Idaho semi-weekly world. (Idaho City, Boise County, Idaho Territory) 1867-1868, 1867-05-29


elimination is made between the treatment Of
the genuine Southern people, on the one side,
and the loyal whites and negroes, on the other,
by the courts and officers of the law. To sus-
tain this assertion the statements of Federal
Commanders stationed over the South are adj
duced Gen, Schofeld, who commands in Virs
GINA, has stated that
The cases of hostility and outrage of one kind
or another by white men upon freedmen are
common, and, as the reports show in all such
cases, the State Courts fail to do justice; that
is, fail to punish white men for assaults and
outrages committed upon freedmen.
Gen. Thomas, commanding in Tennessee,
says:
do not believe there is much chance of con-
vfcting a resident or citizen of Georgia for
murder, if the victim was Union man or ne
gro. If the murderer was a Union man or
negro, they would convict him very speedily,
or if the man had moved into Georgia since the
war and was known as a Northern man or
Union man.
Gen sickles, commanding in South Carroll
na, says:
In my Judgment, the bias of the people is so
strong against the presence of the garrisons in
the State and against United States soldiers
that you could mot find jury in South Carroll
ma that would convict q man for killinga Union
soldier. They do not arrest anybody, nor pros
ecute anybody, nor indict anybody for such
offences.
And Gen. Baird, who preceded Sheridan in
Louisiana, states
The Courts are controlled by public senti-
ment and by their own prejudces. | believe
the Judges, who are men OF education, would
be more frequently disposed to do justice, but
am quite satisfied that they would be unable
to procure justice in suit between white
man and black man or Union man and
rebeh
Let the statements of these high Military off,
GERS be taken as. entirely correct, and then,
we ask, does not q condition of things exist
| throughout the whole North of a precisely SIM
liar character, so far as the effect of popular
prejudice, or magisterfal bias or the action of
the authorities, in court or out of court, is in
V0lvedl During the war, hundreds of men
were brutally maltreated, or butchered. oil
over the North, and stir no punishment was
ever meted out to the ruffians or murderers, for
no other reason than that they We're Union
men," so-called, and their victims were dis
Toyalists, or 'Copperheads." All manner of
heinous and savage crimes were committed by
" loyal mobs upon Democrats, whose proper
ty was stolen or destroyed, and yet the loyal
civil or military authorities could not be brought
to- arrest, much less to punishs the aggressors.
AT; this very period it is next to impossible in
most of the Northern States for any Democrat
to obtain a verdict of damages matter how
plain and manifest are his rights in law or in
equity-if the defendant be Radical And
rarely will Radical Court or Radical jury
faib to give Judgment to the Radical in the
cause, if Democrat Is the party opposed. |
Numerous instances, I'M civil cases, have occur
red within the last year in California, to go no
farther for Illustrations And in criminal trials,
most notorious cases attest the truthfulness of
what we aver Take the single case in that
State, of the acquittaf Of Chas.P Duane, that
most infamous, red-handed assassin, after his /
eowardly and cOd-bl0Oded murder Of Col
VIM G.. Ross 1t is too well known to admit
of denial that the only reasons why he was
permitted to escape the just vengeance of the
law for that atrocfoiIs crime Were-that Col
Ross was a /" secessionist, and his murderer
" lOval man.
We could multiply instances of like char
acter; but it is unnecessary to doso. The fact
which weeassprt cannot be controverted-that
at this day, all through the North, judgments
and verdicts are made very much to- depend
upon the relative political opinions of the par
ties before the Court, by the Judges as well as
the iuries, and it is very rare that Democrat
can gain case, or that Radical IS cast IN a
Judgment And this being s0 can we wonder.
that the people South are infuepced, in like
manner with our own people, in their admin
istratinn of the laws, so that suits are decided
more through political or sectional prejndices,
or because of the peculiar status of the par
ties before the court than from the real merits
of the cases themselves ? IF; because in the
South, the civil courts fail to give justice in
suits between whites and colored people, or be-
tween ssecessiOnists and Radicals, or between
men friendly to the party in power and those
who stand opposed,-if, we repeat, because of !
these irregularities, it is necessary that Milf
taTy Government should be established Overl
the South, it fellows that, for ex9ctly similarl
reasons, a Military Government is already re-
CURED in the North. And tie complaint made
by General Sickles, that the bias of the South (
e1n people IS strong against the Federal SOL
dlers, should cause us to respect rather than
to censure that people We think it not only
natural, but especially to be lauded, as the
strongest proof of their true manly pride and
independence of spirit, conquered though they
be, and ground under the oppressive foot of an s