* * * * *
Indeed, many of the statements we now read of the necessity of the wise
governing the weak and ignorant are almost literal reproductions of the
arguments advanced by the slaveholders of the South in defence of
slavery just preceding the outbreak of the Civil War. That divergence
from our original ideal produced the pregnant sayings of Mr. Lincoln, "A
house divided against itself can not stand," and its corollary, "This
nation can not permanently endure half slave and half free." He saw
dearly that American democracy must rest, if it continued to exist, upon
the ethical ideal which presided over its birth--that of the absolute
equality of all men in political rights. WAYNE MACVEAGH.