The tri-weekly standard. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1866-1868, 1867-02-05
Tri-M)eekIv Standard.
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY s, 1867.
The North-Carolina Rebels on their
Knees to the Radicals.

The great mass OF Inc peoPie VI IniS
Commonwealth would, in the opinion OF the
Committee. prefer to commit themselves
their honor. and their interests to Congress,
as now composed, rather than to those whose
only hope of ruling, lies in the disfranchise-
ment and oppression of more loyal and bet
ter men,"
The above is an extract from the report of
the Committee of the present Legislature OF
North Carolina against the ratification OF the
Constitutional amendment. This report was
adopted by the Legislature, by a large ma
iority in each branch The above is re-
markabe proposition in more respects than
one, considering the source from which it
emanates. In the first place, it strikes one
as 4 little strange that in contemptuously de-
Ginning the terms offered by Congress, these
trembling traitors should not have noted
the inconsistency of their abject proposal
"to commit themselves, their honor and their
interests" to that body. Men aoho haze honor
commit it to the keeping of no one. But
the arrogant scorn of these secessionists for
the despised Radicals could not be con-
cealed even in the act of making pretence of
most abiect and unmanly humbling of their
pride To impress upon the mind how great
a sacrifice they are willing to make, they
would commit their honor to Congress, " as
nO,c composed" as much as to say, that as
mean as they consider the present members
of Congress- they will condescend to commit
heir hono7. to it for the sake of not being
made incapable of holding office, as is pro-
posed in the Constitutional amendment
The members of Congress have honor enough
to despise this miserable cant, and they are
not over anxious to take charge of such hon
or as is offered to be prostituted for office.
But the meaning of all this is, they wish
to tell how much they hate the Union men
of the State AS much as they despise and
hate the Congress, they hate Union men
more. And this they would pass off as 10y
atty to the Union Their loyalty consists in a
love of treason and traitors and hatred of
"the Yankees and the Union" We remem
Der the violent and vulgar denunciations of
Union men in 1861, and during the rebellion,
and the same cry is still kept up, and the
same malignant and vindictive spirit is still
displayed towards them by the beaten trait
ors whose purposes they helped to thwart.
Thousands of loyal men in this State were
murdered or starved to death in the prisons
at Richmond and Salisbury. Thousandswere
conscribed and dragged ANONYMOUSLY in
handouts and chains to an unwilling war
fare against the flag of their country. Their
families were outraged in every way that the
most british cruelty could suggest. Women
were tortured to be made to disclose the
places of their husbands concealment-w
taken from their starving infants and kept
in pens in out of the way places, at the dis
posal of depraved guerrilas and scouts, until
their breasts, in some instances, actually
burst from the accumulation of milk, or
from worse and more loathsome treatment.
The thumbs of one poor woman in Ran
dolph, in the presence of her weeping chill
dren, were put between the rails of fence,
and two fendish soldiers Sat upon the top
and enjoyed the agony of their screaming
victim, until she was forced to betray her
husbands hiding place and consign him to
death. But these were only the wives and
daughters of detested Union traitors who
refused to fight for the "beloved Confedera-
cy :" and no man then dared raise his voice
to cry shame. The secessionists, high and
low, approved it all-especially, the ranting
hypocrites, like the Rererend VIM. E. Pell,
ri, ,oroctit,1to1 tho ohurchac Of tho
living God to purposes of treason and blood.
And it was encouraged by many of their ap
proving hearers, who, lounging in cushioned
pews, required for their depraved hearts such
religious consolation. If Union man dared
raise his voice in defence of humanity, ne
was threatened as traitor to "the cause, in
suited, cast into prison or mobbed.
The proof of these outrages is at hand, in
more than hundred instances, and could be
obtained in more than thousand In the
instances cited above, respecting the treat
ment of females, the proof is of record for
the Hon. Thomas Settle, of Rockingham,
true and devoted Union man, in whose neigh
borhood they occurred, brought them to the
attention of Gov. Vance by letter, at the
time, and he has now in his possession the
written orders of Gov. Vance, under which
they were committed, and letters from him
evading an investigation of them. But no
"true Confederate" was ever prosecuted or
punished for crime committed on Union
man or his family in North-C Carolina, provi-
ded he wore traitors uniform when he COM
mitted it. If the crimes and cruelties per-
petrated on Union mer and on defenceless
women and even children in this State du-
ring the rebellion, were brought to light
by proper and thorough examination and
published to the world, these brutal traitors
and their guilty leaders know that the hope
of preserving the honor of their rebellion
would be lost, and their merited infamy rem
dered immortal: They hope to escape expo
sure by holding the State government in
their own hands. Their Legislature has re-
Gently passed an act of" general amnesty" to
cover these crimes and prevent an I'M
thorized exposure of them. Should the
State government be committed to the
hands of loyal men, they fear there would
be an act Of the Legislature authori-
zing affidavits to be taken in the several
Counties, and record of their crimes pre-
served in the public archives and published