The Wheeling daily register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1864-1878, 1868-08-27

| DEAR SIR: duly received your leGter
of the 18th instant, as chairman OF a
committee of the Jackson Democratic
Association, inviting me to attend at
the dedication of their hall on the even
ing of Thursday next, and expressing
the belief that my association with Cen
eral Jackson will enable me "to add to
the interest of the OCCASION"
In reply, l have the honor to thank
ven and YOUR committee for remember
ing me in my seclusion, and to inform
you that my duties elsewhere on
that evening, and my Discrimination, at
the age of seventy-nine years, to mlngle
in political excitements, forbid an ae-
ceptance of your kind invitation. But
recognizing the duty ef every living
man to do what he can to serve his
country in times of danger, l have no
hesitation in communicating to you
and YOUR association the views l enter
tain upen the issue involved in the elee-
tions of this year.
Of the men who are candidates | have
nothing to say. 1t seems to me the du-
ty of every true patriot in this momen-
tous crisis to think only of the great
principles and results involved, and
overlooking all that is merely personal
in the candidates, consider them merely
as instruments in maintaining those
principles and affecting those results.
A vast majority Of our Northern people
went into the late war for the preserva-
ton of the Union. The war was sue
cessful, and the Union was preserved.
The rebels everywhere laid down their
arms. and peace was restored through
out the land. All that was needed to
make that peace perpetual was State
officers in all the seeding States, sworn
to support the Constitution of the Uni
| ted States.
True, every man who had borne arms
against the United States, and every
one who had given them aid and COM
fort, had, under the Constitution and
existing laws, incurred the penalties
of death and confiscation. From these
penalties they could be relieved only
by the constitutional pardoning power,
or by trial and acquittal in the courts.
The subject was exclusively executive
and judicial, and altogether beyond the
rightful jurisdiction of the legislative
power. Now, who does not know that
had the amnesty proclamations of the
President been allowed to have their
legal effect, and the Southern States
been permitted to reorganize themselves
| under officers sworn to support the Con-
stitution of the United States, we should
long ago have had peace and compara-
tive prosperity thrOughoutour borders I
Why is it not SO! 1t is attributable
entirely to the usurpatons of Congress.
That body began by adopting the alb
surdity that the successful war for the
preservation of the Union had III fact
destroyed the Union; that in compel
| ling the seeding States to remain IN
the Union our armies had IN fact thrust
them out; and that however anxious the
Southern people might be to stay in or
get in, they could not do so without
asserting to such conditions rs Con
gress might prescribe. If the saccess
OF the war put the Southern States ont
of the Union, would its failure have
kept them inf On this absurdity was
based the entire reconstruction legisla-
ton of Congress. They assumed that
the seeding States, Instead of being
portions of our great Republic, were
instead of being repentant rebels, were
conquered enemies. Upon these pre-
texts they took them ont of tho constitu-
tional supervision of the executive and
judicial departments of the Government,
and subjected them to the unlimited
power of Congress, irrespective of the
Constitution. Instead of leaving them
| to be pardoned under the laws in exist.
encc when their crime was committed,
they passed er post tdctO laws, imposing
upon them new and unheard- Of -disabil-
| ties, from which their victims could, ac-
cording to their theory and practice, bc
relieved only by the usurping and abso-
Lutte power which had imposed them;
and when the President and judiciary
indicated disposition to exercise their
constitutional rights, they sought to
deprive them of their rightful powers
by legislation, and by threats of punish
ment by impeachment. Thus, practi-
cally, has Congress snbvcrted the Con-
stitution, and, on this subject, taken
| into their own hands all the powers OF
Government-legislativc, executive, and
judicial. if their theory were true, in
stead of being false, as it is, where did
they get the power to legislate over the
seeding States-to treat them as out
laws, and put them out of the pale OF
civilized and republican institutions !
Not, surely, in the Constitution of the
United States. And if not there, what
rightful power had they, beyond that OF
any body of usurpers not bearing the
title of members of Congress, TO leSis-
late over these people at all The par
ty which has produced all this wrong,
usurpation and oppression calls itself
| Republican. Before, and during the war,
its leaders maintained that the South
ern States had not republican govern
ments, because the negroes had no right
to vote. The same men have joined In
imposing governments upon those States
| ia which large numbers of white men
have no right to vote; and yet these
governments are republican enough for
them. And these Republican leaders
have shown their regard for republican
government by the scheme lately con,
cocted in Washington, and sent out to
be executed by their tools in the Southf
for taking even from these new tledged
voters the right to vote for Presidential
| eleCbOTs-a IiBuo iobS eASiS'cSu " VIZ
people of every State in the Union ex-
cept South Carolina, the most aristocra-
tic in the Confederacy. And this plan
has been actually adopted in Florida,
and so far defeated in Alabama by the
veto of Soutbern-born Governor. who
strangely imagines that modern repub-
licanism means something more than q
design to retain control of the Govern
ment, even at the expense of every tru-
" republican prisciple and institution.
Look at the rest of the new States
which Congress has admitted into the
Union, without the population of sec
oud. rate city, each having as many
Senators as old States with their swarm
ing millions. Is it republican that
twenty thousand voters in the Western
plains and mountains should have the
same representation in the Senate and
the same vote for President, in case of
an election by the House of Representa-
tives, as o million of voters in New
York, Pennsylvania, Ohie, and the other
great Statesi Yes, it is modern republi-