Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1856-06-05

this proud Caucasian blood, which you Doast.-
The profession with which you began, OF AH
bv the People, has been lost in the wretched re-
atty of Nothing for the People. Popular Sow
ereignty, in whose deceitfal name plighted faith
was broken, and an ancient Landmark OF Free
dom was overturned, now lifts itself before us,
like Sin, in the terrible picture of Milton,
,lTbat seemed woman to the waist, and fair,
But ended foul in many scay fold
Voluminous and vast, serpent armed
With mortal sting; about her middle round
A cry of hel-hounds ceasng barked
With wide Cerberean mouths full loud, and rung
A hideous peal yet, when they list, would creep
If aught disturbed their noise, into her womb,
And kennel there, yet there still parked and hoWIed
Within, unseen"
The image is complete at oil points; and, with
this exposure, | take my leave OF the Crime
against Kansas. .,.
Ii. Emerging from oil the blackness OF this
Crime in which we seem to have been lost as
in savage wood, and turning our backs upon
it, as upon desolation and death, from which,
while others have suffered, we have escaped,
come now to The APOLOGIES which the Crime
has found. Sir, well may you start ut the sug-
gestion that such a series of wrongs, so clearly
proved by various testimony, 80 openly confessed
by the wrong-doers, and so widely recognised
throughout the country, should find Apologies.
But the partisan spirit, now, as in other days
hesitates at nothing. The great Crimes OF his
tory have never been without Apologies. The
massacre of St. Bartholomew, which you now
inst!nctively condemn, was, at the time, ap-
| plauded in high quarters, and even comment
GRATED by Papal medal, which may still be
procured at Rome; as the Crime against Kan
eminence, has been shielded OH this floor by ex-
| Fam xunrds nd Nv Presidential
message, which, like the papal medal can never
be forgotten in considering the madness and per-
versity of man.
| Sir, the Crime cannot be denied. The Pres
dent himself has admitted illegal and repre-
hensibe" conduct TO such conclusion he was
compelled by irresistible evidence but what he
mildly describes | openly arraign. Senators
may affect to put it aside by Il sheer; or to rea-
son it away by figures; Or to explain 1t by
theory, such as desperate invention has produc-
ed on this floor, and the Assassins and Thugs of
Missouri were in reality citizens of Kansas ;
but all these efforts, so far as made, are only
tokens of the weakness Of tho curse, while to
the original Crime they add another offence Of
false testimony against innocent and suffering
men. But the Apologies for the Crime are
worse than the efforts at denial In cruelty and
hcartlessness they identity their authors with
the great transgression.
They are four in number, and four fold in
character. The first is the Apology tyrdnn'cal :;
the second, the Apology imbec,le; the third. the
Apology absurd and the fourth, the Apology
Infamous This is all Tyranny, imbecility
absurdity, and inlamy, all unite to dance, like
the weird sisters, about this Crime
The Apology tyrannical is founded on the
mistaken act Of Gov. Reeder, in authenlicatng
the Usurping Legislature, by which it is assert-
ed that, whatever may have been the actual
force or fraud in its election the people of Kan
sag are efectually concluded, and the whole
proceeding ID placed under the formal sanction
OF law. According to this assump ion, COM
plant Is now in vain, and it only remains that
Congress should sit and harken to it, without
correcting the wrong, as the ancient tyrant lis
tened and granted no redress to the human
moans that issued from the heated brazen bull
which subtle cruelty had devised. This call
the Apologize technicality inspired by tyranny.
The facts on this head are few and plain
Gov. Reeder, after allowing only five days for
object 0ns to the rctulns--a space OF time UNI
reasonably brief in that extensive Territory
declared u majority of the members OF the Conn-
Gil and Of the House Of Representatives duly
elected, withheld certificates from certain 9th
ers, because OF satisfactory proof that they were
, not duly elected, and appointed day Tor new
elections to supply these vacancies. Afterwards
by formal message, he recognised the Legisla-
, ture as legal body, and when he vetoed their
act Of adjournment to the neghborhood of Mis-
souri,, he did it simply on the ground OF the H.
q legality Ct such an adjournment under the or
ganic law. Nov, to every assumption founded
on these facts there two satisfactory replies
first, that no certificate of the Governor can do
more than authenticate II subsisting legal act,
/ without of itself infIsing legality where the es-
sence Of legality is not already; and secoadly,
that violence or fraud. wherever disclosed WITH
' ates completely every proceeding. In denying
e these principles you place tho certificate above
the thing certified, and give perpetual lease
. to violence and fraud, merely because at an
ephemcral moment they were unquestioned.-
3 This will not do
Sir, am no apologist for Gov Reeler-
!, There is sad reason to believe that he went to
Kansas originally as the tool of the President
but lis simple nature, nurtured in the atmos-
>. phere Of Pennsylvania. rcyoted at the service
required, and he turned from his patron to du-
g ty. Ghievously did he err in yielding to the
A Legislature any act of authorization but he
has in some measure answered for this error by
determined efforts to expose the utter illegality
4 of that body which he now repudiates entirely
= 1t was said of certain Roman Enperors, who
n did infinite mischief in their beginnings, and in
y finite good towards their ends, that they should
never have been born, or never died and
would apply the same to the official life OF th!s
Kansas Governor At all events, dismiss thu
!. Apology founded on his acts, as the utteranct
q of tyranny by the voice of law transccndlns
n the declaration of the pedanlc judge, in thu
~ British Parliament, on the eve OF our Revon
n ton, that our fathers, notwithstanding tlci
= complaints, were in reality represented in Par
) Lament, inasnuch as their lands under tn
, original charters, were held Sc in common soclge
IS us of the manor OF Greenwich in Kent" whiet,
If being daily represented, Carried with it all th
IF Colonies. Thus in other ages has tyranny us
"a sumcd the voice OF law.
Of Next comes the Apology imJcc'le, which j
II founded on the alleged want of power in tn
le President to arrest this Crime. 1t is openly as
D. serted, that under the existing lawsof the Uni
Y, ted States the Chief Magistrate had no author
ity to interfere in Kansas for this purpose. Sue
al is the broad statement, which, even if correct
of furnishes no Apology for any purposod ratfca
e. ton Of eCrime bat which is in reality untrue
lie and this, call the Apology of imbecility.
- In other matters, no such ostentatious imbe
a. cilty appears. Only lately, a vessel of war il
H. the Pacific has chastised the cannibals of tn
Fejee Islands, for alleged outrages on America
ry citizens. But no person of ordinary intell
r gence will pretend that American citizens in th
of Pacific have received wrongs from these canni
r balls comparable in atrocity to those received b
he American citizens in Kansas. All sir, the III
: terests of Slavery are not touched BY any cbas
to tisemeut of the Fsjees.
of Constantly we are informed of efforts at Ne,
Is York, through the agency of the Government
"a and sometimes only on the breath of suspicion
ct to arrest vessels about to sail on foreign voyage
lis in violation OF our neutrality Laws or treat.
of stipulations. Now, no man familiar with til