Wilmington journal. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1844-1895, 1868-01-17
Conversational LaViessness.


eases require desperate remedies, they hest
tate not to destroy every junction pertain
ing to the Executive and Judicial Depart
ments Of the Government. The newest
plan Of Reconstruction, III order to thwaft
the feeble chances of the Southern whites
to defeat the proscriptive Constitutions
which negroes and their degraded white
co-adi tutors are attempting to fasten upon
them, presents features which would alarm
every patriot in the country if these partl-
Fans had not so frequently before ignored
all laws and Constitutions in their schemes
for party success. It is low proposed to
deprive the Judicial and Executive Depart
ments of the Government of all power or
authority over the Southern States and
vest it in q military chief. It is pro-
posed by this bill to settle every que ton
in regard to Reconstruction by the ipse
diru of General GRANT. The President is
to be held guilty Of high nlisdemeanor and
impeached if he exercise any authority
attaching to his Office, aid the Gordian
knot of legal construction, now pending be-
fore the Supreme Court, is to be cut by the
sword of the General in Chief. His armed
sentry will guard the Presidential Mansion
and watch the door Of the Supreme Court,
SO that no orders or DEGREES from these
sources shall interfere with his supreme
administration of the affairs of Govern
ment.
While depriviug the Supreme Court of
all real power over the question, in order
that it may actually never be put to the
test, il is proposed that it shall be required
that two thirds Of the Court must concur
in pronouncing an act of Congress uncOn-
stitutional before its decree shall have the
effect of law, and to prevent any future
objections to the legality OF the proposed
fourteenth Amendment to the Consttu-
ton, it is sought to declare ii ali eady
adopted by the requisite number OF
States Nay, these men do not stop
at this, but seek to rob gallant men of
the just reward of their services and their
sufferings In order that officers, whose
conduct in peace is as honorable as their
bearing i'll war, shall not be able to ill the
position of District Commander under their
Military Acts, they propose to reduce the
ranks of such officers as Major General
HANCOCK and Brigadier General ROUSSEAU.
There seems, indeed, no lengths TO which
Congress is not prepared to so Ill order to
insure the success of the Radical party.
Public laws and private rights are alike
ignored. The Constitution OF the United
States and the laws OF the States stand not
in their way; Unionists and Rebels, Fed
erals and Confederates are alike the sub
iects of their wrath and their vengeance if
holy ambition.
The question suggests itself, how far the
President will regard it necessary, i'll order
to preserve the public peace, to subordinate
the trust which the people have reposed
in him and his cath of office? "lf Con-
gress shall pass an act" says the Prosi-
dent in his last message, (which is not
only in palpable conflict with the Consti-
tuition, but will, If certainly carried out,
produce Immediate and irrepayable injury
to the organic structure of the Government
and if there be neither judicial remedy for
the wrongs it inhicts, nor power IN the peo-
pie to protect themselves without the aid
of their elected defender; if, for instance,
the Legislative Department should pass an
act, even through ali the forms of law, to
abolish CO. ordinate department of the
Government, in such a case the President
must take the high responsibilities of his
office, and save the life of the nation at all
hazards" Here, then, is a law abolishing,
in fact, if not III name, two Departn ents of
the Government and vesting them in Il
military dictator. Will General GRANT &C
cept the powers given him hy the bill,
should it pass, and attempt to exercise
them q? viii the President submit
to this subyersion of every principle of
Republican government and bend to the
will of the Dictator These are serious
questions which may, probably must, be
settled within very short time. How
much OF how little is involved in the deci
sion, time only can tell. These measures
are the desperate means Of despairing par
tizans. With their aid they cannot save
their party from destruction-they may en-
compass the ruin of the country.