The Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1860-1888, 1866-09-13
Appeal of the Loyal Men of the South to
their Fellow- citizens of the United States.

w ~, bean SHARED the cruelties ofthe Rebellion
and the direct horrors of civil war. Here, on
the spot where Freedom was pronerea ana
nIedred by the Fathers of the Republic, we
iEmnIore your help against recognized OPP
weston whose sole object is to remit the con-
trol of our destinies to the contrivers of the
Rebellion after they have been vanqulshed IN
honorable battle; thus at once to punish us for
our devotion to our country and to intrench
themselves in the official Notifications OF the
Government.
Others have related the thrilling story of our
wrongs from reading and observation. We
come before you as unchallenged witnesses,
and speak from personal knowledge our sad
experience. If you fail us we are more utterly
deserted and betrayed than if the contest
had been decided against us; for in that case
even victorious Slavery would have found
profit in the speedy pardon of those who had
been among its bravest foes. Unexpected per-
fidy in the highest place in the Government,
accidentally filled by one who adds cruelty to
and forgives the guilty as he pro-
scrlbes the innocent, has stimulated the almost
extinguished revenge of the beaten conspira-
tors, and now the Rebels who offered to yield
everything to save their own lives, are seeking
to consign us to bloody graves. Where we
expected benefactor, we find prosecutor.
Having lost our champion, we return to you
who can make Presidents and punish traitors.
Our last hope under God, is in the unity and
frmness of the States that elected Abraham
best statement of our caseis the appalling yet
unconscious confession of Andrew johnson,
who, in savage hatred of his own record pro-
claims his purpose to clothe four millions of
traitors with the power to impoverish and de-
grade eight millions of loyal men.
Our wrongs bear alike on all races and our
tyrants unchecked by you, will award the
same fate to white and black We can remain
as we are only as interiors and victims We
may fly from our homes, but we should fear to
trust our fate with those who after denounc
ing ana defeating treason refuse to right those
who have bravely assisted them in this good
work. Till we are wholly rescued there is
neither peace for you nor prosperity for us.
we cannot better define at once our wrongs
and our wants than by declaring that since
Andrew johnson affiliated with his early SLAM
derers and our constant enemies his hand has
Deen lald heavily upon every earnest loyalist
in the South. History, the just Judgment of
the present and the certain confirmation of the
future, invite and command us to declare:
That, after neglecting his own remedies for
restoring the Union, he has resorted to the
weapons OF traitors to bruise and beat down
patriots;
That after declaring that none but the loyal
should govern the reconstructed South, he has
practlced upon the maxim that none but trait
ors shall rule
That while in the North he has removed CON
scientlous men from office, and filled many of
the vacancies with the sympathizers of treason,
| trusted patriot and selected the unqualified
and convicted traitor;
That, after brave men who have fought for
the old flag, have been nominated for positions
their names have been recalled and avowed
rebels substituted;
That every original Unionist in the South
who stands fast to Andrew ohnson's covenants
from 1861 to 1865, has been ostracised
That he has corrupted the local courts by of
fering premiums for the defiance Of the laws OF
Congress, and by openly discouraging the OBJ
servance of the oath against treason
That while refusing to punish one single con-
| spicuous traitor, though thousands had earned
| the penalty of death, more than thousand OF
devoted Union citizens have been murdered in
cold blood since the surrender of Lee and in
no case have their assassins been brought tC
judgment
| That he has pardoned some of the worst Of
| the rebel criminals north and SOUTH including
some who have taken human life under circum
stances of unparalleled atrocity;
| That while denouncing and lettering the op
erations of the Freedmen's Bureau, he, with a
| full knowledge of the falsehood, has charged
that the black men are lazy and rebellious, and
has concealed the fact that more whites than
blacks have been protected and fed by that no
bic organization, and that while declaring that
it was corruptly managed and expensive to the
Government, he has cOnnived at a system OF
| profigacy in the use of the public patronage
and public money wholly without parallel save
| WITCH lllc UTdlUOFb Tile treasury, ttn0
sought to dlsorganize and scatter the army and
J the money only to make it more easy to cap.
