The daily phoenix. [volume] (Columbia, S.C.) 1865-1878, 1867-12-04

ize either by express words or by
clear implication. II the authority
we desire to use does not come to us
through the Constitution, we can
exercise it only by usurpation, and
usurpation is the most dangerous of
political crimes. By that crime. the
enemies OF free government in all
ages have worked out their designs
against public liberty and private
right. It leads directly and imme-
diately to the establishment of abso-
lutte rule; for undelegated power is
always unlimited and unrestrained.
The Acts of Congress in question
are not only Objectionable for their
assumption of ungranted power, but
many of their provisions are in con-
fiict with the direct prohibitions of
the Constitution. The Constitution
commands that Republican form of
government shall be guaranteed to
all the States; that no person shall be
deprived of life, liberty or property
without due process of law, arrested
without Judicial warrant, or punish
ed without q fair trial before an i'm
partial jury; that the privilege of
ha6eas corpus shall not be denied in
time of peace; and that no bill of at
tainder shall be passed, even against
single individual. Yet the system
of measures established by these Acts
OF Congress does totally subvert and
destroy the form, as we'll as the sub
stance of Republican government in
the ten States to which they apply.
1t binds them hand and foot in abso-
Lutte slavery, and subjects them to
strange and hostile power, more un-
limited and more likely to be abused
than any other now known among
civilized men. It tremples down ali
those rights in which the essence of
liberty consists, and which free Co.
vernment is always most careful to
protect. It denies the habeas corpus
and the trial by jury. Personal free
dom, property, and life, if assailed
by the passion, the prejudice or the
rapacity of the ruler, have no securi-
ty whatever. It has the effect of a
bill of attainder, or bill of pains and
penalties, not upon few individuals,
but upon whole masses, including the
millions who inhabit the subject
States, and even their unborn chill
dren. These wrongs, being expressly
forbidden, cannot be constitutionally
inflicted upon any portion of our
people, no matter how they may come
within our jurisdiction, aud no mat
ter whether they live in States, Ter
ritories or Districts.
1 have no desire to save from the
proper and just consequences of their
great crime those who engaged in
rebellion against the Governments;
but as a mode of punishment, the
measures under consideration are the
most unreasonable that could be
invented. Many of those people are
perfectly innocent; many Kept their
fidelity to the Union untainted to
the last; many were incapable of any
legal offence; large proportion even
of the persons able to bear arms,
were forced into rebellion against
their will; and of those who are guilty
with their own consent, the degrees
of guilt are as various as the shades
of their character and temper. But
these Acts of Congress confound
them all together in one common
doom. Indiscriminate vengeance
upon classes, sects and parties, or
upon whole communities, for offences
committed by portion of them
againts the governments to which
they owed obedience, was common
in the barbarous ages of the world.
But Christianity and civilization
have made such progress that re-
course to a punishment so cruel and
unjust would meet with the con-
demnation of all unprejudiced and
right-minded men. The punitive
justice of this age, and especially of
this country, does not consist in
stripping whole States of their hber-
ties, and reducing all their people
without distinction, to the condition
Of slavery. 1t deals separately with
each individual, confines itself to the
forms of law, and vindicates its own
purity by an impartial examination
of every case before o competent
Judicial tribunal. If this does not
satisfy all our desires with regard to
Southern rebels, let us console our
selves by rejecting that a free Con-
stitution, triumphant in war and
nnbroken in peace, is worth far more
to us and our children than The graft
fication of any present feeling.
am aware it is assumed that this
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