Lewistown gazette. [volume] (Lewistown, Pa.) 1843-1944, 1866-06-13

diate participation i'll the Government of
the United States And without waiting
10 ascertain whether the people they rep
resented would adopt even the proposed
amendments, they at once called elections
OF Representatives to Congress in nearly
all instances before All Executive had
been chosen to issue certificates OF cleo
ton under the State laws, and such cIec-
tiOns "a We're held We're ordered by the
conventions. Ia one instance ut least the
writs of election were signed by the pro-
visional governor GIaring irregularities
and unwarrapted assumptions of power
are manifest in several cases, particularly
in South Carolina where the convention.
although disbanded by the provisional
governor on the ground that it was a rev.
olutionary body, assumed to district the
State.
The report insists, with startling fierce,
that the insurgent States
should exhibit in their acts somatI,inc,
more than unwilling submission to an
unavoidable necessity; a feeling. if not
cheerful, certainly not offensive and def
ant, and should cyince an entire repudia-
ton of all hostility To the General Gov
ernment by an acceptance of such lust
and faTcTabie conditions as that Govern
naent shogd think the public safety de-
n4aMds. Has this been ta01Roo 7 ,et rs
hook at the facts shown 10Y the evidence
taken by the committee. Hardly had
the war closed before the people of these
insureCtionary States come forward and
hastily claim as Il right the privilege of
participating at once in that Government
which they had for years been fighting to
overthrow.
Allowed and encouraged by the Execu-
tive TO organize State governments, they
81 ence f39acVe in Pew'er kcading rebels. un-
repcntaRt ard unpardOned, excluding
with contempt those who had manifested
an attachment to the Union, and prefcrr-
ing III many instances those who had
rendered themselves the most obnoxious.
In the face of the law requiring an oath
which would necessarily exclude all such
men from federal Office, thev elect with
very few exceptions as Senators and Rel-
rcocntatircs ia7 Congress. men who had
actively participated in The rebellion. in
SEItngiy &c1ioaHCiEg the law as uncon-
stitlltiOna4.
~ X ols4E necessary TO Instance the cleo
ton tc the Senate of the late Vice Presi-
dent Of the Confedcracy. \ man who.
against his own declared convictions, had
lent all the weight of his acknowledged
ability and of his influence as a most
prominent public man to the causes Of
the rebellion, and who, unpardoncd rebel
as he Is, with that oath staring him in
the face, had the assurance to lay his Gre
dentials on the table of the Senate. Other
rebels of scarcely less note or notorietv
were selected from other quarters. Pre-
Tossing 40 repentance, g!orying apparcrt-
" III tiic Crinac they had comalttcd.
aNoWlng still, as the uncontr9diCtcd tcs-
timony Of Mr.. Stephens and MANY others
an Il tn T.,
doctrine ef secession, amd declaring that
they yielded only to necessity, they insist
with unanimous voice upon their rights
rs States, and proclaim that they will
submit to no conditions whatever prcIim-
mary to their resumption of power under
that Constitution which they still claim
the right to rcpudate.