The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1869-03-12
The Claim. Of southern Loyaii.t..

ne claims of southern L0yalfsts.
sue Murphy is again nm the tapis-not the
identical lady who, for several weeks furnish
ed an average of an item day to the WASH
lngton correspondents, but parties who prefer
claims against the government for property,
destroyed during the war as she did. Senator
Abbott of North Carolina on Wednesday in
troduced bill for the appointment of commits
sioners to audit claims of Southern loyailsts'
not exceeding 100000, and the Senate eau
Gus held the same evening decided that TINS Is
one of the measures that must be considered
during the present session. This is but the
entering wedge that is sure to be followed by
claims whose aggregate will be many millions.
II is one of the most discouraging features of
the financial situation that year after year vast
claims will be presented by the Southern peo
pie for payment. Defeated at one session they
will come back the next For every conces-
sion made aud every new class of claims adj
mitted as valid, dozen others will immediate
~ be urged with the utmost persistence. Vast
loDoles will be in constant attendance at
Washington in the interest of the claimants
A new race of claim agents will.spring up. A
new and magnificent field for fraud will be
opened.
There are many of these claims that are just
and that ought to be paid, no doubt. The dif-
ficulty is in sitting out the spurious ones. In
| any scheme for their payment, whether gener-
al or special, loyalty" must necessarily be the
test to which all are subjected who demand
compensation at the hands of the government
Now "loyalty," as everyone knows, is very
n 70 - fo
equally well known that it was an exceeding
ly scarce thing in ten or eleven States from
1860 to 1866 1t is also a matter of common OBJ
servation that where disloyal parties have per-
sonal interests to subserve they find no difficult
ty in proving by unimpeachabe evidence that
they were always Union men, and that SO far
as they were able they acted and spoke with
view to the triumph of the Union arms. Met
amorphoses of this kind more wonderful than
any mentioned in Ovid have taken place in
simultaneously in thousands of cases. The pc
culiar ethical notions prevailing in Southern
ATTITUDES makes it praisewortby thing to take
a false oath for the purpose of establishing
| claim to non existent loyalty, when such
| loyalty will be of value in securing money or
| the right to VOTE The iron-olad oath did not
| prevent the registration of many thousands as
| Thoroughbred Rebels as there were in the
| South, during the reconstruction period. In
fact such persons were advised by the leading
lawyers of their section that the oath would
not be binding, and that they might take it
blamelessly. If the Southerners would stoop to
false swearing to make themselves voters, they
cannot be expected to let mere matter of per-
| jury stand in the way of filling their purses.
The consideration that few really loyal and
deserving persons will get their dues is the
only one that can reconcile us to the prospect
that these Southern claims win sometime be
| paid. But it is an unfortunate time to begin
| now, since the recognition of new demand
for public expenditure SO vast and underlined
as the Southern war claims will be almost
enough to neutralize the effect upon our credit
of the new administration with its honest and
economical policy and Of any act Congress
may pass declaratory of the integrity of it's
purposes with reference to the national debt.