The Lancaster gazette. [volume] (Lancaster, Ohio) 1863-1886, 1864-02-04

lengc you to name il! What has been
your realization Of liberty under the
rebel rule? I." ..-t
THE PENALTIES OF REBELLION,
Governor Hamilton next exhibits
the disasters which have followed Sc
cession: 'r a.H.
You have either been denied the
right to carry your cotton and other
products to the only market open to
you-the Mexican border-or you
have, when there, been shamclessly
plundercd by Government agents and
military commanders, who have thus
secured for themselves fortunes, now
safely deposited in foreign countries,
which they expect to enjoy while you
suffer the evils which they have en-
tailed upon you. Taxation in some
form has been visited upon you day
by day, until you are no longer able
to meet the demands of your mas
ters. And at last, when every appli-
ance to eXtort money from you had
failed to satisfy them, because of the
worthlessness ofthe currency they had
compelled you to accept, agents were
appointed TO call upon you at your
homes for one-tenth of your crops
the proceeds ofyour honest toll.
Martial law has been visited upon you,
and in every town and village, and
neighborhood, some petty despot ap-
pointed, to whose edicts you were re-
quircd to bow in meek submission
You have been denied the right to trav-
el through the community near your
homes on the most necessary business,
without the written permission of one
Of these tools of tyranny. You dare
not convey to market the product OF
your farms and your labor without
permission. Your wagons and teams
have been seized by government a.
gents at home and on the road to mar
lct, in order to compel you to sell
them your crops for a nominal price in
worthless paper No interest has been
secure and no right sacred. Law and
order no longer exist among you. '' =
The vicious and dcpraved-the mur-
derers and ruflians Of the country are
banded together in secret societies
known as "Sons of the South" and
are from day to day sitting in judg-
mcnt on the lives of the best citizens
'ofthe State.
/ Three thousand of your citizens
have perished because they loved good
government, and peace and order in
society perished as felons. They have
been hung, shot, and literally butch
cred; they have been tortured, in ma
ny instances, beyond anything know
in savage warfare.
Uncertainty, and gloom, and des-
pair are resting upon you to-day like
the frown of God. Are you in love
with this, and do you desire it to con-
tinue? .......
TIE AMNESTY PROCLAMATION.
Governor Hamilton next refers to
the Amnesty Proclamation, offering
pardon to all but the rebel leaders
and discusses that part of it requiring
the surrender Of slavery:
1t is true that negroes in Texas arc
legally free; but how docs this injure
you? If you yourselves are free the
fact of all other things being free also
will not impair your rights nor abridge
your privileges. The leveling process
so much complained of, is, indeed
very different fl ON that intended by
your masters; they intended to keeI
the negro in bondage, and reduce you
to the same condition. The Govern
ment of the United States has deter
mined that you shall continue free,
and to that end has deemed it neces
sary to give freedom to the slaves.
Your position in Government and
society will remain unchanged, thai
Of tho negro improved. Let those wht
feel concious that they cannot success
fully compete with the negro for the
prize of acknowledged merit and NOR
al worth, chafe and complain. The
man who is conscious of endowments
physical and mental, superior to The
negro, and who intends to employ
them for the good OF his country anC
his race, need feel no jealousy of thu
ncgro's freedom.
...a SLAVERY ARRAIGNED.
Governor Hamilton, continuing
f shows how slavery has retarded th,
I prosperity of Texas, how it had grow
! to be despotism, destroying all VIII,
dared to oppose it a h.. .
In our own State, during the sum
J mer and fall of 1860, according to tn
published account of the murderer
themselves, two hundred and fifty Q
$ our free citizens were hung as felons
{ and thousands driven from thei
homes and compelled to leave the Stat
! because they were suspected Of inf
t deity to slavery. And, finally, gath
s ering temcrity from its successful wa
9 upon the rights and lives ofits citizen
@ it lifted its unholy hand to destroy tn
s Government to whose protection
9 owed its power. In its efforts to &C
f complish this, you have only bee
@ considered as so much material TO b