Litchfield enquirer., 1868-01-02


 petual war, in which one antagonist. is al- ways vanquished, and the other is on guard" -ear ee .,a,,,...n,er f..,.sf
 To0permit the State organizations, which had formed the Confederacy, to be incor- porated in the Union, would have been both suicidal and illegal. Illegal, because no officer con neeted with them had for five years sworn to support the Constitution of the United States, and every office in them was therefore legally vacant and the whole fabric of State government was lapsed and void; suicidal, because each of these gov ernments was ohicered by rebels, whose on- ly right, If they were to be regarded as cit- lzens of the United States, was to be hang ed for treason, or if aliens, then to be re- admitted to citizenship on such terms as should be prescribed. To allow them to continue Tn the control of ten States, would be to enter into partnership with the re- beltlon. not to o3erthrow 1t. General Sher- man. proposed to General Johnson a plan of surrender by which these State oovern- ments would have been preserved. Had itPres1dent Johnson then foreseen his sub- sseqnent Quarrel with the Republican, party. he probably would have affirmed the Sher- man Johnston treaty. pne country is in- debted tothe energy of Secretary Stanton alone, flor the fact that this treaty. Was re- Jected, and that,the, reconstruction procla- nation, which soon followed. was based on the theory that the State governments were destroyed, andstlat newy'ones must be ere. ated.a The President therein 'sbuilt more wisely than he knew" for, in assuming that ne State governments must be formed. he necessarily raised the. duesti6n9 by what authority they should be, constituted, and sWho should vote in forming, them.A The former question could only De ailsyer,t m fagor'ot Congress. The latter 'pf5ve., .t enteflhg-wedge to universal sufffagee ll is- sung prociamations Of reconstruction. ami in defining therein who should vote, benaved ehe way for reconstruction by Conoress. on the basis of impartial suffrage, and rxfnteJ Tn advance the positions he subseoneutlv took-that the States could moi u.>troy their relatlonsto the Union, and tin t tn.. National Government had no bower to re- construct them.
 MT, Lincoln in his letters to Governor Hahn and General Wadsworth. had fore. strong predictions in favor of unlversal suffrage asg the basis Of recon structlon. His humane instincts would nave moved hin. strongly to couple with it suhlVersal amnesty. No sentiment of ami mostly towards rebels, as such would have slnsplred h1s coursen But at the close of ghe war, the massiot the northern people felt far more, animoslty toward rebels, than deslre that the freed race shouid have any political rights. They called aloud for the punishment of traitors, but, as a mass. at tached much less consequences than was due to the building up ota loyal constitu- ency at the south, and the establishment of peace by the ballot. Journals and states men reared to breast public clamor by fa- yonng amnesty or advocating suffrage. Tn tnls immature and chaotic state of public opan1on, the Presidents reconstruction poilcy, at the time it was adopted met with very little dissent. The President failed to see that he had committed g fatal blun- der. by attempting reconstruction on the White vote only. But most of our Repub- llcan statesmen were no further ahead. . Ihaddeus Stevens. Edwin M Stanton, B, Gratz Brown, MT. Sumner, and 6 few oth. CTS and one or two journals only, dissented from the scheme Notuntil tue evils re- sultlng rom the plan began to deveiope, in black codes that substantially restored sla- very, did the people and politicians begin to move forward to universal suffrage. But when the white vote organized State and city governments that elected none but rebels to power, such as General Hum phreys In Mississippi, Mayor Monroe in New Orleans, Raphael Semmes in Mobile, and the like; and when the ex-rebels, com Ing together in Legislatures, enacted that no negro should own land or hire a house. thus practically breaking up hls home, and compelllng nm to. work ss g menial; when during the first weeks of January, and in default allowed him to be sold for3sa term Of years; when they adopted systems of ap prentlceship for blacks which were not ap- pied to whites; when they provided the lash and whipping post for blacks and not for whites; when they excluded colored witnes- -ses rom courts of justice; when they or ganlzed rebel regiments, which, surrender ed under Lee, e1a n0SSe into State militia who disarmed the black troops that con- quered under Grant; when they revived the fugitive slave law for blacks who did not work out their contracts, but no punish ment for whites who did not pay the wages due. on the same ontracts; when they re- lnctantly, and only under impudent pro- tests assented to the. repeal of the ordinan- ces or secession; when they drove out Northern emlgrants, assailed the Freed men,s Bureau, organized bands of negro Killers, and finally eliminated these outra- ges Tn the massacres of Republicans and negroes, at Memphis and New Orleans, and e 6 ICttulu0SSS GO p1fU0traG0 the same oufrages all over the South; when the President imperiously demanded that the Freedmenss Bureau, the only protec- tion the negro had, should be abolished: when he denied the power of Congress to enact laws for reconstruction, and enforced his densals by scurrilous exhibitions which excited contempt and removed all fear; when southern courts were deciding tle Civil Rights Bill to be unconstitutional, and Southern State officers were tramp. ling upon its provisions, and defying the Congress that enacted it; then, finally, the Republican Congress. be gan ito move to- wards reconstruction on the basis of uni versal suffrage But they moved slowly. Their first step seemed even step back ward. It merely provided that unless the South should grant. suffrage to the blacks, their number of represef1 tatives in Congress should be diminished in propor- tion to- the number of blacks disfranc chised z The inference was, that by accepting tE1 limitation, the Southern states might re- turn to the Union with the blacks still un- franchised. It was a dangerous offer to make and would have been, fatal, to our fu- tIIre Deace had if hann ,5 D-L