Daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, Va. [W. Va.]) 1859-1865, 1864-01-25
To the linton Men OF rms city.

certain members of the City Council last
Saturday night.
1t will be seen by an ordinance which
we publish this morning that a meeting of
a portion OF the Council was held Saturday
night, and that al ordnance was, at that
last hour and last chance before the
election day, proposed and put through
which takes away from the soldiers who
are residents and voters here the right
which they have under the general election
law of the State to vote to-day. By this
last-hour and last chance piece of dis
loyal work, every soldier who has gone
forth from our midst to protect this city
from invasion, has been, in defiance of the
laws of the State, stripped at q blow OF his
franchise aud degraded as Citizen
Under this ordinance the vote of Carlin's
Wheeling Battery, now at New Greek, and
others of our soldiers, cast and sent in
according to the forms laid down in Sec
tion 26, page ll9, of the acts of the Leg
islature, passed at the last session, is to
be thrown out of the ballot box to-day.
It's difficult to speak of this high hand
ed proceeding with any degree of forbear-
ance. We feel that the Union men of this
city have cause for extreme indignation
to-day. 1t they do not rise up and shake
off every vestige of apathy still remaining
with them, and rebuke the desperate and
dislOyal meu who have in this fragrant
manner attempted to continue the rule of
Secession in our midst, then we shall de-
sPAir utterly of every possible appeal to
them in the future.
The whole case we are called upon to
consider to-day is, briefly stated and as we
understand it, this: Last Monday night
the Council was specially convened for the
the purpose of recousidering the refusal of
the second branch, to make the forms of
elections in the city conform with those of
the State at large. AT that meeting the
vote of previous meeting by which the
second branch of the Council had refused
to repeal an old ordinance of the city pre-
scribing the viva voce system in elections,
was reversed, and it was enacted that the
voting should be hereafter by ballot. 1t
was further enacted
"That all the provisions of the laws of
this State shall be held to be applicable
to all elections within the limits of the
city"
The ordinance as passed gave entire sat-
isfaction to the Union men of the city, and
there was better feeliugtoward the Coun.
Gil in consequence of it than had formerly
prevailed, aud that, too, Notwithstanding
general belief that it :was only passed
under the firm conviction 10 the minds OF
many of those who voted for it that if til ey
themselves did not made the election laws
OF the city conform to those of the State,
the Legislature would do the thing for
them. This disposition to conform, did
not last long, however, and to the surprise
of everybody meeting was held last Sat-
urday night, the business of which, so far
Union man in the Council. and at that
meeting, it being the..last hour and the last
chance, cut and dried scheme was intro
duCed and put through by which the sec
ton above quoted was auuulled aud
stricken out of the ordinance passed
last Monday night.
The matter stands noW therefore this
way, viE-that whereas the City Council of
Wheeling last Monday night did agree and
did pledge their faith to the people of the
city
"That all the provisions of the laws OF
this State shall be held to be applicable to
all elections within the limits of the city,
They. the same men in part, last Satur-
day night, at the last hour before the cleo
ton. and when no subsequent full meeting
of the Council could be held, met together
and repealed their agreement and broke
faith with the people, and decreed that the
laws Ofthe State governing the forms of
elections should not b. recognized and hon.
ored in the elections of this city.
Now for the explanation. AS we stated
awhile back considerable number of SOL
diers' votes, taken aud sent in according IN
the form laid down in Sec. Goth page lis
of the acts Of the legislature, were known
to be 10 the city ready for to day. The
men who engaged in Saturday nights work
knew full we'll for whom and for what those
votes would be cast. They knew they
would be cast dead aud solid against them
aud all their affiliations and associations
to-day, aud they straightway determined
to get together aud rule them out. Aud
accordingly they met, aud in so far as any
enactment of theirs could do such thing,
they have ruled them out.
We do not regard the enactment of the
Council as worth a fig in legal point of
view. We regard the votes of our soldier