Knoxville weekly chronicle. [volume] (Knoxville, Tenn.) 1870-1875, 1870-06-08
lconNuNIcATED.I
DEMOCRATIC LEGISLATION.
Repeal ON the Brain "A Chapter of Law
Murders.

lowed to read the Bible, the Jesuits frequently
bought all the Bibles offered for sale to prevent
their circulation; and it was no small pleasure
to these Jesuts to cast these Bibles, one by one,
into great fire built in public for the purpose,
and at the same time to utter an awful curse
upon all who dealt in that holy book without
leave of the church. A similar pleasure seems
to have prompted the recent Legislature o. Ten
nessee The principal work done at Nashville
in the last eight weeks has been done in the re-
tail repeating business. No less than forty
stcen chapters of the published acts Of lS69-70
me devoted to repeats of former acts. And
what is more remarkable, considering the in
teligence' y and ''statesmanship'' of the Demo-
cracy,l many laws have been repealed over and
over again, as if one repeal was not quite suf-
cientl But more; not satisfied with repeating
live laws, the present Legislature has actually
repealed laws that have been dead for years
To illustrate: The law requiring that jurors
should be legal voters was repealed October
18th, 1863; but, either from shortness of mein-
Dry, or because they remembered only the law
that kept them and those who elected them out
of the jury box, these Democratic law makers
or, more properly, law U9makers, in a few weeks
afterwards again repealed the very same law
And as if continually to remind the people that
this to them hateful law is dead, dedd, DEAD
as the Judges say when sentencing man to be
hung, the repeating acts are published no less
than three times in the statute book s4See
chapters 4, 80 and ll7.) There is nothing like
killing thing dead. again; The "act to en-
force the laws of the State was repealed De-
cember 18th, 1869, Chapter 90 y but the Legis-
lature having forgotten it in their Christmas
wine-cups on re-assembng again set to work on
the already dead law, and finally succeeded
February 25th, 18T0-chapter So in repeating
it second timely large majority The
'act to regulate the publication of legal notices"
was first repealed October 10Th, 1869; but as the
repeating act did not restore justice to the press
of Tennessee" exactly one week afterwards this
wise, economical Legislature, with memories at
least six days long, repealed the dead act again.
with flourish of rhetorical trumpets to intro
duce the second execution of the already
slaughtered act. These two repeating acts stand
side by side on the statute book as chapters l
and Pa fitting Introduction to the whole book
Surely the author of the story, "rwice Killed, +"
must be in this Legislature.
When the Republicans were in power at
Nashville, our Democratic friends" insisted
that not only the acts of thr Republican Legis-
lature were null and void, but that the Legisa-
ture itself was bogus and unconstitutional.
But now, presto--change we find these Repub-
lican laws not only valid and binding, but SO
valid as to require at least two repeating acts to
kill the most Unconstitutional of them all. y
sour Democratic friends seem now to think
that Republican laws have as many lives as q
cat These things grimly reminds us how, du-
ring the war, when Democratic bullet had
slain some Union soldier in battle, there were
not wanting Democrats, ''chivalrous gentlemen"
to mutilato the doad body OF the fallen patriot
As q specimen of the repeal of laws repealed
long ago l merely refer to one whose repeal
ought have been very well known to every
country squire-the law for the transfer of suits
back to the county where originally brought.
This law was repealed March 18th, 1868, CHAP
ter G2 y but the present Legislature, gone blind
on the subject of repeal, set to work on the dead
and buried law, and on March Sd, 1870, two
years after the law had been repealed, they sue
ceeded in repeating the detunct statute once
more, chapter 10l.) This digging up of laws
that have been dead and buried for years in or
der to crafty political vengeance by again stab
bing t carcass to the heart, calls to mind how
the tyr,llt English king had the body of the
great Cromwell dug up from the grave where
It had lain for years and hung upon a gibbet.
Surely it would have been better for the over
burdened taxpayers Of Tennessee if the pres
ent Legislature had gone into the wholesale re-
pealng business, and by one sweeping act red
with uncommon wrath have repealed every
statute passed since the war Nero, the greatest
of tyrants, wished that mankind had but one
neck so that he might exterminate the whole
race 1T one blow. But this Legislature with
more political bloodthirtiness than Nero enjoys
the pleasure of killing the Republican laws of
Tennessee one by one, just as their fellow Dem
ocrats at Libby, Andersonville and Salisbury en-
joyed the hellish pleasure of killing their Union
prisoners by slow degrees.
But no! To have done all their repeating at
one blow would have made the session too short,
The Democratic politicians were much in love
with short sessions while out of office, but now
they are in office, we hear no more Of short
sessions And to show conelusiyely how run
mad this Legislature has been on the subject OF
| repeats, they have actually repealed some laws
they did not intend to repeal, and repealed
| others they had to turn right around and re-
enact Ween the Republicans were in power,
| "our Democratic friends stoutly insisted that
| there was no such being az "Kuklux;" and as
men can tell lie so often as at least to believe II
| 70 be truth, so the Democratic party, having
lied itself into the belief that there was no 'Ku-
klux, one of their first acts was to repeal the
| "Kuklux law (chapter ll2.) But no sooner
was this done than the "Kuklux" began again
to swarm out of their secret holes to malt'eat
rob and murder, under cover of masks and mid
night, so that in a few days the Legislature
passed the "Kuklux law over again, (chapteI
! o. almost in the same words as the old law
| Consistency, truth and craftsmanship
If, therefore, it tokes two or three repeats tc
| 10 kill an unconstitutional state law, enacted
| by bogus Legislature" how many repeats
| would il require 10 kill constitutional United
| States law, enacted by u lawful Congress- we
pause for a reply If the Democracy should
get into power, It would take them forever TO re-
! peal all The laws passed by Congress since this
same Democracy fired the first gun on
Fort Shmterl Aud If il would take forever t.
repeal these laws,lip the name Of the eternity 81
! ct6rnities how long would il take 10 repeal thC
/ various Constitutional Amendments adopted
since the beginning of the Democratic rebellion