Rensselaer Union, Volume 10, Number 39, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 June 1878 — THE ISSUE. [ARTICLE]

THE ISSUE.

The open letters of Postmaster General Key aild Hdn. Alexander H. Stephens on the revolutionary scheme of the democratic majority of the lower house of congress, put the whole matter before the country in its true light. Mr. Key says: No plan, need hope that the schemes of the men who have engineered the movement to unseat President Hayes can ho curried out without a bloody war. Mr. Stephens sayilt I look upon the whole proceeding, concocted as it wits, conducted as It has been, us most unwise, most uiifortiiiiute and most mischievous. Its effect will be to disturb the peace, harmony and quiet of the country,. Those who have, though sown unwittingly, sowed the wind will renp the whirlwind. Sly opinion Is, as I have repeatedly said, that this nffuir will prove iu« tiie end either a contemptible farce or a horrible tragedy. Whether it will lead to tiie Mexican Mathm of our federal republic, tiny,result must show; but 1 say, us I anid on another occasion, that all soft words instilling in the minds of the people of this country tiie Idea that Mr. Hayes cun he peaceably unseated by congress are" as delusive and guileful us tho whisperings of the great arch-fiend, in tiie shape of a toad, in the ear of Kvc, from which sprung nil our woes. Oti this subject there cau be but cue opinion amoug sensible men who arc informed iu the history both of our own country and that of otlifer nations. The striking down of compromises solemnly made, of tlio findings of a court of arbitration, whether it be in national affairs or those, pf a private natureutiways does and must inevitably lead to extreme results. The Abrogation of the Missouri Compromise Was tiie clpud signal of the i storm whose long accumulating and

pent-up fury first disturbed tho frontiers of Missouri, Kansns nnd Nebraska, and circling round southward to tiie east, deluged one-third of our liutlonul territory with mndness, blood nnd ruin. The cloud which now overhangs the nation is no less porteutous und threatening. While it obscures the horizon all patriotic people must feel a measure of alarm. None hut fools or reekless madmen can look upon the gathering and npprouching of a cyclone without n sense of nervous anxiety. Tho reopening of tiie presidential question in the manner it lias been done, by the party of wicked and unscrupulous antecedents, cau mean and doc*9 mean nothing less than an attempt at desperate revolution, bloody if it must be. There is no avoiding this result except the people unite in the elections this fall to set tlifclr condemnation u|>on those who havo precipitated tiie issue upon the country. This is the great overwhelming question to be solved at the approaching election. No side issue can begin to compare with it In importance. The people will either condemu this revolutionary tendency of the democracy by electing a republican congress, or they will encourage it by electing a democratic congress. This bs no more a season for foolishness, or a stolid ignoring of the peril which threatens peace, prosperity and the integrity of republican institutions, than was the presidential campaign of 18(14, when we were in the midst of a civil war that had been precipitated upon the country by the same party of desperation, broken pledges and violated oaths. To eneourug? the democracy at this time, either by being lead after foibles, manifesting a careless indifference as to the result, or joining with them upon any measure of compromise, is to commit a blunder if not a stupendous crime.