Des Arc weekly citizen., 1868-08-25

sums, by fraudulent confiscation ant tax sales!
 The only clause of the oath whicf seems. to be particularly obnoxious il as follows:
 -"That accept the civil and DO litical equality of all men; and agre, not to attempt to deprive any persoI or persons on account of race, color, ol previous condition, of any political ol civil right, privilege or immunity en joyed by any other class of men,"
 Political test paths were unknown before the late civil war. They are tn. devices of radical politicians, and have been invented, as this was, for party purposes.
 On the restoration of Charles tht Second, the British parliament passed a religious test act, which was designed to deprive the catholic people from holding public offices, and was tho work of religious prejudice and intol. erance prevailing in that age. It was condemned by enlightened statesmen and under the influence of an advanced civilization and more liberal and en. larged spirit of charity in matters oi faith and conscience, it was plotted from the English statute book-and now the catholic, the protestant, dis Sn t>r al ov, Ol.v ns,A the long wronged and persecuted sons of Israel, sit side by side in the house of commons.
 But the tories and the whigs of Eng land, ever struggling for political as- cendancy, and alternating in their tri- umphs, would, on either side, have scorncd the meanness of enacting DO. litical test oath as device for retain ing political power. So with the whigs and democrats of America, whilst these parties were contesting for power. It remained for the professed admirers of the black race, whilst exer- cising short-lved and ill-gotten pow CT, to prescribe for people, whom they desire to rule, and tax, and fattcn upon, political test oath, designed to drive them from the ballot-box, and their own power through the suffrages ofa deceived and deluded race. Shall they succeed by means of this device?
 The provisions of the oath before read, has two distinct clauses or fea- lures, which will take up separately, and cndeavor to ascertain what they mean, and what man swears to when he takes the oath:
 First clause-"That accept the civil and political equality of all men,"
 This does not mean that 1t is to be accepted as truth that all men arc phy ysically, mentally, morally or social ly equal, for such proposition is false by the common consent and judgment of mankind. Besides, the language in its terms relates to the civil and politi- cal equality of men.
 Nor could the framcrs of this clause have intended to make man swear that he accepts it as q fact that all men, everywhere, are on q civil and political equality; for such is not the fact, as every one, not grossly ignorant, knows. Men in the natural state, without gov ernment, are upon common footing ; and the stronger men, or more numer- ous combinations of men, subdue and plunder the weaker men, or less nu- merous, or inferior combinations. But when men form governments, their civil and political equality, or inequal- ity, depends entirely upon the plan and framework of the government. For example: in the absolute monarchies, such as Russia, Austria, Turkey, China, Japan, and even now in France (once republican, one man, the emperor, is by inheritance, the centre and source of all civil and political power, and he distributes it to his subordinates and subjects according to his will. So in limited monarchies, such as England, one man or woman is born king or queen, other men are nOblemen by birth, and some men can hold office and vote, and others cannot. In Amer ica, where the republican form of gov ernment has been adopted, all men do not possess equal civil and political rights, either under the federal or state constitutions. A foreign born man cannot be president of the United States; no man can be senator until he is thirty, nor representative until he is twenty-five years of age. h nearly all the northern states, men oi the black race are not permitted to vote, serve on juries or hold an office of any grade. Yet the Chicago con. vention, representing the party to which the men who framed the oatt which l am considering belong, re- fused to declare it as an article in theil creed, that the black men of the north. crn states should be put on civil anf political equality with the white mer of those states. No, ignoring thcil boasted dogma of the equality of al men, they cunningly declared tha "the question of suffrage in all thu LOYAL states properly belongs to tht people of those states" What people
 The white people of course, who ar' the only people in those states wht have voice in the regulation of suf frage. There they abandoned the pool black man to his fate, because they wer, not willing to hazard the issue of thi
 race for public spells upon question that had been badly beaten in thos,