The Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1860-1888, 1867-07-25
Thursday, July rs, 1867.
The Southern States Debts.

We publish in another column of this pa.
per, the message of the acting president,
transmitted to the Senate, in which it is de.
clared that the United States, by the recon
struction acts of the last session have legal
ly assumed, and become responsible for the
State debts of the several rebel states, exist
ing prior to the rebellion, amounting, Mr.
Johnson says, to over hundred million
dollars. This monstrous assumption is
made on the ground that congress by the
passage of the reconstruction acts before re-
ferred to, destroyed the governments o. those
States, and by that act assumed all their
responsibilities. But the conclusion is based
upon wrong premises.
Those debts were contracte by the peo-
pie of the States, and they are still respon-
sible, because the great fundamental princ
pie of the common law that man nor a
people can profit by his or their own wrong,
still adheres. The people of the Southern
States themselves destroyed their constitu-
tional State Governments when they en-
tered into the rebellion, and formed a South
ern Confederacy. Will the acting president
claim that Congress at that time became
responsible for the ante-rebellion debts of
those States? Of course not, because the
sophistrles by which the assumption has to
be sustained would be too transparent
Will he claim that Congress assumed those
State debts when the State governments
under the so called confederacy were super
seeded and their legislatures dispersed by his
proclamation, on the suppression Of the re-
bellion Such claim would not answer
his purpose, for it would not help his sup
porters to manufacture political capital
1t was only when Congress- for the more
speedy reconstruction aud re-admission of
the seeded States into the Union, and to
all their franchises, under that Union, SUI
persedea the bogus State governments es-
tablished by executive proclamation, that
those debts were transferred from the States
to the shoulders of Uncle Samuel, accord
ing to Mr.. johnson.
If Mr.. Johnson's argument was good, and
of general application, we could pay off our
city debt in the same way, or have it as
sumed by Uncle Samuel. All we should
have to do would be to refuse to pay the in
ternal revenue tax, and make such dem
onstration towards the collectors as to ne
cesstate the quartering of squad of U. S.
soldiers upon the city. According to the
Johnsonian theory, such act to sustain its
legitimate authority would efectualIy sad
die the debt of the city upon the United
States government So to, an individual
debtor might pay off his debts But so far
as we have heard, theState does not become
liable to pay the debts of all the criminals
it imprisons. States like individuals are
debarred by the common law from profting
by their own wrong.
We regret to see that our popular cotem-
porary the Milwaukee Sentinel of Thursday
morning last, falls into the error of Mr..
Johnson, and admits that the ante-rebeIliion
debts OF rebel States are perforce legally as
Sumed by the United States, but thinks the
Federal government may reimburse itself
out OF the property Of the people of those
States. But on the same ground, that
might be claimed mere jumping out OF
the frying pan into the fire. Would not the
coniscation of the property Of the people
make Congress liable to pay the debts of
those people? Most assuredly, if there is
any force or legality in the claim set up bv
the New York World, the acting president.
and the Milwaukee Sentinel The Sentinel
thinks that the n. Y. World's suggestion is
and in the shape 10 which the ed
ltor OF that de'ectable sheet puts it, of NOR
force than it IS in the shape in which It is
put by Mr.. johnson. We think the reverse
Is the fact. The fact of the United States
having conquered the rebel States in their
attempt to destroy the Union, cannot bv tha
law OF nations be urged as reason wbv tba
). Government should be held liable n
pay the debts Of those States contracted he
lore the rebellion. Mr.. Johnson's claim