Democratic enquirer. [volume] (M'arthur, Vinton County, Ohio) 1867-1873, 1870-10-26
FrOm the Cincinnati Enquirer)
Military Interference a
Elections. tA.

AA'o0lh "i'09' Ol0eCVu py nc IJeo-
pie of the provinces in their
jealousy of the royal Governors,
who had control of the military
power, passed enactments that
no soldier should he stationed
within a considerable distance
Of a voting place or precinct.
This distrust of bayonet infu-
ence they derived from Great
Britain, where, since their rev.
olution of 1889, it has never
been permitted. After our
Revolution, if the idea had been
suggested for seventy years,
that in the United States sold
iers under the authority at
Washington would be employ
ed at the polls, it would have
been hooted at as utterly i'm
possible. 1t would have been
said that it could not be done
without a violent and bloody
revolution, that would entirely
change the nature of the Gov
ernment. 1t is the characteris-
tic of a monarchy and of a mil
itary despotism, but never of a
republic. When soldiers are
stationed at the polls by a
Washington Administration,
and permitted to remain there,
the principle of liberty in the
country is dead. The Consti-
tuition of 1889, and the amend.
ments adopted since, give the
Federal Government no more
right to send bayonets to the
voting places than it does to
elect and swear into Office q
king. Any effort Of that char
acter is an attempt at revolu-
tion as open and palpable as
was Louis Napoleon's "coup
d'etat" in 1851. Yet what do
we see ? The Administration
of General Grant, pretending to
fiud authority in some statute
passed by Congress preparato-
ry to carrying out the Fifteenth
Amendment, has sent its armed
Pretorian guards to Philadel-
phia to seize the ballot-boxes,
and is contemplating the same
action at the coming elections
in New York and Baltimore.
The threats Of the Administra.
tion were thus alluded to in our
Washington dispatch of yester-
day
POSTMASTER General CresweIl mado
a speech in Baltimore last night, in
which he said that the President in :
tended to carry out the legislation
of Congress regarding the elections
to the very letter. and, if need be,
to call out the regular army and the
militia of the States for that purpose.
lie said he should warn the people
of Baltimore that in November they
would have a properly conducted
election, and that Governor Swami,
who is running for Congress in the
Third District, would probably feel
the effect of 1t for the first time
The Presidents represented by 9th
ers as saying that he will station n
gunboat at the foot of every street
in New York City if it be necessary
to enforce the Congressional election
law there on the 18th prox."
Was there ever such impu.
dent presumption ? If a mem
Der of the Cabinet of Great
Bitain-the Gladstone Minis
try-should have the audacity
to talk as this Postmaster Gen
eral Creswell has in Baltimore,
he would lie forthwith impeach.
ed in Parliament, and would be
lucky if his life was spared
from popular indignation. AS
to the President stationing a
gunboat at the foot of every
street in New York City, to
NOW down the people with
grape and canister on election
day if they did not vote to suit
him-for that is all there is of
it-can not be spoken of with
out the most intense bitterness
of feeling. VIII the voters of
this country submit thus to be
tyrannized over by military
scoundrelism ? The war has
been over for FIVE years, There
is no pretense Of martial law or
its necessity anywhere, and yet,
in a time of profound peace,
such threats of military violence
are uttered against New York
and Baltimore, and actually
performed in the case Of Phil
adelphis. There is in this
much food for thouoht and re.