An Open Letter To James Buchanan

Froin the Fliilndelphia Press, tlarch 4. Four years ago this day you entered the Presidential chair, the Ohief Mag istrate of tho hnppiest und freest poop]e on the earth The contest from which yon emorgod n conqueror, ;ilthough distinguished by unexampled animation and acritnony, was fojlowed by expressions, on the part of friend and fot, of complete confidenoe in your personal integrity. Thoso vvho had opposed your eleótion wero profuse in announcing their disposition to give vour administraron tho fairest trial. Tho principien which prevailed in yonr triumph, had been anticipated in your speeches beinre your nomination, endorsed in your lotter accuptin; it, affirmed in your inaugural address, and reaffirmed in your letter to Governor Walker, ander date of July 12, 1857, and were so plain, so sulf-evident, and so convincingly right, that the Amori can people were ready to hail in you the august suceessor and representativo of' those great men vvho laid the foundation of the government In the choice of your Cabinet you were aupposed to be singularly successful. - From the aged statesman at the head of your constitutional advisors down to your Attorney Goneral, there was no name that had not at one or at anther time been associated with high and honorable position. These gentlemen, selected from lioth sections of the Confederacy, each a type of his own people, wero known cordially to sanction and heartily to co-operate with yon in the policy to whioh you had been committed in the previous campaign. Every department of the Federal goverment waa in your hands. Both branches of Congress were contiollod by a tnajorily of your supporters. The Supremo Court of the United States was known to sympathize with you. Our commerce with all the world was in the most flourishing condition ; internal trado in its tnanifold ramifications was prosperous beyond all example ; sectional strife had terminated ,n a national victory, thus giving new uarantees for the preservation of a Union which at that time seemed held together by bonds alike sacred and indisoluble. This inspiring prospect should have elevated you above all unworthy passions and unholy ambition. When you nounted the Presidential chair you wera not, according to your own account, quite sixty-lïve years of age. Too oíd to undertako tbe destruotion of your country, you wore young enough ;o raake it more potent at home and more honored abroad. Your' enemies, :or more than forty years, had irnputed ,o you many questionable qualities of lead and heart; but your friends reied upon yrur administration to repel this imputaüön. The first aecused you of eoifishness, ingratitude, and aristQcracy ; the second ciaimed for you the v.ghest attnbuteb of private character. The first had frequently predicted that, t ever clothed with the almost iinperiil power of tho Presidency, you would devote yourself to the overthrow of the narty to whioh, near your {ortieth yer you attached your pulitical fortunes ; ;he second contended that, by your modoration and consisteocy, you would not only immortalizo yourselt, bu. so consolidato the democracy as at the close of your administration to leave it without a respectable adversary How you fulfilled tho prophecies of the on% and how you disppointed the hopes of the others, the impartial historian will record on his imperishable tabluts. It would be superfluous to recapituaio che thriee-told tale of the dovvnfali of yourself, your party and your country. Even those who envied your friends, whilo those friends were reoieing over your election, were shocked at the mantier in which you persecuted and hounded the men who, during many years of minority, had carried your cause upon their shoulders, until finíilly they placed you in the Presiden tial chair. No such spectacle hae ever been presentod in any country. You struck the most fatal blows at those who had rendered you the most devoted serviee. Therö was a rancor and a eruelty in your treatment of these men that no imagination could have anticipated and no logician defend - Even those who attempted to maintain their usual kind relations to your person were repellod with haughtv and frèezing indifference, or subjected to your will by being made tho slaves of your caprices and the echoes of your ireacheries. In proportion as you conducted this unprovoked warfare upon these citizens, you took inio your confidence men who had never treated you save as an object of hatred and of Bcorn. Posteriry tatos littlo nole of the treatment extended by a public man to hfo long supporters. It is not too tolerant, however, whon such turpituda is accompanied and euceeeded by persistent attempts to distract and demoralize a l.appy and united people. Had you but served the Republic; had you maintained your plighted faith to your principies; ad you displayed a vvise, comprehensivo, and practical statesmanship; had you insisted upon economy and integrity in your atlmiuistration - the judgment of the people would have rewarded you, and your recreancy to your f'rionds would havo been forgotten in the stern impartiality and justice of your policy. The ruler of a civilized and Chnstian peoplo may, in a moment of rash impulse, inflict incalculable injury upon his country. - But you have no impulsos. That which at first seemed to be thé madness of the moment so.n assumed the shape of settled malignity, When you consonted to trample upon a holy and an undying truth, it is now evident that you had made up your mind to persevere to the end. No eotreaties could move you to change your course.