O God, to Thee."

[Illustration: Parade.]
Washington Inaugural Celebration, 1889, New York.
Parade passing Union Square on Broadway.

[1890]

At the opening of this its second century of existence the nation was
confronted by entirely new issues. Bitterness between North and South,
spite of its brief recrudescence during the pendency of the Force Bill,
was fast dying out. At the unveiling of the noble monument to Robert E.
Lee at Richmond, in May, 1890, while, of course, Confederate leaders
were warmly cheered and the Confederate flag was displayed, various
circumstances made it clear that this zeal was not in derogation of the
restored Union.

The last outbreaks of sectional animosity related to Jefferson Davis, in
whom, both to the North and to the South, the ghost of the Lost Cause
had become curiously personified. The question whether or not he was a
traitor was for years zealously debated in Congress and outside. The
general amnesty after the war had excepted Davis. When a bill was before
Congress giving suitable pensions to Mexican War soldiers and sailors,
an amendment was carried, amid much bitterness, excluding the
ex-president of the Confederacy from the benefits thereof. Northerners
naturally glorified their triumph in the war as a victory for the
Constitution, nor could they wholly withstand the inclination to
question the motives of the secession leaders. Southerners, however
loyal now to the Union, were equally bold in asserting that, since in
1861 the question of the nature of the Union had not been settled, Mr.
Davis and the rest might attempt secession, not as foes of the
Constitution, but as, in their own thought, its most loyal friends and
defenders.

[Illustration: Statue about three times life size on a 30 foot pedestal.]
Unveiling of the Equestrian Statue of Robert E. Lee, May 29. 1890.

[Illustration: Portrait.]
Henry W. Grady.

By 1890 the days were passed when denunciation of Davis or of the South
electrified the North, nor did the South on its part longer waste time
in impotent resentments or regrets. The brilliant and fervid utterances
on "The New South" by editor Henry W. Grady, of the Atlanta
Constitution, went home to the hearts of Northerners, doing much to
allay sectional feeling. Grady died, untimely, in 1889, lamented nowhere
more sincerely than at the North.

When Federal intervention occurred to put down the notorious Louisiana
Lottery, the South in its gratitud