Keowee courier. [volume] (Pickens Court House, S.C.) 1849-current, 1870-12-23
From Washington.

nv gave holice yesterday, proposing an lnreS-
tigation with view to tho restoration of tho
Arlington estate to the widow of Gen. r. E.
Lee; the removal of graveyards on the prem
ises, and general restitution for any incum-
brance placed there in tho interest of the
Government.
Edmunds hoped that leave would not be
granted, as the proposition to dig up the
bones of our dead soldiers, in order that GER
tain property might be given back to its real
owners, was to his mind perfectly monstrous.
While entertaining the highest respect for
his friend, McCrecry, he hoped the Senate
would never entertain the proposition.
McCreery thon occupied twenty minutes
upon the subject He referred to crcum.
stances attending the recent death of two of
t. e foremost Generals ON either side in the
iate war-Lee and Thomas lie spoke of the
friendly intimacy existing between those
Generals up to the commencement of the re.
bellion, when Thomas followed the starry
emblem of the Union, and Lee resolved to
stand or fall by the State that had given him
birth.
McCrcery reviewed in detail tho valient
feature of General Lees civil and military
services, particularly his recent efforts in
connection with Jefferson College, his revolu-
tioDary ancestry aud sincere devotion to duty.
Referring to the sword as the least capable
of all tribunals to decide a cause upon its
merits, the Speaker went on to argue the
judgments Of the sword had not always com.
manded that universal respect which would
have been expected from court of SO large
jurisdiction, aud that history had enrolled
the names of Hampton and Sydney upon the
list of martyrs in the sacrei cause of right.
WASHINGTON, December l3.-Gov. Bard
writes the Prooidont an eight page pamphlet.
Bard cannot follow the President into the
support of extremists. Bard says: "I could
not have known that Georgia was to be kept
in state of perpetual bondage, tho prey of
irresponsible demagogues, the associate in
misery with South Carolina and Louisiana,
whose Governors and Yarmouth
fo.n, with Bullock, trumviratc of unuiti
gutcd political scoundrclism without precedent
since the latter days of the Roman Empire,
and have cursed the States over which they
rule with plaques vorsc than the frogs and
lice of Egypt. This is truth, and truth is
eternal"
The following responses were made to
McCrecry in the Senate:
Ednunds said that, instead of being we'd
dcd to institutions OF Virginia, Gen. Lee was
the ward of the nation. That nation had
fed, clothed and educated him; that ho lived
at the capital, but when the capital called
upon him to defend the flag under which he
had been born, protected and honorcd, he
deliberately turned his back upon it, and
planted his cannon in sight of the capital he
mad sworn to protect and defend. But he
(Edmunds) would not dignity such propo.
sition by discussing it. Gen. Lee was now
dead The only regret he thought that any
right. minded man who believed in the war
would have, was, that Gen. Lee had not died
either in his youth or his patriotic manhood,
or even that he had not died earlier than he
did by the hand of the law, which would
have atoned in some measure for his crime
Trumbull, while disclaimiug sympathy
with the apparent object of the resolution,
whioh was to surrender and mutIlate the last
resting place Of thousands of Union dead,
held that it would bc, if not unprecedented,
at least supplementary to deny to q mem.
bcr simple request for leave to introduce
any legislation not in itsoif insulting to the
Senate.
Carpenter inquired whether Trumbull
could state proposition more fagrantly in.
sulting to tho Senate than that to remove the
slaughtered dead Of the Union army from
Arlington for the purpose of returning the
farm to it's rebel possessors.
Trumbul replied Tint while tho resolution
was without doubt repugnant to tho sense ol
the nation, 1t was not in personal sense in
sulting to the Senate. IIo was avcrse to the
adoption Of any precedent, the effect Of which
would be to prevent tho free exercise Of q
right guaranteed to member of the Senate
Edmunds and Sumner cited two instances
| the former the case Of the proposed anhexa
tiotI OF Texas, tho latter the bill for the re-
peal of the Fugitive Slave Act, when requests
for loavc TO bring in bills were refused. Five
additional instances were enumerated by The
IVice.P President it
Morton protested against consideration o
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