The daily phoenix. [volume] (Columbia, S.C.) 1865-1878, 1868-06-30
Protest Against the .Adnfssfon OF the
80 Arl<nnsns representatives,

Protest Against the Adsnfssf0n or the
Arl<nnsns Representatives,,
In the House of Representatives,
on MONDAY, Nj. Brooks. on behalf
lof the Democratic members, offered
the following protest, which was
ordered to he printed in the nficial
IicSsssss!! CT Congressional debatea.
The recognized presence three
persons ON the floor Of th. -1ouse,
from the State Of Arkansas, sent
here by military force, acting under
Brigadier- General of the army, but
nevertheless claiming to be members
of this Congress-, and to share. with
US, the. Representatives from free
States, in the imposition of axes
and customs and other laws upon
our people, makes it our imperative
duty in this, the first case, to remon-
strate most solemnly, and to protest
as solemnly. against this perilous
and destructive innovation upon the
principles and practices of our hith-
erto Constitutional self-government.
The so-called reconstruction Acts
which created the military govern
ment in Arkansas, and like govern
ments in other Southern States, to
share with us in the legislative power
of the Northern and Western free
people, we have every reason to
believe, have been held to be uncon-
stitutional by the Supreme Court of
the United States, the public declara-
ton Of which fact was avoided only
by the extraordinary and strange
device of this Congress in snatching
jurisdiction from the court, in the
McArdle case when such public
decision was about to be made. Of
the three great branches of the
Government, it seems, then, that,
after the Executive vetoed these Acts
as unconstitutional, the Judiciary
adjudicated them to be so, while a
Congress-the creation of but twenty
seven of the thirty-seven States of
the Union-over-ride these equal
and coordinate branches of that
Government, first. by voting down
the vetoes; next, by multiplying the
judgment of the court. In an era of
profound peace, when not an armed
man rises against the Government,
from the Potomac to the Rio Grande,
there, in ten States, our American
historical way of creating the organic
law has been utterly subverted by
the bayonet. Ever since the Declara-
tion of Independence, with scarcely
an exception, and even amid the
battles of the Revolution, Conven-
tions have been convoked through
and Constitutions created by the
electors Of the States, the only
authorized repositories of the sove.
reign power of every State, without
exterior dictation, rs, under the
existing Federal Constitution, the
hardest and harshest test oath re-
quired, from 1776 to the peace of
1888, was an abjuration oath of alle-
glance to George the Third, while
some of the now so-called bayonet-
made Constitutions from the South
propose absurd and cruel tests-ab-
surd, as in Arkansas, where is inter-
woven in the organic law n mere
party test between the radical recon-
structionists and the Democratic
conservatives, such us would exclude
from voting, if living there, the
thousands and tens of thousands and
hundreds of thousands of Democrats
in the free States (article g.. section
~ or cruel, as in Alabama, where
no white man can vote who will not
forever forswear his own race and
color, and perjure himself by swear
ing, in defiance of the law of God,
that the negro is his equal, and for
ever to be his equal, at the ballot
box. in the jury-box, with the car
touch-box, in the school, in the
college, in house and home, and by
the fire e-side-in short, in every way,
everywhere (article 7, section a.
Now, in these and the other South
ern States, in the: midst of war,
President Lincoln, in his proclama-
tion, December 8, 1868, offered am
nesty and pardon to rebels then in
arms if they would lay down their
arms and take the oath of fidelity;
while now, not Union man in
Arkansas or Alabama can vote,
unless, in the first place, he swears
allegiance to the majesty Of this Con-
gress; and, in the next, swears off his
Americanism and Africanizes himself
Hitherto Constitutions with us have
been the outgrowth of popular life,
SOriD oinfy from tho ovr,baronoo &c 49,,