Daily Ohio statesman. [volume] (Columbus, Ohio) 1855-1870, 1867-09-07
The Soldiers, Relief Fund.

AhO 41UCHGy OSHCGueC ldS biiO iOi'o''
"There will be no Soldiers Relief funu
to be distributed to the townships tnis
year. The last Ohio Legislature TOOK
$780, 900 from the Fund for other purposes
AS it is in Hooking county, so is it in the
other counties of the State. The Commits
sioners of this (Franklin) county, at their
last session, finding the fund exhausted.
reluctantly ordered the payments to the
suffering widows and orphans of soldiers
to be stopped. In this county alone, as we
learn at the Auditors office, there are two
hundred families dependent, in whole or in
part, on the fund for support.
A more ruthless, brutal, wanton act was
never cea,mitted than this robbery by the
Legislat ure of the fund set apart for the
relief of these destitute families of soldiers
who fell during the war. The men who
committed the act, andwhose ruthless
hands took the money. raised for this no.
blest of objects, and used it for other and
different purposes, are now before the peo-
pie of Ohio for reelection, and the Con-
vention who nominated them, with full
knowledge of the fraud committed on the
soldiers, endorsed the Legislature by ap-
proving its acts, and endorsed Messrs. GoD-
MAN and WEST, by re-nominating them for
Audi tor of State and Attorney General,
and then, with hypocrisy that would
shame PEcKsNIFF, by resolution professed
an ardent love for the very soldiers and
families they swindled, and promised them
Substantial support" at the very moment
the party leaders, by filching SS0O000 of
the Relief Fund, left them the option of the
Poor House or starvation.
Because the Democracy favor the pay
ment of the National Debt as it becomes
due in the same kind of currency that it
was contracted in, and which is legal
tender in payment of all debts between
man and man, the press and the orators of
the Republican party denounce it with
ferceness and call it repudiation. The
Legislature of Ohio, in view of the suffer-
ing that the war would cause, ordered a
tax TO be levied to support the necessitous
families of soldiers who had fallen in bat
IT,, and the soldier who, from his wounds
was incapable of earning living by his
labor. After this fund was thus raised by
taxation and passed into the State Treasury
ready to be handed over to the county au'
thorities to be applied to the relief of those
for whose benefit it was raised, the Legis.
lature, in defiance of the Constitution o.
the State, which dec lares that taxes thus
raised for one purpose shall not be used fol-
any other object, seized the greater part of
the money, and thus lett the soldiers and
soldiers families to starve or become pau
pers.
This fragrant breach of faith to the de-
tenders of the nation and to the poor and
helpless-this basest, meanest of all repu-
diations, is not called by that name by
those who profess to believe the payment
OF debts in legal tender currency, is re-
pudiation of the faith of the State.
The faith of the State and of the peopl:
was pledged to care for and to shield tron
want, the families of the dead soldiers
The people performed their part of the
contract in paying taxes for this purpose
and paid them willingly. The money was
collected and put in the hands of the State
Treasurer, but eight hundred thousand
dollars of the amount-as much the prop
erty of these unfortunates as lift had been
plid over to them, was. taken without
their leave, and the result is that over six
thousand families, in suffering circum
tstances, stepped to the very lips in poverty
will have to suffer and to starve, or elst
take refuge in the County Intirmaries of
the different counties, whereas, if it hac
not been for the taking of this amount, they
might have been able to make provision
for their winter comfort and support.
The leaders of the party that committed
this act have their hearts filled with low
for the Negro. They have no compassion
for the widows and orphans of the lleat
soldiers robbed of their rights. A little o
this love for the black race, if expended
upon the poor aohites-protecting them from
robbery and injustice-would go tar il
saving these leaders from the charge o
base hypocrisy.