such insinuations I sincerely deplore; I should not deplore it were I really an enemy of the Administration.
My position with regard to the Administration is easily stated, and that statement will be a complete refutation of the charge of factious opposition. When General Grant was elected to the Presidency his mission appeared to me so exalted and enviable as to excite and satisfy the noblest ambition. I described that mission, as it stood before my mind, in the first speech I delivered in the campaign in 1868, and I desire to quote a few passages of it, not as though the ideas put forth might not be clothed in more fitting language, but in order to show that I have only adhered to the line of thought expressed before General Grant's election. In July, 1868, I said:
The nomination of General Grant for the Presidency was not the work of the politicians; it was the work of the people. The popular instinct pointed to him as the available man in the best sense of the term; that is to say, not only because his renown as a soldier would command for him the largest number of votes, but because General Grant was looked upon as the fittest man to do just the things which at present are to be done. To execute the laws and to secure the results of the Congressional policy of reconstruction is a task which might have been performed with judgment and vigor by any Republican President. But another thing is to be done. The great objects of the Republican policy are to be reached in a manner calculated to overcome the difficulties produced by passion and animosity, to bring forth willing submission on the part of our opponents and to restore the long lost cordiality of feeling.
The waves of passion are still running high, and nothing is more necessary than that the country should be brought back to an even balance of mind. The questions before us require calm thought and a considerate exchange of ideas. It is in vain to hope for this as long as Andrew Johnson is President. It would certainly be vain to hope for it if the Democratic party with all its impatient greed and pent-up vindictiveness