ture the Government
| That while declaring against the injustice OF
leaving eleven States unrepresented, he has re-
fused to authorize the liberal plan Of Congress,
simply because it recognizes the loyal majority
and refuses to perpetuate the traitor minority
| That in every State south of Mason and Dix
on's line his policy has wrought the most
deplorable onsequences--social,m moral and pc.
lltlcal. 1t has emboldened returned rebels to
| threaten civil war In Maryland, Missouri West
Virginia and Tennessee unless the patriots who
saved and sealed these States to the old flag
surrender before their arrogant demands. Ii
has corrupted high State officials, elected by
/ Union men, and sworn to enforce the laws
against returned rebels, and made them the
mere instrument ofthe authors of the rebellion.
| 1t has encouraged new alienation between the
sections, and by impeding emigration to the
South has erected formidable barrier against
| free and friendly intercourse III the North and
| West. 1t has allowed the rebel soldiery to per.
secute the teachers of the colored schools, and
| to burn the churches in which the freedmen
have worshipped the living God. That a sys-
! tenn so barbarous should have eliminated in
| the frightful riot at Mem Dhis and the still
more appalling massacre at New Orleans was
as natural as that bloody war should flow
| from the teachings of John c. Calhoun and
Jefferson Davis. Andrew johnson is respons-
ible for all these unspeakable cruelties, and as
he provoked so he justities and applauds them.
Sending his agents and emissaries into this re-
fined and patriotic metropolis to insist upon
making his reckless policy test upon a chris
tian people, he forgot that the protection ex-
tended to the 18th of August Convention in
Philadelphia was not only denied to the free
people of New Orleans on the Both of July,
when they assembled to discuss how best to
protect themselves, but denied amid theslaugh-
ter of hundreds Of innocent men. No page in
the record OF his recent outrages upon human
justice and constitutional law is more revolt
ing than that which convicts him of refusing to
arrest the preparations for that savage carnival
and not only of refusing to punish its authors
but of toiling to throw the guilty responsible
ty upon unoffending and innocent freedmen
The infatuated tyrant that stood ready to crush
his own people, in Tennessee, when they were
struggling to maintain government, erected
by himself, against his and other traitors per-
secutlons, was even more eager to illustrate
his savage policy, by clothing with the most
despotic power the rioters of New Orleans
Notwithstanding this heartless desertion and
persecution by Andrew johnson, the States of
Missouri, Kentucky, Tennessee, Western Vir-
ginia, Maryland and Delaware, imbued with
Democratic Republican neutrality-suspicious.
which the fathers of the Republic designed for
all America-are now making determined bat
tie with the enemies of free Constitutional
Government, and by the blessing of God these
States will soon range themselves in line with
the former free States, and illustrate the wis
dom and benefcence of the great Charter of
American Liberty by their increasing popula-
ton, wealth and prosperity in the remaining
ten States. The seeds of oligarchy, planted in
the Constitution by its slavery feature, have
grown to be monstrous power, whose recog-
milton thus wrung from the reluctant trainers
OF that great instrument enabled these States
TO entrench themselves behind the perverted
doctrine of State rights. and sheltered nv
claim OF Constitutional obligation to maintain
slavery in the States to present to the Ameri-
can ca; government the alternatives of oligarchy
Win slavery or Democratic Republican govern
ments without slavery. A forbearing Govern
iment, bowling to supposed constitutional be-
nest, acquiesced in the former alternative. The
hand OF the Government was STAYED for so
years. The principles of constitutional liberty
l1aIngmshed for want of Government support.
matured its power with subtle de-
sign. Its history for Sc years is replete with
injuries and usurpations; it devel-
op9d only the agricultural localities, geograph-
lcaily distinct from the free-labor localities, |
ana less than one-third of the whole, with At
rlcan slaves. 1t held 1000. 600 of hnman heiroe