The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1867-02-23
Congregational Reconstruction.

Congregational Reconstruction.
From the Nation.
At the end of the session, Congress has un-
dertaken in earnest the work of reorganizing
the Southern States; and both Houses have
passed bills designed to break up the Govern
ments organized by the President, and to sub
iect the Rebel States to military rule while
new Governments are being organized upon
the basis of universal suffrage. At the time
of our present writing, the two Houses have
failed to agree upon any precise measure; and
although there is no doubt that they will agree
upon something immediately the bill will
now be subject to the risk of pocket veto.
We are not without hope, however, that Mr..
Johnson will for once be wise enough to resist
the temptation to commit this act of folly, and
will either sign or openly veto the bill.
We stated last week the reasons for our
approval of the main features of the bill pro-
viding military government for the South.
The condition of society there is so thoroughly
unsound, and the forms of law are so syste-
matically perverted into oppression, and so
unblushingly overridden when perversion is
too troublesome a process, that it is a mockery
to refer any loyal man to an average Southern
court for Justice. The existing Governments
of the Southern States were founded by mill
tary power, exercised in totally unconstitu-
tional manner by the President, who usurped
to himself the whole authority of the Legis-
lature, and used powers conferred only for
the purposes of war to establish institutions
designed to be perpetual through times of
peace. Delay has so strengthened these
usurpations that they can be set aside only by
a vigorous exercise of the same military power
which set them up.
To effect this is the purpose of the 'Military
bill" " as it is commonly called; and with this
purpose we heartily sympathiZe. On account
of their origin in executive usurpation, their
total exclusion of the colored people, and
their practical exclusion of all loyal white
men, we are opposed to any kind of recogni-
tion of the de tdctO governments at the South.
We believe that the wicledness of their course
thus far, atrocious as it has been in Texas,
Mississippi, Louisiana, and elsewhere, is
mere trife compared with what it would
have been if Mr.. Johnson's policy had been
adopted by Congress; and we are unwilling
that the work of reorganization should be i'll
! any degree entrusted to men who have shown
| such malignity and bigOtry as the majority OF
| Southern officials.
But we have felt anxious that it should
appear not merely by speeches i'll Congress,
! but by the text of the law itself, that measure
SIlllBelll anu III 10TH 50
! purely transtionary in its nature, and intended
| to pave the way with all possible speed to q
reorganization of the States upon democratic
basis. Accordingly, in our judgment, the
amendment offered by Mr.. Blaine in the House,
and substantially adopted by the Senate,
greatly improved the bill. Nor do we suppose
that this amendment would have excited any
opposition but for its indiscriminate admission
| of disloyal men to the right of suffrage. This
is a point of no small difficulty, since without
such an administration of the law as cannot be
| boped for while Mr.. Johnson remains in Office
| it is vain to suppose that the loyal voters of
the South will have a fair chance at the polls.
Their enemies are, at least, nearly as nume-
rous, thoroughly organized, trained to political
action, in possession of all the wealth of their
| States and unscrupulous as to the means of
victory. We believe that all these advantages
will fail them in the long run, if they persist
in maintaining unjust laws, and administering
them as they now do. But we cannot wonder
that Southern radicals, like Messrs. Stokes
and Arnell, should be unwilling to adopt any
system of government which puts their necks
in present peril, no matter how confident they
may be that it will work benehcially for theiI
| posterity.
MIR. Eliot's bill for the reconstruction Of
Louisiana is much harsher in its operation
upon Rebels and Relel sympathizers than the
amendment to the Military bill, since it re.
ouires all voters to take the test-oath. This
Of course puts the government of the State
exclusively into the hands of those who have
always been loyal, three-tourths of whom are
colored people. This is too severe a rule not
to be highly injurious if permanently main
tanned; and the probability is that when once
established it would be kept up too long, anG
finally be broken down by wholesale perjury
as in Maryland, or nullified by the rising NJ
of new generation able to take any oath as
10 their freedom from acts of disloyalty, and
vet embttered by the exclusion of theil
Darents and friends. Months ago we urged
that no plan of mere exclusion would avail t.
deprive Rebels of power, and that the remedy
should be sought in the opposite direction
We are still of that opinion which has re
ceived strong confirmation from the tota
failure of the exclusive system in Maryland
and Kentucky, and the acknowledged certainty
of its failure in Tennessee, where it has owed
all its limited success to the intense zeal 0
Governor BrOwnlow.