The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1867-06-25
Chnaa ON RahsIIIon.

Chase ON Rebellion.
From the Tribune.
Chief Justice Chase delivered at Raleigh, N
c., on the 18th, an opinion, in the case of
Shortridge & Co. VS.. Macon, which declares
and defines the law of the land on very i'm
portant question arising out of our late civil
war. The plaintiffs were Pennsylvanians, the
defendant North Carolinian but whether
personally Rebel or not, we are not advised
and it is not essential. He owed Shortridge
& Co. debt, and had given a note therefor;
but this note, during the ascendancy of the
Rebellion in North Carolina he was obliged to
pay into the Confederate treasury, whether
willingly or not. We may safely presume that
he did it willingly, as the fact that he owed
the note might otherwise have been concealed.
Suffice it that he owed money to Shortridge &
Co., which he paid to the Confederacy and
took its discharge from the debt, considering
that the end of the matter. But ShOrtridge
& Co. could not see the matter in that light;
so after the Rebellion collapsed, they brought
suit against Macon in the United States
District Court, where Judge Chase has just
decided that Macon must pay his debt, and
that his Confederate discharge from it isn't
worth a rush, though it would have been if
the Rebellion had succeeded, so that Campbell
or ShaTkey had now been holding Confederate
District Court at Raleigh for the trial of this
case. All this is simple common sense, and
the Chief Justices statement of the facts and
the law is signally lucid and forcible. If any
reinforcement were needed, the consideration
that Rebellion is not quite ga New Way to
Pay Old Debts'' would afford it. We know
that very general and severe pressure of
debt at the South in 1860 was one of the main
indictments to secession. Thousands, goaded
to madness by the pressure of their liabilities
to the North, said-"Civil war cannot make
our situation less endurable than it is''-and
rushed in. Now let it be established that an
insurgent population could discharge their in
debtedness to their loyal creditors in the way
Macon supposed he had paid his debt, and we
may have rebellions fomented on purpose to
square off debts, and given up when that end
is achieved. That won't do.
But the Chief Justice sees fit, without
obvious necessity, to argue as follows:-
courts have no policy. They only de-
can we say judiciaiiy that the Ievying OF war
ceases to be treason when the war becomes
formidable ?-that, though war levied by ten
or thousand men Is certainly treason, 1t Is no
longer such when leyied by ten thousand or
one million ?-that the armed attempts of
few, attended by no serious danger to the
Uniou, and suppressed by slight exertion Of me
constitutional definition but attempts by
vast combination, controlling several States,
putting great armies into the field, menacing
with Imminent peril the very life of the Re-
public, and demanding immense Efforts ana
immense expenditures OF treasure ana blood
the boundaries of the definition, and become
innocent in the proportion Of their enormity."
Answer.-The Chief Justice here overlooks
the very grave difference between Govern
ment based avowedly on the right of the peo-
pie to modify or radically change their political
institutions, and one founded on the doctrine
of divine right or legitimacy,Na as are the Old
World monarchies. In the view of this doc
trine, the more formidable the rebellion the
greater the crime; so that to have four-ffths
of the people in sympathy with the rebels
would only aggravate the wickedness of their
| outbreak.
But in republic based on popular consent,
the case is bravely altered. Here the conspi-
racy of a few argues culpable design to sub
! ject the many to despotic sway; not so the
arousing of millions, "a vast combination con-
trolling several States, putting great armies
into the feld," etc. etc. Such rallying OF
millions implies either the existence Of real
! grievances to be repressed, or the sincere
though mistaken conviction that they have
wrongs that they can only right by the sword.
And this is why our earlier statesmen, down to
and including Webster, have held doctrine
regarding formidable instructions which seems
to us the opposite of that above enunciated by
the Chief Justice.
But it is said, ''If the disaffected are so
numerous, they may peacefully secure a re-
may; yet not always. If our Revolutionary
fathers had been fairly represented in the
British Parliament, they could not have there
obtained justice; if Ireland were allowed her
fair quota of members of Parliament Eve be-
lieve she has it now), she would still be sub
iected to oppression. A fair and full vote OF
the British people would not have given our
fathers the independence they demanded such
a vote in Spain would not have permitted the
separation of Portugal; such a vote in the
British Kingdoms to. day would not do ireland
justice, though the time is coming when il
will.
We cannot deem it necessary to repudiate
the axioms which underlie the righteous
struggle of our fathers for independence in
order to demonstrate the wrong of the Southern
Rebellion. We hold that Rebellion to have
been lmpelled by slavery-by the hateful
spirit OF caste-by conspiracy to degrade
and depress labor-a conspiracy essentially
antl-popular and aristOcratic, and which was
obliged to plunge the country into civil war il
order to secure for itself that ascendanoy ovel
the South which it could not gain by argu
ment in peace. There never was a day, priol
to the bombardment Of Fort Sumter, when
majority even of the Southern whites desired
a dissolution Of the Union. The clash of arms
was precipitated expressly to sire the Southern
heart" and thus give the Confederacy a holC
on the masses which it had hitherto failed Il
acquire. II is easy to prove that inaugurateC
by South Carolina in 1860 the most causeles
and uniustifable of rebellions; but it is neithe
necessary or wise to maintain that twelve mil
} lions of people in the Southern States have III
right to be governed otherwise than as tWent!
millions in other States may see fit.