Cedar Falls gazette. [volume] (Cedar Falls, Iowa) 1860-1895, 1866-03-02

end of one or two years. The Commit.
tee propose two years more. rhe order
was dated january, 1865, and we pro-
pose three years from that time, which
will expire January, 1868, or about two
years from this time. '
AUTHORITY FOR APPROPRIATIONS.
The Senator wants to know by what
authority you buy land or provide school
houses for these refugees. Have we not
been providing school houses for years?
Is there session Of Congress when acts
are not passed giving away public lands
for the benefit of schools? But that does
not come out of the Treasury, the Sena-
tor from Indiana will probably answer.
But how did you get the lands to give
away? Did you not buy them of the
Indians? Arc you not apprppriating
every session of Congress money by the
million to extinguish the Indian title,
money collected of his constituents and
mine by taxation? We buy the land
and then we give the land away for
schools. Will the Senator tell me how
that differs from giving the money!
Docs it make any difference whether
we buy the land from the Indians and
give it for the benefit of schools, or
whether we buy it from some rebel and
give--no, sir-use it for the benefit Of
schools, with n view ultimately of sell
ing it for ut least its cost? l believe /
would rather buy from the Indian; but
still If the traitor is to be permitted to
have title, we will buy it from him If
we can purchase cheaper. uaf~ .t.
TRUE ECONOMY. 81. .....
| Sir, it is matter of economy to do
this. The cheapest way by which you
can save this race from starvation and
destruction is to educate them. They
will soon become self-sustaining. The
report Of the Freedmen's Bureau shows
that to-day more than seventy thousand
black children are being taught in the
schools which have been established in
the South. We shall not long have to
support any of these blacks out Of the
public treasury If we educate and fur
nish them with land upon which they
can make n living for themselves. This
is very different thing from king the
land of A and giving 1t to B by an act
of Congress. .. .Hm.l....
JUDICIAL AUTHORITY OF AGENTS.
But the Senator is most alarmed at
those sections ofrthis bill which confer
judicial authority upon the officers and
.
says if this authority can be exercised
there is an end to all the reserved rights
of the States, and this Gevernment may
do anything. Not at all, sir. The au-
thority, as I have already shown, to be
exercised under the seventh and eighth
sections is u military authority, to be
eXerted only i'm regions of country where
the civil tribunals are overthrown, and
not there after they are restored. 1t is
the same authority that we have been
exercising all the time in the rebellious
States.
THE CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT.
| But the Senator says that these Sec
tions, he supposes derive their authori-
ty, i'm my opinion, from the amendment
to the constitution of the United States.
Sir. | think that amendment does con-
fer authority to enact these provisions
into law and execute them not through
the military tribunals, but through the
judicial tribunals of any State Of the
Union. What was the object of the
constitutional amendment abolishing
slavery? 1t was not, as the Senator
says, simply to take away the power of
the master over the slave. Did we not
mean something more than that? Did
we not mean that hereafter slavery
should not exist, no matter whether the
servitude was claimed as due to an in.
diviiual OF the State? The Constitu.
tional amendment abolishes Just as ab.
solutely all provisions of State or local
law which make IL man a slave as IL
takes away the power of his former mas.
ter to control him. ...
If the construction put by the Sena-
1 tor from Indiana upon the amendment
be the true one, aud we have merely
taken from the master the power to
control the slave, and left him ut the
mercy of the state to be deprived Of his
civi! rights, the trumpet of freedom that
we have been blowing throughout the
land has given an uncertain sound, !"
and the promised freedom is delusion.
Such was not the intention ofCongress,
which proposed the Constitutional
amendment, nor is such the fair mean
/ ing of the amendment itself. With the
destruction of slavery necessarily fol-
lows the destruction of the incidents ~
| slavery. When slavery was abolished,
slave codes in its support were abolish
ed. ..HE r. ...s -. r....-
Those laws that prevented the colored
man going from home, that did not al
low him to buy or to sell, or to make
contracts; that did not allow him to
own property; that did not allow him
to enforce rights that did not allow him
to be educated, were all badges Of servi-
tude made in the interest of slavery and
as a part of slavery. They never would
have been thought of or enacted any
where but for slavery, and when slay-
cry falls they fall also. The policy of
the States where slavery has existed has
been to legislate in its interest; and out
Of Difference to slavery, which was toll
Grated by the constitution of the United
States, even some Of the non. .slavehold-
ing States passed laws abridging the
rights of the colored man which were
restraints upon liberty. When slavery
goes, all this system of legislation de-
vised in the interest of slavery, and for
the purpose of degrading the colored
race, of Keeping the negro in ignorance,
of blotting out from his very soul the
light of reason, ii that We're possible,
that he might not think, but know only
like the OK, to labor, goes with it.
Now when slavery no longer exists,
the policy of the Government is to leg
islate in the interest of freedom. Now,
our laws are to be enacted with a view
to educate, improve, enlighten and
Cbristianize the negro; to make him
an independent man; to teach him to
think and reason; to improve that
principle which the great author Of all
has implanted in every human breast,
which is susceptible of the highest cul-
tiyation, and destined to GO on enlarg-
Ing and expanding through the endless
ages of eternity.
have no doubt under this provision
Of the Constitution we may destroy all
these Determinations in civil rights
against the black man and If we can
not, our Constitutional amendment
amounts to nothing. It was for that
purpose that the second clause of the
amendment was adopted, which says
that Congress shall have authority, by
appropriate legislation, to carry into
effect the article prohibiting slavery
Who is to decide what that appropri-
ate legislation is to be? The Congress
Of the United States. And il is for Con-
gress to adopt such appropriate legisla-
ton as 1t may think proper SO that it be
a means to accomplish the end. If we
believe Freedmcn's Bureau necessary,
If we believe an net furnishing any man
who deprives a colored person of any
civil rights on account Of his color nee