Fayetteville observer. [volume] (Fayetteville, Tenn.) 1850-1966, 1866-11-08
FAYETTEVILLE, TENN;
Thursday Morning, November 1885,
The Baltimore Trouble.


most of us, and the Radical jour-
nails make the obscurity ten times
more obscure by falsifying the
plainest facts in order to create
partisan capital. What is the
trouble itself? What is it about?
What is the actual state of the
case without any political bias on
one side or the other? We hear
these questions put up every day
by honest people who cannot COM
prehend the confused statements
given, and are not willing to &C
cept in good faith the perversions
of truth manufactured for political
effect. Suppose we briefly and
impartially"post" the reader, there
fore, on the interesting subject.
I0aprlnalS, then, as Maryland
was a "border State" much affect
ed with the spirit of rebellion, the
''loyaP' few contrived to exclude,
by law, all electors from the regis
try but themselves. This plan
worked we'll during the war; but,
in order to keep possession Of the
reins of authority, the Radicals
still insist upon monopolising the
franchise, though it is admitted
that they comprise but small
proportion of the population, and
disfranchise thousands of Conser-
vative electors who have never
been rebels in any proper sense.
In Baltimore, for instance, the
number of legal voters is forty
thousand, but at the recent local
elections the Radicals allowed no
other party to poll vote, and con-
sequently only five thousand were
found in the llot-box-that be-
ing the total strength of the mi
nority which, by its own interpre-
tation of the law, rules with a
rod of iron the metropolis of that
State, AS the remaining thirty
five thousand electors think they
have rights which should not be
ignored, and as they conceive that,
under just construction of the
law as it stands, at least ten or fif-
teen thousand of them are un-
questionably entitled to the ballot,
and have been defrauded out of it
by the police commissioners of
Baltimore, those gentlemen have
been accused before the Governor
with grave misconduct in Office,
and their trial, as well as their re-
movai, if found guilty, demanded,
The Governor of the State has CT
ted them to appear for trial; but
these commissioners refuse to sub
NIT to the executive authority, and
hence the Governor proposes to go
on with their trial, whether they
put in or not a defence to the char
ges made against them.
The Radical friends of the COM
missioners, we are sorry to say,
endorse their characterization, and,
what is more, arm themselves and
call upon all returned soldiers of
their political faith to organize and
resist by force the State authority!
The Radical press of Philadelphia,
as well as of Baltimore, has open
ly called upon their partisans to
march, fully armed for battle, to
defy the legal power of the State,
even when legally employed,
should it attempt to remove these
commissioners, on conviction, from
office! In this dilemma the Gov
ernor of Maryland calls on the
President to aid him, should that
State be invaded or an Instruction
arise, to maintain the majesty of
law, and General Grant has said
that, as the head of the federal
forces, he shall do his duty and
put down the insurgents without
regard to party ties or partisan
proclivities. On Friday, 26th, the