The Bedford gazette. [volume] (Bedford, Pa.) 1805-current, 1868-08-07

constitution, the vast powers cOntidcC
to them for the restoration of the u
nion for purposes Of party and section
al aggrandizement. And yopegll re
member how often and how solemnly
ly the Republican party repeated the
pledge that the war should not be wag
ed in no spirit of oppression, but solely
to restore the Union, with all the e
quality and rights of the States unim.
paired
The people of the United States trus.
ted these declarations and believed
them sincerely made. The soldiers
trusted them, and, therefore, risked
health and life in the cause. [ ask any
man who followed the flag during the
war whether he would have fought to
disfranchise and degrade the white peo-
pie of the South, blot out their States,
and subject them in serfdom to their
former slaves, and to destroy the form
of our national government establish
ed by the Constitution Prolonged
cheering, and cries of ''Never, never. ~
If Jacobins in the Capitol-who sat in
cushioned chairs through the war and
| filled the quartermaster's and COM
missary's, and contractors depart
ments with their friends and relatives
! who never saw rebel fire except at Bull
Run, and then stampeded at the first
tlash-had ayOWed such atroci0us pur-
! poses while the war was going on, the
Union armies would after conquering
| the rebels have marched on Washing
ton to disperse these usurpers as equal
Iy dangerous to the Constitution and
Union with the rebels in arms. Tire
mendous cheering.
l must, however, do the leaders Of
the Radical party the justice to say
that during the war the most of them
sincerely intended to perform these
solemn pledges, and to have the avow-
ed object of the war promptly accom-
plished at its termination. But when
it ended they forgot their pledges and
their patriotic purposes. They had not
the courage to restore the Union, with
the Southern States governed by white
electors, lest, with its restoration, the
Republican party would lose control of
the general government. AS many of
the Radical leaders preferred when the
South seeded, to let it 90 in peace in
order that they might govern the rest
of the nation, so at the end of the war
they chose to destroy the Southern
States, rather than have them return
to shake their power.
Now, fellow-citizens, no man could
have complained of the Republican
party if it had fairly used its power at
the close of the war, acit5in the limits Of
the Constitution, for party advantage.
What we have chiefly to complain of
is that it has not only prevented re-
union, but has, by Congressional fiat,
destroyed, or attempted to destroy
the ten States We fa,,eslt fn restore to
the Union. Applause. If they had
only destroyed the ten States, and left
them as Territories, to be restored in
the next generation as States, their acts
would have been more tolerable. But
after destroying them, they disfran-
chised and disabled the whole govern
ing talent of the South, and committed
the political destinies of those States to !
the custody of a race just emerging
from barbarism, through slavery, with
whom we cannot commingIe on terms
of either social or political equality. |
Our form of government is one which |
can only exist and flourish where the |
electors are intelligent, and are, or may
become, homogeneous. If controlled in /
great part by electors grossly and hope |
lessly incompetent, of a race which can /
never become one with us, we cannot |
expect the government to stand and |
prosper. Cries Of ''That's So" and |
applause.
While the walls of these black gov
are going up they have to be .
propped by Northern bayOnets, and /.
knowing that the Northern people will
not long keep an army in the South to
maintain them, Congress has now on
its anvil a bill by which they will strip
our Northern arsenals of artillery,
sabres, and pistols, and give
them to a black militia in the South
ern States, to sustain these despOtic
when the national army
shall have been Withdrawn.
When these usurped State govern
ments shall have been established, one
of three results will follow: Either
they will fall by the fiatOf the North
ern people in November or the South
ern white men, by superior tact, will,
through the forms of these de .tuctO
Overnments, obtain coItrol of them;
r this whole scheme ofreconstruction
i'll be overthrOWn by tie upheaval of
I'll War-aye, civil wa which, if the
aeral government tales side with
tbIack man against tie white, will
siad over the North, and its ashes
m cover the ruins of the Republic.
Isis the result for With our armies
1oHt? Is this the ''pace" of which
Gehal Grant talks il his letter?
EnIsiastic cheering. Instead Of
haVl the restoration Of the Union
uhdehe Constitution, which was the
only tificatiOn and Object of the war,
the Hicals give us his atrocious
ooh
Schelbig with threatened disasters
10 lhe public. [Apphuse.
but I Republican party has not
stoppetere. 1t has robbed the Presi-
deht OF most essential constitution
al poWelo as to practically destroy
| the FXpc 90. -. r - :1