- Even those whom you had wounded without provocation repeatedly and humbly exhorted you to pau-ie in your career. In vaiu. You seemed to havo becomo the incarnation ot absolution. Tho bloody iiolds of Kansns, the porishing iodustry of Pennsylvania, tho argunients of the good, the thundertoncs of the ballot-box, producad no more impression upon you than upon tho walls of the building in which you sat cold and hcartless as those walis themcelves. Not content with doing wrong your: self, you insisted that all others over I whoso interests you exercised the 'elightiiBt cpntrol i-hould likosvise do wrong. Hesitation or refusal on their part to yeield to your cnmmnnds was punishéd with instant exclusión from place or romorseless social ostracism. - No ono was too high to bo reached bv the shafts of your angt;r; no ono too low to be ground under the heel of your proscription. You raked the official kennels for victima. Whethor an honest man objooted to your oonduet who held position nnder you in a foreign land, or in ynur own State, or noar the Presidential mansión, he was recalled or removed without an opportunity of ilefence. And in proportion as you perseented the good yon corapensatod the bad. Tlms, your own example became a grand premium to all who were rendy to accept place at the loss of character. When the moncy of the peoplo was used to debauch the people - when the Chief Magistrate consented to degrade himself fov the purpose of gratifying hts revonge - the reckless men around your person aceepted your own oonduct as a license to them. Bent alike upon plundering the treasury and breaking up tho Union, tliey organized a system of peculation aud fraud uncqualed in any civilized government, and, with your airl, enlisted in the work of destroying the democratie party. You pretend at this day that you were ignoraut of their practices in the first, but you cannot deny that you stitnulated a-nd eacouraged them in the second. The disruption of the democratie party at Charleston and Baltimore was plotted in the White House ; and, when it was accomplishod, although adinonished that it naust lead to the disloeation of the Union itself, you refused to throw yourself into the breach, and to accept the regular noraination of the party. - Once more you einployed the patronage of your admimstration in order to gratify your worst passiona. You liever forgave Stephen A. Douglas because he indignaut ly refused to endurse your defection in 1857; and, when you contrasted the popular verdict whicli gratefully approved his course with tho popular expression which coudemned your own, you resolved that he should be defeated, even at the hazard of the annihilation of the Union. You saw the democratie party staggering undfir the doublé burden of being held responsible for the enormities of your administration and of being identiüed with the cause of disunion. Again you wero admonished that perseverance in these proceedings must lead to the most dire ful consequences, and again you refused to listen to the voice of reason. Indeed, through your organs aud your friends, you circulated the doctrine that it was far botter that the gtneral opponeuts of the democracy should triumph than that the regular candidato of the party should be elected; and when this portiou of your programmc was iulfilled, when, by means of your patronage and with ihe aid of your mercenaries, you assisted to elect Mr. Lincoln to the Presidency. you gave currency and credit to that fatal theory which has hurried cuir ñee institutions to the very precipico of disunion. Preparations for armed resistance to the law as a consequenco of Mr. Lincoln's election were made under your own eyos, participated in by your own Cabinet Ministers, advocated by your ewn newspaper exponent, and so far approved by those who held position under you in different States, North and South, as at last to assume the air of a virtuous revolution. - Iu that hour when, for a moment, you seemed to comprehend the magnitude of your crimes, did you step forward to execute your high trust by anticipatiug the macbinations of the southern conspirator, by crushing secession in the bud, and by making an oxample of every mau who held a commission at your hands who dared to approvc their proceedings? - Alas ! no. In your last animal message to Congress, whilst arguiug against ths right of a Stato to withdraw from the Uniou, you offered immunities to the enemies of the Union by declaring that you had no authority to punish them. Your Cabiuet exploded in the midst of your own complications and your eountry's distresses, and then was disclosed a picture of crime, moral and political, such as no natiou has ever been called upon to witness. Compelled to summon to your side other counsellors, animated by difl'erent sentimeuts, and resolved, so far as they could, to rescue the Uuion, you ombarrassed thoir action by your timidity, vagillation, and weakness. At this moment, while you are preparing to assist in the inauguration of your successor, it is doubted whether you have left hiin even the fragment of agovernraont to administer. Your encmies might congratúlate themselves upon tho entire fuliiümeut of thoir predictions, if they woro not called upon to mourn over the decay and dowufall of the Union itself. It inay be said these are harsh worda to address to an old man. Your couatrymen have been told that, as you approach the close of your official term, you manifest some regret at the past ; and within a short time it has been given out that the weight of years and cares has fearfully oppressed your spirits; but, Mr Buchauan, ihe vcry last acts of your administration have shown that still in their ashes live the wonted tires of your malignity and revengo. Manyofyour recent appointments have shocked the country. Even now, the name oí one of the chief a"euts in all those proceedings which have coutributed to rush the Kepublic upou the verge of Ruin is pending bufore the United States Sonate for a high judicial position, and others who have beenequally prominent in the proseriptions aud treacheries of the four years goue by have been honored with the most distinguished marks of your confidence. It wil!, therefore, be secn that you are approaching the Psulmist's age, without fecling a single emotion of remorse for the wrougs you have inflicted upon a patiënt aud suffering people. I do not envy you your reflections in the winter of your years ; but likc that Frenchman, when called upon to vote whether he would doom the tyrant of his country to the death he 60 rlchly merited, I conclude this epistle in his own words: "I conmisérate the poor, and the needy, and the oppremd, but I have no pitii for tw oppressor of my country." ■'J J.W.F. fríE The power of dreams forco tho iTüinite into the chainber of a human brain, and throvvs dim reflections fi-om thu eternities upon the mirrors of the 6leep'mï niind. L3f MeUinclioly seea the ultímate of tliTrTgs - things as they will be, and 1 not as they are. It looks upon n : boantiful fuco and ees but a grinning 1 skul!.