitimate demands of the Gowernment. The elements of the financial problem which were regarded with alarm five years ago, no longer afford scope for any apprehension, unless the Government is put into the hands of the party of repudiation.

Thus in every particular the croaking notes of the Democratic party have proved false. Instead of a country weighed down with unendurable debt and taxation, darkened by a war of races, imperiled by a separate people no longer under restraint, and at the same time unfit for the responsibilities of freedom, with a section overwhelmed by the waste of war and the worse impoverishment of an unfruitful peace— instead of all thisi we witness reviving prosperity, burdens removed, former master and slave working side by side for mutual benefit, the blacks ripening into intelligent citizenship, and the whole country, North and South, entering upon a new and brighter career. This is the work of the Republican party, and we may confidently challenge in the history ot any other party, in this country or elsewhere, the production of so great and successful a work accomplished -in so short a time and amid so many embarrassments.—AJtany Kttning Journal, July 26.