Rensselaer Union, Volume 11, Number 38, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 June 1879 — Cause for Alarm. [ARTICLE]

Cause for Alarm.

Wc have from tim£ to time attempted to point out the true scope and object of the Democratic plan and the danger of permitting that party to obtain control of the Government. The Journal is not an alarmist without cause, nor desirous of seeing dangers where they do not exist. Neither is it knowingly untruthful or unfair. But believing that the Democratic party as now organized and controlled does represent ideas and principles dangerous to the welfare and perpetuity of the Government, it would be false to the people and to its own convictions of duty if it did not say so and give the reasons for so thinking. It is not a pleasant duty. It is not pleasant to think that any considerable body of Americans, much less a body numerous enough to aspire .to the control of the Government, hold and represent ideas essentially and fundamentally opposed to our Constitution form of Government. It may be that we are entirely mistaken in thinking that the Democracy do hold such ideas, but believing that they do, it is our .duty to say so. It may be that many, or even a majority of, the Democrats do not mean to bo unpatriotic or disloyal, but if the principles of the party are unpatriotic or disloyal, they must be exposed without regard to the feelings of individuals. For these reasons we have felt justified in quoting the expressions of representative Democrats and Democratic papers to show that the dominant sentiment* of the party is hostile to the National Government, to equal rights, and to the cause of liberty and progress. The evidence on this point is abundant and cumulative. Every Democratic speech made in Congress during the present session has breathed the same sentiment. It may have been glossed over with a thousand fine phrases and loud professions of patriotic concern, but underlying all these was the sentiment of determined hostility to equal rights, to fair and free elections, and to the authority of the National Government. In the North these sentiments are put forth as a summary of Democratic faith, not only harmless, but beneficial, reformatory and wholesome. In the South they are supplemented by an outspoken devotion to the principles of “the Lost Cause” which must excite alarm in every loyal American. In addition to the evidences of this fact heretofore cited, we call attention to the following. Representative Tillman, of the Fifth South Carolina District, 'composed of the Counties of Aiken, Barnwell, Beaufort, Colleton and Edgefield, himself electedjby tissueticket frauds, has published a political letter to his constituents, in which he says: v “At the worst, I hope and believe that our political oppr.saion will cease very shortly after the inauguration of the next President. If the President be a Democrat, it is reasonably certain that a majority of both houses of Congress will also be Democrats, or at least Conservatives. If so, the Reconstruction acts will speedily be repealed, which wonld leave suffrage where it Constitutionally belongs, under control of thp States. Then, admitting the cberced amendments of the Constitution to be valid, the States could attach a property qualification to suffrage without violating these amendments, which wonld practically destroy negro suffrage as a disturbing element in the body politic. Again, after tne Democrats get possession of the Executive and Legislative Departments, the present Judges of the Supreme Court may declare the Reconstruction acts, as well as the two fraudulent amendments, unconstitutional, nail and void, or, if they fail to do so, the Court can be reorganized simply by an increase of Judges, even as the Hadioala did on a memorable occasion, and, by making a proper appointment of new Judges, the Constitution of the fathers can be restored.” ' Asa State’s-right Democrat, representing an aristocratic Southern district, Mr. Tillman may fairly be regarded as a representative Southern man, and the foregoing as an expression of the Southern plan as foreshadowed by Southern hopes and wishes. We ask every candid reader to peruflb it again. It is not the expression of a cross-roads politician, a wild enthusiast or ah obscure editor:' • It ft 5 the expression of a Democrat whq,represents in Congress a representative

district of the South. The programme which he foreshadows is put forth in a political address to his constituents, framed with a-view of securing popularity. In it we are told that all the legislation of the war period! Is to be repealed, the Constitutional Amendments nullified, negro suffrage practically abolished, the Supreme Court revolutionized, and “the Constitution of the fathers restored.” This means practically the success of the rebellion. It means that the results of the war are to be reversed, the principles for which the North contended to De eliminated from the Constitution and the laws and practice of the Government, and the principles for which the South contended put in their place. This is in keeping with the whole tendency of latterday Democracy, the success of which moans practically the snccess of the rebellion and the overthrow of the Government. If there is not good ground for apprehension in the possible success of such principles, then the Journal confesses itself an alarmist without cause. —lndianapolis Journal.