The Bedford gazette. [volume] (Bedford, Pa.) 1805-current, 1862-09-26
THE CASE OF LEWIS BALLARD.

Imprisoned without guilt, held without
trial, liberated without reparation-that is
the damning record which Lewis Ballard
must write; an honest and loyal man, i'm
prisoned in Fort Lafayette by Provost Mar
shal Kennedy, under orders from Secretary
Stanton, for having been engaged in the
substitute agency business-only that and
nothing more. A policeman, whose badge
was concealed, stepped into MIR. Ballard's
office, where he was transacting business
not yet prohibited or proclaimed crime
his honesty guaranteed by such men as Bel
mont & Co., Hoyt, Spragues & Co., and
Daniel Drew, his loyalty proven by the
whole course of his life. The policeman
purchases an obligation to provide him with
substitute if drafted (such are the arts by
which Justice must reach its ends), then
shows his shield and takes Mr.. Ballard a
prisoner to the head quarters of Mr.. Ken
nedy. The Provost Marshal refuses to re-
ceive bail, sends his prisoner to the Fifteenth
ward station house-even denies him per-
mission to visit first his own residence. Not
merely was no trial granted-no warrant
was shown by the Provost Marshal. To "a
citizen of New York, one of the states of
constitutional Union, the oral statement of
an insolent and arbitrary officer was deemed
quite enough ground for consigning him to
the walls of Bastile and the companion
ship of traitors. He lies there for days,
and at last is released Internationally, with
out information as to the estimate of his
guilt, without bonds, without oath given or
required Indebted, perhaps, to the inter-
vention of powerful friends with member
of the cabinet for the liberation which, if
he was guilty, was not his due, and if he
was guiltless, was, in its manner, insult ad-
ded to outrage. This betell in New York
the chief city Of the nation---the very core
of its loyal heart.
The stones of the streets of city of era
vens should cry out at such scorn of her
honor, her loyalty and her citizens rights.
Imprisoned without guilt, for an act yet to
be pronounced.a a crime, arrested without war;
rant, incarcerated without trial, liberated
without reparation. In what other terms
than these do we phrase the high handed
ordainings of despotism? Is there any 9th
er language for the deeds of tyrants? Yet
this is republic, and these are the men of
the nations choice.
There are none to plead the cause of the
oppressed. The bar of New York is silent.
A phantom Provost Marshal opens and shuts
the doors of the harbor fort, and they are
dumb The fort is named for him who gave
to the father of his country the key of
Bastile which has perished, but the omen is
nought. The blood in their veins is milk.
The days go on. The administration
permits this monument of its shame to be
heaped higher-of dead civil rights and of
throttled liberties. Every hour offers it the
chance of atoning for the past and of estab-
fishing impregnable what only in an hour of
national peril it could have undermined
But every hour the shaft is driven deeper.
The crime is even clinched. For he who is
liberated goes free neither because he is
confessed guiltless nor because he has been
proved guilty; and the prisoners who re-
main, guilty or guiltless as he-not more,
not less-remain it would seem, that the
spotless majesty of Law may be sullied by
every ofense.- [K 7. World.