The New Orleans crescent. [volume] (New Orleans, La.) 1866-1869, 1868-04-02

The procTastinating and elusive pr0pen7'y
If Judicial remedy, in periods when it is most
bitterly needed, has been illustrated in the
tardy decision Of the Supreme Court with re-
ference to confscation on account Of disloy-
atty and rebellion, by proceedings in rem
The prosecutions referred to took place under
an act of Congress which no lawyer in the
land, having decent regard for his profess
sional fame. ever pretended to consider as
justifable in point of constitutionality, JUS
tice or reason. The figure known in rhetori-
cal nomenclature as pessonifcation, was
made the basis of Legislative enactment
Inanimate properties, regardless of the
sentiments or the actions of proprietors,
were subjected to the imputation of treason.
and pursued, seized, tried, convicted and con-
fscated for fictitious and impossible Grimm
atty. But while thus prosecuted as though
they were animate and veritable traitors and
rebels, they were not allowed trial by jury,
and other conditions precedent to conviction,
which the Constitution guaranteed in such
cases. This trivial inconsistency, however,
was not destined to bar the path of prosecu-
bright by flames of inextinguishable
greed. Carpet-baggery was then in its
psscency, and its infantile hunger was
fearfully prophetic of the Gargantnan
voracity which was to be developed in its ma
turer age. The forms taken by its prehensile
instincts and powers were modified then, as
they are now, by its existing environments.
For, after ell, carpet-bsggery is mortal, and
''trooly loil " mortality, though of the most
exquisite simon-purity, must work within the
limits of sublunary possibilities. The un-
conditioned and the absolute can be pre-
dicated of nothing human or earthly, and
even the ETHEREAL and transcendental
virtues Of Baker or Conway
have not yet lifted him into the supra
mundane sphere of divine and intangible
essence. 1T may be said that .carpet-baggery,
in the period to which we refer, was merely
whetting its appetite for the feasts which it
scented in the impending era of reconstruc-
ton; and in this way the Judicial grindstone,
turned by faithful judges and untiring district
attorneys, served its purpose well. The pro-
ceedings in rem against various properties for
imputed treason constituted an indis-
pensable crank in performing the oper-
alton. This city, for example, abounded
in loose materials which could not
be conveniently or prudently grabbed in
private way. Manufactures, printing Offices,
houses and lots, it was found expedient for
the most part to gobble by some sort of judi
cial hocus-pocus under the act of Congress
before indicated a process ingeniously quick
ened by making district attorneys informers
and detectives partners in the spoils. Those
were palmy times, truly 1t thrilled the
heart of the patron demon of carpet bag
gerry, Beelzebub to-wit, with ineffable emo
tons to see the cormorants and carrion crows
renG and deyour their prey, and the jackals
and hyenas lick their reeking jaws in sign
of satisfaction after feasting. But those
palmy days ended when the war ceased, and
Judicial spolation become impolitic and un-
fashionable; and at last it would seem that
the Supreme Court sees fit to declare the in
validity of all appropriations effected by pro-
ceedings IN rem for the benefit Of in
fantile carpet baggery. With few ex-
ceptions, however, the declaration, like
the delayed patronage of Lord Ches-
terfeld to DR.. johnson, comes too late
comes when either the substantive value or
the person who might have enjoyed its re-
storation has passed away. Where confsca-
ton applied to movable property, SO much
time has elapsed as doubtless in many cases
to set up the bar of prescription against the
dispossessed owner, even supposing the effects
to be discoverable and accessible. In such
empty and hooking voice, reminding sufferers,
to be sure, of what should have been, yet was
not; but otherwise signifying no more than
the inconsequential gibberish of an idiot.