The Columbian. [volume] (Bloomsburg, Pa.) 1866-1910, 1867-10-04
SPEECH OF
HON. G. R. BUCKALEW,
Delivered IN he Court House, bloomsbury,
Saturday Evening, September 28th
REpoRTED by j. j. MURPHY.

and continued four years between tn
Northern and Southern sections of ou
country came to an end in April, 1865
at least, lit then came to an endas mill
tary question. There are, however, per
sons among us who seem to labo
under the impression that it has contin
ucd down to the present time, and tina
IL Is yet in existence, for they support
and applaud measures of national policy
which are based upon the idea that tha
war Is yet in existence, and that certain
legal principles consequent upon wal
therefore continue and justify peculiar
measures of public policy. A thing sC
absurd as this does not require debate
does not require refutation in any in
telligent community in any section ot
our country.
Cnquestionably our great civil war, Il
| war Of uneXampled magnitude in the
New World, n war the burdens and the
passions of which reached every COM
munlty and almost every iireside in the
land, did both in point of fact and in
point of law terminate in April, 1865, by
(he surrender of those armies which un-
derdistinguished Military commanders,
IL mean distinguished in point of abil.
| ty,-had been arrayed against us in the
southern country and had for years con-
|
doubtful in its issue, and causing the
deepest apprehensions among all of us
concerning the continuance of our Re
publican system Cf government and of
| the Union with which it was associated.
| The armies of Lee and Johnston sur
| rendered. The few vessels which the
| Confederate government had sent out
| as privateerS were also either surren-
dered or were fleeing from our armed
vessels of war in remote seas and i'm dis
! tant oceans. Those armies surrendered
to General Grant and to General Sher-
| man upon single condition and what
was that? That so long as they con-
Quoted themselves peaceably and did
not resist the authority of the United
States, they should not be molested
or called in question in any way
whatever by the United States
That parole which was taken by
the whole of the Southern Confeder-
ate forces then in the field has been kept
both in spirit and in letter down to this
day. Nobody can question that there
has been no further resistance to the ar
mics ofthe United States, and there has
been no resistance to the civil authority
of the United States. Our courts have
uninterrupted jurisdiction over the
whole of the South. Nay, so COM
plete, so universal has been this ac-
quiescence in our authority that even
that Military Government which was
established by act of Congress in March
last, and which is now in existence in
the Southern States, and which bears
with Il severe and heavy hand upon the
populations i'm that section, is submit
ted to without question and without
complaint. If there ever was people
in any period of the history of the
world and in any country upon its broad
surface whokept faith, who performedan
obligation assumed by them, the people
of the South are that people with refer
ence to the agreement which was made
between their leadersa and General Grant
and General Sherman who represented
the Federal Government in the field,
and whose agreement with the COnfed-
crate forces was approved by the execu-
tive administration at Washington, and
accepted without complaint or objection
throughout the country by the Ameri-
can people.
The war then, gentlemen, ended in
April 1863. What was achieved by that
war? What was accomplished by it:
You are rs competent to judge of this
question ms the profoundcst lawyer or
statesman in the country, because it
requires for its solution nothing but
good sense, good common judgment
undisturbcd and unperverted by pas
sion and prejudice. This is all that is
requisite. Now what was accomplish
ed By the war? We would suppose,
gentlemen, that the object of the war
was accomplished when victory was
achieved.
Now then we go back to the question,
what was the object OF the war which
we prosecuted so long and ut such cost
to ourselves, in which we expended
half million OF precious lives and
poured out treasure by hundreds of mil,
lions and incurrcda debt btofuneXampelcd of
world that is, as debt incurred with
in the same period of time? Why did
we arm ourselves? why did we clothc
ourselves with the terror and thunder
of battle and rage freely and vio-
lcntly throughout the Southern country
until the people there were thoroughly
subdued and humbled before us: We
announced to the world the reason of
our conduct and the object we had in
view; and, stated in a single sentence,
it was this: we went to war and we
waged war to preserve the union of
the American States. That was our
announced purpose, and because we
announced ii our fellow citizens every
where throughout the adhering States
came forward with alacrity to uphold
the arm of the Federal power in the
struggle. Individual means We're
contributed voluntarily; appropriations
of money were given ungrudgingly both
| in Congress and in the Legislatures OF
| the States a Sanitary Commission
| nj .,th oh r a. =
! drawing heavily upon the liberality OF
| the people. Nay, so patriotic and deter
mined were our population in that great
war, that although the political majorl-
ty which controlled the Federal Ad-
ministration by which it was managed,
misconducted itself as we supposed, +,
descended to many acts Of maladminis-
| tratiOn and Of abuse of power on peace
| full citizens, and deprived our people OF
| their constitutional rights and privile-
ges--notwithstandin all these things
and many others which ! will not stop
| to enumerate, there was, rs question
of honest fact to be written down in his
| tory, q general concurrence in carrying
on the war and in supporting the au-
thorities to whom its management had
been committed and WHO had the legal
right to control it.
If these charges of disloyalty, which
have been heard so long and which are
yet impudently repeated, upon nearly
one -halfthe population of Pennsylvania
and of the other Northern States, had
been true if they had represented the
actual fact as it stood during the war,
that war would have had widely diff
| forent conclusion and termination. In-
stead of victory, there would have been
defeat Instead M the subjugation OF
our enemy, we ourselves would have
failed in the war, and with shame and
humiliation we would have been obliged
to submit to the inevitable, and with
reluctance, if not grief to take up our
future national course as fragment OF
a country rs severed fragment only
Of that Union of which we had formerly
ly constituted an integral part. No;