Mieczysław Ledóchowski: NY Times Editorial June 24, 1874

It appears that the American Pilgrims have presented to the Pope an address sent from this country to that eminent ecclesiastical martyr, Archbishop Ledochowski, of Posen. Pius IX took occasion to say in reply that “the United States is the only country where he is really Pope in the eyes of the government.”

That, it must be added, depends entirely on circumstances. If the Sovereign Pontiff means that in this country his pretensions to infallibility and to the headship of the Christians world meet wit he same impartial toleration as would the alleged spiritual; sovereignty of the grand Lama of Tibet, or of Mumbo-Jumbo, he in unquestionably right: but if he means that he cold repeat, without interference, in the United States, any such experiment as that which was attempted in Posen, he would be clearly wrong. For example, the Pope conferred on Count Ledochowski, during the sitting for the Vatican Council, the title of Primate of Poland.

That there was a direct political attack upon the three great powers who hold slices of that dismembered kingdom, because the revival of an exploded spiritual dignity restored also the claim associated with it, of being regarded as regent of the kingdom during the vacancy of the throne. In fact, a German ecclesiastical almanac for 1872 includes Archbishop Ledochowski in the list of reigning sovereigns as representative of the King of Poland.

We may stigmatize the partition of Poland as an infamous piece of royal brigandage, and yet refuse to recognize the right of any ecclesiastical authority to keep alive, by this and similar means, hopeless and ruinous sedition among the subjects of any European power. The attempt was all the more imprudent, since the priestly agents by whom it was promoted were sustained by the pay of the State against which they were conspiring. Suppose “pontifical documents” had been used to fan the flame of disaffection in the South, the Government of this country would have been compelled to take very much the same position in regard to them as the Governments of Prussia, Austria, and other States have recently done. [paragraph splits and emphasis added]

http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=9502EEDC1139EF34BC4C51DFB066838F669FDE

What about:

the Vatican role in the assassination of U.S. President Abraham Lincoln?
the Vatican role in engineering World War 1 and 2, plausibly to resurrect and then to "cleanse" Poland?


Should not the New York Times have shown a continuing interest in the origins of the holocausts of WW2?