The Nashville daily union. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1862-1866, 1862-07-18

ftthl we tlilloeilaia lnNu rev.
a Nice Constitutional Dimcuitv I |
Among the Rebel IRuIers.
There have always been among the
politicians Of the South the shrcwdest
casnists in Constitutional lore They
are wont TO split and divide, 10 refine and (
rciute, 10 discriminate aud eliminate
until the most shadowy propositions. re-
duced TO the minimum Of attenuation. /
became by no means too impalpable ar
eyanescent for the grasp Of their logic
They were forever gossiping, writing ana /
spouliug upon public ailairs, as il politics
chad caiched the Itch on purpose 10 be
scratched" They were a race of poliH.
casters By birth, education aud habit. IL
will be no easy matter, notwithstanding
their attempted transmigration into a new
organization. 20 repress the olden pro-
pensiiy. External pressure and internal
dictatorship may for q season subdue The
critical and disputatious tendcncv. hut h \
must come out The obstinate question
ings OF the Southern brain will ever and
anon burst into expression. The char
acter Of the minute logician cannot be
so suddenly doled
A very pretty Illustration Of all this
is found in the correspondence between
Governor Brown, Of Georgia, and Jenef-
son Davis, as printed in the Inquirer
few days ago. Brown became troubled
with constitutional quams on the subject
OF the Conscription Law, which he
straightway communicated to Davis. who
thcreupon became alarmed at the rising
symptoms of free thought just as
Richard Of old exclaimed The deen
revolving Duke Of Buckingham grows
circumspect" so Jefferson thinks, as he
PAGES his executive chamber that the
critics of his course are considering mat
tiers too curiously, that these delicate To-
gal investigations had better be speedily
checked, and that men had better not be
searching through his acts with eyes SO
prying, and with so much speculation in
them He accordingly plunges into the
question, and in a long episte, riyaling
the length of an annual message, strives
to show himself profoundly skilled in
analytic. AS the hymn says of the little
ant, he labors, and tugs and strives
through mazes and mud TO demolish
Brown. lie chews up clause after clause
Of the Rebel Constitution, and then, like
the juggler withribbons, splits them forth
again Of just such length and color as he
lists.
We may be assured that Jefferson
would not have expended so much
strength at this time upon question of
constitutional law, If grave and urgent
issues were not involved. The reader
may peruse the correspondence without
at first surmisiDg what that issue was;
but Jefferson saw it through the disguise;
and hence, still masking il himself, he
nevertheless practices, with his most
skillful logical fencing, to give II most
palpable hit. The Gorgon face, which
leers at the Presidential dictation be-
meath the questioning letter he is an
| swering, is the old spectre of State Rights,
which, in its malignity grins a horrible
| CHASTITY smile, as il conlronts the central
ism Of the Confedoracy, extenuated aud
exercised by those who had denounced
the centralism of the Union Brown arr
CUES strenuously that, under the new
| Constitution, the States have the power
| of appointing the officers Of the militia.
! and that this power would remain to the
| States, if the COnfederacy simply called
forth the militia of The several States.
| He admits that tho Confederacy has
power under its Constitution "t0 raise
and support armies" but contends that.
practically, the very object in the States
in roserving the power of appointing the
officers of the militia is defeated, and
that portion Of the Constitution is not
only nullitY, but the whole military
power of the States, and the entire con-
troll Of the militia, is vested in The Con-
ioderate Government, whenever it chooses
to call its own action "raising an army"
and not ealing forth the militia"
| JEFFERSON, of course, undertakes 10 put
down this heresy by claiming for the
Government the largest liberty ofcarry-
ing on a war, offensive and'defensiye, and
for this purpose of calling directly upon
its arms bearing population, without re-
gard 10 their being militia of the States.
1t is not for us to settle such great strfes
between a genuine Governor and bogus
President. We doubt not, however, that
many thoughtful mind in the South is
awakening to the reality that their Con-
federacy is not a Utopia, and that they
will be shortly and sorely haunted by
worse and more troublesome political
questions than those from which they
vainly imagined they were escaping. II
would be deserved retribuuon it the
unsurping leaders Of this Rebellion were
TO be pushed from their seats by a school
of politicians faithful 20 the doctrines
from which those leaders have so madly
apostatised.
Another Murder,