Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1868-02-05
Another Exposition of Democratic
Doctrine,

The Democrats had hardly taken breath
after their unlimited praise Of Doolittle's
speech, in which that logician recommended
qualified suffrage for some blacks the
ground that the race were unfit to vote,
when another Democratic orator fires his
az the greatest expoundcr vet of the true
| Democratic doctrine Of reconstruction. This
last champion is Senator Hendricks Of Indi-
ana, and this is the way he commenced his
speech
| lie denied the claim that there were no
State governments at the close of the war.
| Governments adopted by the people existed
at the outbreak of the war. What had be
| come of them? State constitutions were the
| bond of organization holding them to the
Federal Union. lIc knew Of no other. The
cons titution became part OF the national
| Union and the people had no right to destroy
| it either by convention or legislation nor
| could any power short of all the States. If
a State constitution Of the South ceased to
! be such, by what act was it The ordinance
of secession could not do it, being a nullity;
nor could war which was not made on the
constitution, but on the people engaged in
! rebellion whose effort to separate had no
validity in law, and had effect to destroy
or disturb its relations to the Union, however
| they tried practically to do it.
We rather like Mr.. Hendricks logic 1t
is straight forward There is no halfway
work in it, He will not admit that there has
been any interruption in the proper exercise
| Of the functions of states, by any OF the rebel
communities The South Carolina legislature
voted 10 take that state out Of the Union.
| 4 South Carolina governor approved the or
dinance of secession. Said governor and said
| legislature assumed new relations with
confederate government that was carrying on
war against the United States government.
| Yet all this while, their - state constitutions
= were the bond Of organization, holding
. them to the Federal Union" These state
| constitutions didn't make any mention that
the states were. or were to remain, members
of the Federal Union. They were adopted,
we believe, before the states in fact, did be-
come members Of that union. These consti-
! tutons were, in no sense whatever, any part
| Of the agreement or compact, or whatever
| Mr. Hendricks may choose to call the act Of
! Union by which these states became part of
the United States. How, then, these State
constitutions We're a bond Of organization
holding the states to the Federal Union
| do not clearly see, but as Mr.. Hendricks
| serts it, we suppose it must be accepted as
the Democratic theory OF state constitutions.
| But what puzzles us is, how, if these state
governments were all right notwithstanding
federal government and their constitutions
were also sound and still holding them to
their old anchorage in the Union, President
johnson had any right to interfere, knock
! their governors and legislatures on the head,
upset their constitutions, appoint provisional
governors and reorganize the states in all
their departments. And if the President
had n t any right to do what he did, how
will Hendricks get along with the johnson
Governments 1t seems to us, this Indiana
senator would do we'll to settle this question
before assailing Congress
But this opinion of Hendricks WHO is,
perhaps. the soundest reasoner among the
democratic members of Congress gives the
nublic II hint Of what Democratic recon
Structl0n VIII Dc II phity ~ E'e WIZ
control of the government. A Congress and
a president controlled by the theories of
such men as Hendricks, would, as with a
sponge, rub out every step IN reconstruction,
and 90 back to the old Southern state gov
ernments, as the only valid starting point for
the future This course would involve
resembling or reputation of all acts of eman-
cipation and all state constitutional amend
1nents forbidding slavery; and it would also
involve the refusal to recognize the national
constitutional amendment abolishing slavery,
az it would result in holding that that amend
ment was proposed by an unconstitutional
Congress, and never ratified by single slave
holding state, but only by the bogus govern
ments unconstitutoually imposed upon those
states
1t is well occasionally to have a bold Dem
ocrat like Hendricks set forth the doctrines