The weekly North-Carolina standard. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 186?-1869, 1868-09-23

said 8 Give US sheet OF blank paper and
we will not write our terms to remain in the
Union.p So they went to work in the DEM
ocratic Convention to have two Democratic
candidates for the Presidency, SO that both
might be defeated and Mr.. Lincoln cleo cd,
not because they loved his principles, but
because they wanted an excuse to say,
.There. Won have an abolition President,
and we must go out" They were minority
determined on revolution.
Garrett Davis, Democratic Senator from
Kentucky, told US in 1862 how to carry on
this war Twill show you that we have not
been so severe as he recommended. His
resolutions introduced into the United States
Senate declared that the United States Gov
eminent should march into the Southern
States and put down the military power ar
rayed against it. 1t took us two or three
years after that to do it. He said we should
give protection to loyal men. That is one
Of the duties of the Government, to give pro-
lection to the loyal people. Mark you, Mr..
Davis docs not say the loyal ach;te men, but
evidently meant the loyal men of all classes
and races. What would he have US protect
them FORE To aid the loyal men to recon-
struct their legitimate governments" He
meant to say that these governments were
unlawful governments, that it was tile busi-
ness of the United States Government to en-
able the loyal men in the South to organize
loyal governments and bring the States
back in the Union. 1t is said they were in
the Union all the time. They said they
were out. In the Union and out of the
Union, they dwell great deal upon those
expressions. They were in the land of the
Union, but they were not at Washington Ia
king part in the Government. They were
out of the Union so far as they could get
out; but it was our province to bring them
back, to bring them and the people back to
their duty to the Constitution and the laws
of the United States, and Mr. Davis said
take the sword in one hand and the olive
branch in the other Iwish to say to our
friends of the opposition that no nation
ever did bear the sword and the olive branch
as did ours. Whenever our troops took
possession of town, churches and school
houses were opened, and the people were en-
treated to send their children to school.
The Freedmen's Bureau, which has been
cursed SO much, was furnished with its great
stores of provisions to feed the people of all
classes. As one of the officers, helped do
it in tins State and elsewhere / appeal to
any man to say that if it is not true that the
Government fed every man, woman and
child, no matter what their politics or race.
We fed the wives and children of men who
were just across the line trying to kill US.
The Federal Government would not permit
the weakest, poorest, or even the wickedest
to starve.
There was always chance for the South
10 1oxy <1,asr III fhasr
place in the Union. There was not a day
nor an hour when our men were drawn up
in battle array when if the troops on the
other side had dropped their arms and said
we want to come back that, our men would
not have dropped their arms and received
them with shouts of joy. 1 deny that our
people were actuated by feelings of revenge.
We were controlled by a determination to
have one nation and free nation.
Mr.. Davis says 1--WE will infict on the
leaders condign and exemplary punish
ment"-a Kentucky slave holder six years
ago in the U. S. Senate said we must inflict
exemplary punishment upon the leaders of
the rebellion. think the rebellion was
great crime. You cannot call into the bat
tle-field two or three millions of men, smash
them with shot and shell, waste them in hos
pitfalls, starve them at Andersonville, and kill
them in hundred different ways of wal, with
out somebody being guilty of a great crime.
Six or seven hundred thousand men are now
under the sod nearly all of whom
might have been alive to-day if it had
not been for this fight. The men who work.
ed for thirty years to get up this separation
were criminals, and the people should be
taught,as Andrew johnson says, that treason
ie a crime.
In 1851, though there was Republican
President, there was a Democratic Senate
and House that was favorable to the South.
They made the mere excuse of the election
of a President, and raised the rebellion.
Mr.. Davis says the Government should have
inflicted condign punishment upon the lead
ers. There has not been single man hung
for treason in the United States, not one.
General Butler hung man for tearing down
the flag, and others have been hung by the
regulations of war, but by trial by judge and
jury there has not been one man put to
death. think there has been an indiscrim-
mate mercy that did not mean any thing.
If you punished those who deserved it, you
could make distinction between mercy and
justice The law said they were guilty of
treason, and the punishment for treason is
death but the people said let them alone,
and the general rule has been pardon to all.
Mr.. Davis said six years ago, if any State
will not reconstruct its State government
and return to its loyalty and duty, Congress
should provide government for such State,
and secure liberty to the people. That was
the first use of the word reconstruct" He
saw that some of the States might refuse to
reconstruct, as Mississippi has done. We
have not gone quite so far as he said We
have not undertaken to organize the South
into territories and continue them as such.
The earnest desire of all the people of the
| North has been to have these States back
into their relations as speedily as possible,
take away the army in time of peace, take
| away military control, and restore the courts
and elections. They desire to have peace
and Justice reign, and they dislike to have
people live under military control. We have
not been so severe as Mr.. Davis, a Democrat
| ic Senator, said we ought to be, and therefore
we are vindicated from any charge Of harsh
ness in this matter. -,
Suppose, when the fighting was over, we
had called our armies back and exercised no
coatrol over the people and done nothing to
| organize loyal governments, what would
have been the condition of the people2 The
rebels would either have renewed their war
or remained in hostility expressing the
Union men about them. Does any gentleman
think we ought to have abandoned the South
the moment the fighting was over2 1 say
we need not have done it as gentlemen
Here was the great mass of the colored PEG
| pile whom the war, under divine Providence
had set free. There was great body of the