The Cambria freeman. [volume] (Ebensburg, Pa.) 1867-1938, 1869-04-22
Cambria Freeman.
The La st Reconstruction act.


law was passed authorizing the President to
submit the newly framed constitutions OF
the States of Virginia, Mississippi and Texas
to a vote Of the people, at such time as he
may deem eIpedient. This last and worst
reconstruction experiment contains the fol-
lowing scandalous section
That before the States of Virginia, Texas
and Mississippi shall be admitted to representa-
tion in Congress, their several legislatures,
which may be hereafter organized, shall ratIiy
the fifteenth article, which has been proposed
TO the several States amendment to the
Constitution of the United SEateG."
Olious and detsstable as have been all the
former laws on the subject Of reconstruction,
this feature which We have copied from the
last enactment completes the crowning act
of infamy. 1t is the first instance in the
history Of the government in which, by
bold and uuwarranted exercise of power,
Congress mas undertaken TO coerce State
TO ratify an amendment to the constitution.
What would Madison, or Jay, or Hamilton,
have said, if some member of the Convention
of 1887, wise after the manner Of our radical
S1lons of the present day, had proposed to
State to adopt proposed amendment 2
Does any man outside of luuatic asylum
suppose that if this coerciVe power in Con
gress had been incorporated in the section of
the constitution which provides for its own
amendment, that instrument would ever
have been adopted by the thirteen original
States
If Daniel Webster. the great expounder of
the constitution, had occupied scat in the
Senate of the Unitsd States when the section
of which we are speaking was offered and
adopted, wkat an indignant frown would
have rested on his majestic brow and how
his eloquent tongue would have thundered
forth its denunciations against the proposed
outrage! Bat the days of craftsmanship
have departed and the reign of political
charlatans is upon US.
That such glaring legislative fraud should
be not only attempted bat consummated,
was scarcely to have been expected even from
the radical party, and is another proof Of
the total revolution thai is being effected in
our system of government. 1t is forcing ne
gro suffrage upon the people of the North,
whether they are willing to have it or not,
by an act Of Congress, and is therefore bold,
open repudiatiou of the Chicago platform.
1t is Congress saying to Virginia, Mississippi
and Texas, we have compelled you to give
the ballot to your ignorant and degraded rs
groes, and now, unless you force negro suf-
frage upon the unwilling people Of Psnnsyl-
vania by adopting the ffteenth constitutional
amendment, we will refuse to recognize you
as States, or to receive your members of
Congress, and will continue to rule you by
the strong arm of military power. With
much greater right might Congress say to
these three States, if you will elect the rad
icaI candidates for Governor we will admit
you into the Union, but if you do not you
shall remain as you are. In that event the
rights of these three States would alone be
affected, but under this section of the Law
ths rights Of every State in the union op-
posed to negro suffrage are overturned and
trampled iu the dust. 1t Is defiant, insolent
revolution. 1t is amending the constitution,
not in the way provided for IN that instru-
ment, but simply By an act Of Co'.07ess.-
Viewed in All its aspects, that Is the plain
effect of this section Of the act.
Such is the fragrant character of law
which has been approved by = President
who. during his whole life, probably never
read the constitHtion Of the United States.
The radical theory is and has been that
these three States are not in ths Union-
that they are conquered provinces, possessing z
none of the powers and attributes Of State
yet before they are received as States they
are required to ratify q constitutional
amendment. which Is the highest and most
solemn act of power which 3 sovereign
State can perform. The child iG equal to
the man. Merely to state the proposition
is 10 show It's utter absurdity. When this
section was before the Senate even % pro
nounced q radical Mr.. Oonkling, from
New York, felt constrained to dsnounoo it
in the following terms:
Now, sir. as friend of the fifteenth amend
ment, as a friend of restoration. as a friend OF
its completion, earnestly hope that no pro-
cess involving the force, at loast, If nothing
moro of this proposition will be resoFted to as
n means of promoting that amendment If it
can be carried at all it must be carried before
the honest sense, the enlightened judgment of
the American people and as far ss il 10 even
by inadvertance associated with unfair dealing
with breach of faith, with an Get which would
be deemed overseeing between man and man
and recreant looking to the plighed faith OF a
great government, SO far as it is associated with
anything like that, is so far is it contaminats cd
by stigma and distrust which ought not TO
rest upon it. 4"
In endeavoring to find out what 1ods and