upon a task as arduous as ever was set before any man in any country. We cannot attempt to record the history of his administration in this place. It is a record of unsullied splendor, and has justly won for him the gratitude of every true American citizen. Yet praise must not stop short at his integrity, his zeal, or his unintermitted labor in the discharge of his office. What makes the peculiar glory of this administration, is that the Secretary saved the nation in a momentous crisis, not by any trick of diplomacy or finance, but by moral force. He put the question to the people squarely: The Government wants money. If it does not have it, we shall be beaten. Will you lend us your savings? He believed in the people, he trusted in them; when every other face was clouded, he stood in the sun. The people met him with an equal courage, and freely gave him all the money he wanted. On the day after the assassination of Mr. Lincoln more money was poured into the Treasury than was ever given to any government in a single day. This was a free offering; but it will easily be understood that, before these popular loans could be induced, the people had to be educated to understand the method and appreciate the value of the security. To do this, required a prodigious amount of work, and Mr. Chase gave himself up to the task with all his energies, fortunate in the aid of such men as Jay Cooke, Chittenden, and Spinner, and many other good men and true less publicly known. Of later events in the life of Mr. Chase, this is not the place to speak. Rumor has for many months coupled his name with ambition, and has not forborne to encircle the ermine that the Chief-Justice wears, by imputations that we, at least, will not believe till they are proved. The men among us who have been faithful in every ordeal, who have never failed from duty, are not so many that we can afford to lose even one. It is our duty to stand by them-to be true to them, as they have been true to us. MONTHLY CHRONICLE. UNITED STATES. CURRENT EVENTS. THE month of May was crowded with events of importance in our history, chief among which are the close of the Impeachment trial of the President, the meeting of the National Republican Convention, and nomination of Grant and Colfax, the consummation of the Congressional plan of Reconstruction in several Southern States, so far as the action of the people of the States is concerned, the arrival of Minister Burlingame as ambassador from China to all the treaty-making powers, the annual anniversaries of all the religious and philanthropic societies in New York, an annual conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church at Chicago, the retirement of Secretary Stanton from the War Department, the confirmation of General Schofield as Secretary of War, and the singular revelation, by the testimony of Mr. Weed and others, of the efforts made to procure the votes of Senators for acquittal by direct bribery. -The arguments of the Impeachment trial closed on behalf of the President by an address occupying nearly four days by Mr. Wm. M. Evarts, and on behalf of the managers by a three days' address by Mr. Bingham. Mr. Evarts spoke extemporaneously and with more humor than argument, relying upon tact in securing the kind feeling of the Senators toward the President rather than on logic in persuading their understandings. Mr. Bingham's speech was ornate and exhaustive. On May 6th the arguments ended and the case was submitted to the Senate. After a prolonged secret session and arguments by the Senators, on May 7th, the Senate agreed to come to a final vote on the eleventh article on Tuesday, May 12. As early as the latter part of April it had been assumed by the opponents of Impeachment that Senators Grimes, Fessenden, and Trumbull would vote for acquittal, but the fact was not authoritatively announced until the Senatorial debate of May 7th. From this time to the final vote an interest prevailed throughout the country equalled only by the profound excitements and unutterable anxiety with which the issue of the great battles of the rebellion was awaited by the people. Great confidence was VOL. II.-8 felt in the integrity and impartiality of the Senate, and while a very strong element of partisanship characterized the more pronounced Republicans and Democrats, there was a medium impartial sentiment among the press and people at large, very much more powerful than is usually found in regard to questions involving political consequences. While no Democrats in or out of Congress favored conviction, a few Republicans favored acquittal, and a very large number preferred to regard the proceeding as a judicial trial rather than as a political inquest, and to be content with whatever disposition of the case the Senators upon their oaths might make. Nevertheless, a very general conviction prevailed that the President would be removed, and both those opposing and favoring removal were actively canvassing the probable cabinet and other appointments of Mr. Wade, when the divergence of three of the most prominent Republican Senators roused the country from a state of comparative calm to one of intense interest. This increased until, on May 16th, the vote was taken on the 11th article of Impeachment, with the following result: For Conviction-Anthony, Cameron, Cattell, Chandler, Cole, Conkling, Conness, Corbett, Cragin, Drake, Edmunds, Ferry, Frelinghuysen, Harlan, Howard, Howe, Morgan, Morrill (Me.), Morrill (Vt.), Norton, Nye, Patterson (N. H.), Pomeroy, Ramsey, Sherman, Sprague, Stewart, Sumner, Thayer, Tipton, Wade, Willey, Williams, Wilson, Yates, 35. For Acquillal-Bayard, Buckalew, Davis, Dixon, Doolittle, Fessenden, Fowler, Grimes, Henderson, Hendricks, Johnson, McCreery, Norton, Patterson (Tenn.), Ross, Saulsbury, Trumbull, Van Winkle, Vickers, 19. The President was therefore acquitted by a single vote. The Republicans voting to acquit were Fessenden, Fowler, Grimes, Henderson, Ross, Trumbull, and Van Winkle. The Senate then postponed the vote on the remaining articles to May 26th, when the vote was taken with the same result upon the second and third articles, whereupon the Senate, sitting for the trial of the Impeachment of Andrew Johnson, adjourned sine die. -The Republican National Convention met on May 20th, at the Opera House, in Chicago. It is the first Republican Convention in which delegates were present from all the States of the Union. General Schurz acted as temporary and General Hawley as permanent chairman. The first day of the session was occupied by organization, the appointment of committees, the preparation of a platform, canvassing for Vice President, and speeches. The resolutions of the Soldiers and Sailors' Convention, then in session, nominating General Grant for President, and condemning the course of the seven Senators whose votes acquitted the President, were received. On the 21st the National Convention reported its platform, originally in twelve resolutions, as follows: 1. Endorsing the reconstruction policy of Congress on the basis of equal civil and political rights to all, and pledging to mantain it. 2. Placing equal suffrage to loyal men at the South on the ground of public safety, and leaving the suffrage question in the loyal States to the people thereof. 3. Denouncing repudiation and pledging payment of the National debt according to its letter and spirit. 4. Equal and reduced taxation. 5. The gradual payment of the debt and reduction of rates of interest. 6. Best way to lessen the burden of the debt is so to improve our credit as to borrow it at lowest rates of interest. 7. Economy and reform of the corruptions of the present administration. 8. Deploring the death of President Lincoln and condemning the administration of President Johnson, who has been justly impeached for high crimes and misdemeanors, and properly pronounced guilty thereof by the votes of thirty-five Senators. 9. Guaranteeing protection to naturalized citizens. 10. Pledging substantial gratitude to the soldiers and sailors of the war for the Union. 11. Immigration should be encouraged. 12. Sympathy for all oppressed peoples. To which were added, on motion of General Schurz, resolutions favoring the removal of all disabilities from rebels who coöperate in reconstruction and endorsing the principles laid down in the Declaration of Independence. After the adoption of the platform, General Logan, as chairman of the Illinois delegation, nominated Gen. Ulysses S. Grant, who, upon a call of the States and Territories, received every one of the 650 votes of the Convention, and was declared unanimously nominated amid the wildest enthusiasm. On the first ballot for Vice President the vote stood as follows: Wade, 149; Fenton, 132; Wilson, 119; Colfax, 118; Curtin, 52; Hamlin, 28; Speed, 22; and several scattering. On the fifth ballot the vote was Colfax, 522; Fenton, 75; Wade, 42; Wilson, 11; Total, 650. On motion of General Cochrane, chairman of the New York delegation, the nomination of Schuyler Colfax was made unanimous. The nominations are received with spontaneous accord by the party. -Alabama, Georgia, North and South Carolina, Louisiana, Florida, and Arkansas have passed upon the new constitutions, each of them giving a large majority for ratification. In Alabama, however, the constitution failed of adoption, owing to a peculiarity in the Reconstruction law requiring the majority of the registered voters to vote on the question. An act providing that these States should be admitted to the Union, under these constitutions, and with the State officers recently chosen, when each shall ratify the XIVth amendment, provided that no law or constitutional amendment excluding present voters from the suffrage shall hereafter be passed by any of them, and that those portions making void debts due prior to 1865 shall not apply to debts due loyal men, passed the House of Representatives on May 14th, by a vote of 108 to 35. The attempt to strike out Alabama because, under the law, the constitution had been defeated in that State, failed. -The testimony of the eminent journalist and politician, Mr. Thurlow Weed, before the Investigating Committee, relative to the alleged use of corrupt means to obtain the President's acquittal, does not bring corrup tion home to any particular Senator, or to the Senatorial body, but shows that at least $20,000 were raised in New York and Cincinnati for the purpose of corrupting Republican Senators. Mr. C. W. Woolley, the principal actor in the affair, refuses to testify what became of this money, or to whom he paid it. He has therefore been placed in close confinement by order of Congress. -The first triennial festival of the Handel and Haydn Society was held in the Boston Music Hall during the first week in May, opening on the 5th, and closing on the 10th. It was probably the most important musical celebration ever witnessed in this country, and both in an artistic and a pecuniary sense was entirely successful. Grand periodical |