Semi-weekly standard. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1853-18??, 1862-11-14
For the Standard.


Mr.. EDITOR I'm 1860, DR.. j. T. Leach was.
candidate for the Legislature in the county of John
Ston. While he was osnvaSsing the countys he
made a speech in the Court House in Smithtield in
which he advocated ad OdIorem taxation-and in
this speech he made use ofthe following language
Fellow citzens-There are corrupt and designing
men in the South, and in the North, whose aim and
object is to dissolve this great and glorious Union
and, if they succeed in their wicked and nefarious
designs, | tell you here to-day that long, bloody
and desolating war will be the result Should .
catastrophe dreadful and so cslamious beal this
country, who would fight the Northern enemy p
Would it be the rich man, and the large slave
holder? No, gentlemen not the rich-not the large
slave-holder-6ut the poor hard-working, UMPIRE.
tending men of the South would be compelled to
shoulder their muskets in defence of the South,
while the rich would resort to every conceivable
stratagem to keep them from going into war; For
this speech DR.. Leach was dennunced and calumn-
ated by many of his political opponents in this
county. Some Of them even had the audacity and
meanness to say that he should have been takeh BY
violence f:oG the roStrnm-Others, no less mean.
contemplate and malignant expressed doubts about
his loyalty and fidelity to the South. Now, sub
nit to any candid. intelligent man if time has not
proven. the truth Of DIR. Leachs speech.
The CONSUMPTION act Of the Confederate Congress
exempts all owners Of twenty or more slaves, for
the as the advocates of this clause of the act
say the necessity Of the public demands it. They
cannot see that there is q necessity for the poor,
hard.workrng mans mpton-although he has
wife and seven or eight children whose bread
and clothing depends entirely upon their fathers
industry. There is necessity, they say, for the
poor, aged in6rm and decrepid widows son. who
has the sole charge Of her business, and who holds
her aged and reelIng head in sickness. Since the
passage of this act large shareholders who ex-
empt by age have given their sons twenty slaves
in order to evade the operation of this act Of Con-
gress and in sdme cases where the son did not own
a single slave-in other cases, where the son had
from ten to fifteen slaves the father would give him
enough to make the number twenty. In other
cases, where men had few less than twenty, and
father other relative to give them slaves, they
have purchased slaves to keep out of this war,
der this abominable act Of the Confederate Con-
gress And in other cases where man has a num-
Der of slaves less than twenty he claims exemption
upon the ground that his father, mother or other
relative has slaves in the same neighborhood, which
added to his make twenty slaves. These are facts
within my own knowledge l therefore assert une-
quvocally, that the late CONSUMPTION act virtually
exempts nearly all slave owners.
And again: Men who are wealthy who have no
slaves or not enough to exempt them from this act
either hire substitutes or engage in some business
that will exempt them The Spectator and extor-
toner who was poor at the beginning of this war,
has no idea of going to war under the CONSUMPTION
act for the reason that he has made enough either
to hire substitute or to engage in some business
that will exempt him. There is class of young
men who generally manage so as to avoid shoulder
ing their muskets. l refer to the sons of dema-
gogues and politicians These young gentry never
did days work in their lives They have fair
and tender hands. 1t will not do for them to 60
into the war. with musket on their shoulders, but
they must have some office-and if they cannot get
an Office they frequently claim exemption upon the
ground of physical inability, brought on them in
many cases by Incidence and dissipation. Thus we
see that this bears harder upon the poor hard
working unpretending man, than upon any other
class Of our citizens. E.
Johnston Co. Nov. 3, 1852.