The Charleston daily news. [volume] (Charleston, S.C.) 1865-1873, 1870-08-16

highest bidder Tor a sum not less than the
taxes, penalty and costs, and s'shall strike
the same off to the United States, unless some
person shall bid that or larger sum-" 6y
which sale s'the title shall be uested I'm the;
United States or in the purchaser" But the
owner may, within si1ty days after, appear
before the BOARD in person, and, upon taking:
tha oath, &C., and paying the taxes. &C., and.
expenses OF sale and subsequent proceedings to-
be determined by the commissioners, redeem
his land. To execute this law the President,
appointed three commissioners for each State;
with salary Of $4,000 each. The three for
South Carolina made their appearance in
Beaufort in October, 1862, about one year at--
of the parish. Of their doings In that same:
parish will speak presently.
Now any one can see that the title of the act
is a contemplate equivocation and falsehood.
1t is in no sense tax act. 1t is simply an act
Of con6scation and forfeiture of the most
odious kind bin Of attainder, intended TO,
punish without trial all who owned property
in an insurrectionary district, whether they
favored or opposed the rebellion-just such
an act as the Congress of the United States
had no Constitutional power to pass, If the
States had no right to secede. To the poor
exiles who were, without any fault OF
theirs, debarred from all means of know
iES WHaI was IIauspiiiuS III thet POI
ish, it's enforcement, snpposing 1t to have
been fairly and honestly done, was cruel
in the extreme. The act of 1861 subjected
lands to sale (not forfeiture) only In case sutl-
cient personal property could not be found; but
the overpl,s, after the payment of the taxes
&C., belonged to the owner; while the right to
redeem within t,oo years after the day OF sale
was reserved. Now, from what have said In my
first, it Is clear that had this act been enforced
instead of the act of 1862, not an acre of land
in the whole parish would have been sold.
The personal goods of the taxpayers was
greatly more than enough to satisfy every de.
mand of the government.
Individual Instances of hardship or suffering
may be referred to sometimes, to illustrate the
folly and wickedness Of special or judicial
legislation. Congress adjudged that all who
owned property, or resided In the districts
then in rebellion, were traitors, and punished
all unheard. Assuming the parish to have
been in rebellion In June. 1862, let rs see the
justice Of this by single instance. On the 7th
November, 1861, one of the residents of this
unfortunate parish, widow lady Of seventy
years and upwards-opposed to secession and
the war-a supporter, as far as her age and sex
would permit, of the Union-was compelled,
with others, to leave her home for the up
country. Cotton of the value of more than $15,-
900 was lettin her barn, and her plantation was
abundantly supplied for the support of large
estate. n 1865 she returned, to find herselfa
pauper Her cotton had been seized by gov
ernment officials, her other personal property
plundered or destroyed, and her plantation
sold to Yankee adyenturers. But u was sold
as the property Of the government-as conf1s-
Gated and forfeited-not as her property, and
whatever might have been the surplus over
the amount of taxes-and 1t was doubtless
very considerable-if that was not paid into
the public treasury. 1t certainly was never
hot off, oh on.
heavily punished (? Had the act OF 1861 been
enforced, she would have been untouched.
But to return. On the arrival of the COM
missioners In Beaufort they proceeded to busi-
ness, but they first shut their eyes to the fact
that the ''ciyil authority OF the government"
was and had been for nearly year entirely
sufficient for the peaceable execution, in the
whole extent Of that parish, OF the act OF 1861,
and therefore that they had no business. But
they did see that there was no other part of
the State in which they could operate. Ifthey
could not bend this entirely prospective law Of
1862 back, so as to include this parish, their
gains were likely to be small.
Aided by plat of the town made in 1885,.
In which the streets were distinctly laid oat
and named, and the lots numbered, they en-
plored a wandering surveyor to make another
plat On this they marked certain spaces
which they called blocks, remembered from
one up to perhaps seventy or eighty The
houses and lots In each block they designated
by capital letters. This plat they copied into
a1arge eledger-looking-like manuscript In their
Office, and called 1t q Record, accessible to
every one. In the early part Of 1863, pursu-
ant to notice published in the 'sNew South"
the very existence of which was hardly known
outside of the town, they offered at public out
cry all Of the houses and lots and every plan
tation and farm in the parish. How these
last were described, 1t is difficult to say.
The town lots were described according to
their o,Dn plat, as for example: Lot (B) block
70, valuation (perhaps) $1,000, tax $50, penalty
$28 costs $4-no owners name, street, number
or other description Of any kind. Had the
purpose been to deceive the owners nothing
could have been better or more skllfully con-
ed they should hear of these sales. In their
opinion, these lands already belonged to the
government, and no one else had any right or
Interest In them except themselves, to the
extent Of their costs and commissions. Sew
eral sales, from time to time, followed this
first offer. Even up to period after the war,
but very few pieces were sold for their value.
would be equal to few years rent, for though
he took the usual certificate Of sale, he was sus-
picious of the title. The consequence was
that q great many tracts of land and houses
and lots were knocked off to the commission
ers. have heard it asserted that property in
that parish estimated as worth three
millions of dollars Is now held by them
for the Government Of the United States. The
single parish of St. Helena has thus been made
to pay, besides the property previously conds-
Gated, taxes to ten times the amount exacted
of the whole State of South Carolina. These
lands thus purchased are either lying waste or
occupied by freedmen for small rents or no
rent at all. Whether any rent has ever been
collected suppose the commissioners can
tell, and every one else can tell that, cultiVa-
ted as they are, by undirected negro labor,
these fine lands must yearly deteriorate.
What more may have to say OF the outra-
ges and wrongs inflicted upon those who were
once the whole community Of ST. Helena Pa
rish by the officials of a great government, Will
reserve for my next, In which / will certainly
address few words to the Hon. F. A Sawyer
ASAoDEUS.
CHINESE HoUsE-SERvASTS.- st. Louis