Bradford reporter. [volume] (Towanda, Pa.) 1844-1884, 1866-11-01

'haoo W AhioC bolH ~ idCb anu uC
trainers of that instrument were not idiots
yet idiots they would certainly have beer
if they had put into it clause declaring
" that no State, or combination Of States
which may at any time choose to get up an
armed attempt to overthrow the Govern
ment established by this Constitution, and
be defeated in the attempt shall forfeit any
OF the privileges granted by this instru-
ment to loyal States" But an interpreta-
tion of the Constitution which can be CON
celved OF as forming a possible part of it
only by impeaching the sanity of its fran.
ers cannot be an intelpretati which the
American people are morally bound to risk
ruin to support
! But even if we should be wild enough to
| admit the Johnsonian principle respecting
lnsurgent States, the question comes up as
to the Identity of the States now demand
ing representation with the States whose
rights of representation are affirmed to
have been only suspended during their re-
beliIo0. The fact would seem to be that
these reconstructed States are merely the
creations of the executive branch of the
Government, with every organic bond hope
lessy cut which connected them with the
'iA COhIC SOftIHultuGS anu
Ihey have only the names of the States
they pretend to be- Before the rebellion
they had legal people when Mr.. John
son took hold of them they had nothing but
dlsorganized population Out oi this
population he by his own will created
people on the principle, we must suppose,
OF natural selection. Now, to decide who
are the people Of State is to create its
very foundations to begin anew in the
the most comprehensive sense of the word: 4:
for the being of a State is more in its peo-
pie, that is, in the persons selected from its
inhabitants to be the depositaries Of it's po-
ltical power, than it is in its geographical
boundaries and area. Over this people
thus constituted by himself Mr. johnson
set provisional Governors nominated by
himself. These Governors called popular
conventions, whose members were elected
by the votes of those tn whom Mr.. John
son had given tue right Of suffrage and
these conventions proceeded to do what
Mr.. johnson dictated. Everywhere Mr..
johnson nowhere the assumed rights of
the States North Carolina was one of
these creations and North Carolina,
through the lips of its Chief Justice, has
already decided that Mr. johnson was an
unauthorized intruder and his work nuli-
ty; and even Mr.. Johnson's people of North
Carolina have rejected the cons nstituton
framed by Mr. Johnson's convention. Other
rebel communities will doubtless repudiate
his work as soon as they can dispense with
his assistance. But whatever may be the
condition of these new Johnsonian States
they are certainly not States which can
recover" rights which existed previous to
their creation. The date of their birth is t.
be reckoned, not from any year previous TO
the rebellion, but from the year which fol
lowed Its suppression. 1tmay, in old tines
have been polite trick Of shrewd politi-
clans to involve the foundations of States
IN the mists of a mythical antiquity, but
we happily live in an historical period, and
there is something peculiarly stupid or pc
cullariy lmpudent III the attempt of the
publicits of the Philadelphia convention to
ignore the origins of political societies., for
which, after they have obtained a certain
degree of organization, they claim such
eminent traditional rights and privileges
Respectable as these States may be as III
fant phenomena, it will not do to Methusah-
ize them too recklessly, or assert their
CHtoiiiD III 4HtSIiC utIu Dl6" II Will SldIlS
full grown.
1t is evident from the nature of the case
that Mr.. Johnson labors were purely ex-
perimental and provisional, and needed the
endorsement of Congress to be of any force
The only department of the Government
constitutionally capable to admit new states
or rehabilitate insurgent ones is the legis-
lative. When the Executive not only took
the initiative in reconstruction, but assum-
ed to have completed it ; when he present
ed has States to Congress as the equals Of
the States represented in that body when
he asserted that the delegates from his
States should have the right of sitting and
voting in the Legislature whose business
it was to decide on their right to admis-
sion when, in short, he demanded that
criminals at the bar should have seats on
the bench, and All equal voice with the
judges in deciding on their own case, the
effroutery of Executive pretensicn went be-
yond all bounds of congressional endurance
The real difference at first was not on the
question of imposing conditions-for the
President had notoriously imposed them
himself--but on the question whether or
not additional conditions were necessary to
secure the public safety. The President,
with that facility " in turning his back on
himself" with all other logical gymnasts
had pronounced an impossible feat, then
boldly took the ground that, being satisfied
with the conditions he had himself exacted,
tbs exaction Of conditions was unconstitu,
tional To sustain this curious proposition
he adduced no constitutional arguments,
but he left various copies OF the Constitu-
tion in each of the crowds he recently ad-
dressed, with the trust, we suppose, that
somebody might be fortunate enough to
find in that instrument the clause which
supported his theory. Mr. johnson, how
ever, though the most consequential of in
dividuals, is the most inconsequential of
reasoners =; every proposition which is evi-
dent to himself he considers to fulfil the
definition of a self-evident proposition but
his supporters at Philadelphia must have
known that. in affirming that insurgent
States recover their former rights by the
fact Of submission, they were arraigning
the conduct of their leader, who had noto-
riously violated those rights" They took
up his work at certain stage, and then,
with that as basis, they affirmed gen
eral proposition about insurgent States
which, had it been complied with by the
President, would have lett them no founda-