The Potter journal. [volume] (Coudersport, Pa.) 1857-1872, 1866-03-27

man. Why, it was only on the 18th day of
January, 1866, when General Grant issued
this order:
General Orders, No. 3.
WAR DEPARTMENT, j
ADJuTANT GENERALS OFFICE.
| WAsHINGToN, January IL, 1866.
To protect persons against improper ciUh sutts
and penalties in the late re6eHiodS States.
Military division and department commanders
whose commands embrace or are composed of any OF
the late rebelious States, and who have not already
done So will at once issue and enforce orders pro
tectng from prosecution suits in the state or mu
nicipa courts of such State. all officers and soldiers
of the armies of the United States, and all persons
thereto attached, or in anywse thereto belonging
subject to military authority, charged with offences
for acts done in their military capacity or pursuant
to orders from proper military authority and TO pro-
tect from SUIT prosecution all loyal citizens or per
sons charged with offences done against the rebel
forces directly or indirectly. during the existence of
the rebellion and all persons, their agents and en-
ployees charged with the occupancy OF abandoned
lands plantatons the possession and custody of
any kind of property whatever, who occupied used,
possessed controlled the same pursuant to the or
der of the President, any of the civil or military
departments of the Government and to protect tn ern
from any penalties or damages that may have been
or may be pronounced or adudged in ssid courts in
any of such and also protecting colored per.
from prosecutions in any of said states charged
with offences for which white persons OF prose-
cuted or punished in the same manner and degree
By command of Lieutenant General Grant.
! E D. TOWNSEND, Asst AdJt Gen.
all the courts of the South all power over
these questions Has the President conf
dence IN their loyalty? Why, SIR he here
directly protects from disloyal courts and
from diSoyal officers the loyal men in those
States by the power of the bayonet. And
that order was issued on the 18th day of last
iJanuary-the very day upon which this reso-
ilution was introduced into this House. If the
President finds it necessary to direct the mill
itary power to sustain the operation of all
the civil courts in the South as against these
persons and TO annul their DEGREES, to stop
their processes, TO declare their judgment in
valid, it shows that Andrew Johnson holds in
the hollow Of his hand all the power of those
eleven States, or did hold it on the 18th day
of January last, FIVE months after this war
? was said to have been closed. Well, sir, he
did that simply because of these attempts to
prosecute these officers OF the United States
in their attempts 10 put down the rebellion.
Efforts were making all over the South on
the part of these disloyal courts to prosecute
the officers and agents of the Government
everywhere and the President, by his bavonets,
puts stop to all these proceedings. And Gen
eral Grant, too, has said that the war in the
South has not ceased. Well. then, they can
not be loyal States there cannct be loyal
communities there if the war is still going on !;
!, and this order of Gen. Grants shows that for
all military purposes it is still going on. And
he has said so directly. He has refused to
withdraw the troops. He has said that he
will withdraw them just as soon as the peo-
pie of the South have given evidence that
they will execute the laws of the land in an
orderly and loyal way. He has said that
f and now, instead of withdrawing thc troops
he issues still more stringent orders for their
activity and energy, and for the protection Of
loyal men.
There is another point in the gentleman S
speech to which desire to reply. 1t is one
that has been asseSted all over the South,
and repeated by every rebel in the South and
by rebel sympathizers in the North land
which shows their disloyal sentiment); it is a
charge which has been constantly made
against the poor and oppressed people of
that section, who have had to work all their
lives for peck of corn and pound of bacon
per week, and clothes not fit TO coyerany one,
but who have become free. The charge is
that those people are guilty of laziness i'm
providence and licentiousness. | know moth
ing about that last charge. The gentlemen
probably know more about that than we do
However that may be, say that the first two
! allegations in this charge are false. They
the blacks of the South, are not idle; they
are the only working people in all the South !;
they are the only industrious people in all
that land and they have been industrious
all the time, under great proVocation to be
otherwise, under great temptation to be idle.
They have been industrious from the time of
their freedom up to this time, whenever they
could be. Sir, speak from my own personal
knowledge when say they are the only in
dustrious people in that part of the South
through which had an opportunity of pass
ing. Since the last election, / made little
trip down through Virginia to Charleston,
and affirm that in the city of Richmond and
in every village and along every road trav-
/ eled they were the only men il the South
at work. They cannot load or unload a ship
or a two-horse wagon without the aid of
these despised colored men at least they do
not do it. They cannot run railroad nor
keep one IN repair without those colored men
and these are the only men to be seen at work
anywhere, either at the wharves, unloading
ships, on the few buildings undergoing re-
pairs, carrying the hod and sometimes laying
the brick, or upon railroads, keeping the
! track in repair, wheeling coal for the loco
motive and sometimes throwing it on the fire.
! There were not more than two white laborers
on any train that / was on anywhere in the
South. And, sir, they are doing intelligent
labor down there they are showing consid-
erable capacity for progress and Improvement.
On one occasion I walked through the mar
xet house of Charleston and ! saw there a
large number of people selling meats and veg
etabes and other products needed to supply
the wants of such city, and | noticed that
most of these people engaged in selling these
articles were colored. Impelled by feeling
of curiosity, | started back and went through
the market house for the purpose of counting
the white men thus engaged and out of
| about five or six hundred men and women
there engaged in supplying the city of Charles
ton with something to live upon, there were
just ten white people, all the rest being black,
and the blacks being the most intelligent,
genteel and well behaved. Those people SUP
piled the city in all its provisions. They