New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1871-04-11


menced. With one hundred and twenty
six candidates voted for in the parish Of
Orleans, this count was necessarily slow
and tedious, and was prolonged several
days; but at no time was it conducted with
secrecy, and generally proceeded under the
scrutiny of from two to three hundred in
terested parties.
didates and their friends raiaed the cry of
frsuds; they res0rted to the courts, presided
over by Democratic judges, and after q
fruitless contest in that way they gracefully
succumbed and acquiesced in the result of
what has been since conceded as the most
quiet and peacefufelectio held in Louisiana
within the memory Of the oldest inhabitant.
For that part Of the Senator's remarks
basing his charge of fraud in that election
upon admissions made by my colleague, l re-
fer the Senate to him when he shall have the
opportunity Of speaking for himself, though
had it from his own lips last night that the
Senator from Missouri had not truly repre-
sented him.
deny the charge that, under Republican
rule, there has been reckless increase Of
the public debt of Louisiana. The Demo
cratic Legislature Of 1866, created under
President JohnsOn's policy, appropriated
more money than its two Republican sue
cessors. The bonds Of Louisiana, upon the
accession of the Republicans to power,
were only worth thirty-tive to forty cents
on the dollar. They are now salable at
sixty-five to seventy, and are in good re-
pute with capitalists throughout the cosn-
try.
Our financial position can best be illus
trated by quoting from the remarks of the
member from the Second Congressional
District, made yesterday upon the floor Of
the House, in reply to similar attacks upon
t1.n nf 2koto NJ hal cnsA .
"When the present administration Of the
Stafe> government came into power the
bonded, floating, and contingent debts of the
State of Louisiana amounted to something
like fourteen million dollars. The Repub-
ican administration has built more than
forty miles of expensive and permanent
levees, besides repairing levees in other
places, which has contributed largely to the
increase Of the Indebtedness of the State" "
"Now, there is one other fact which ought
to be considered in relation to correct un-
derstanding of this whole matter. When
the war closed there was mania in the
public mind of the South. among men of all
political parties, in favor of the construction
of railroads, and other works of internal
improvements. 1t equally prevailed with
the Democratic as well as with the Repub-
ican party. Money has been literally ap-
prOpriated in all the States for railroads.
The same thing has taken place in my State:
but. sir, not one dollar has been apprOpri-
ated for any sham railroad, but in every in
stance the money has been devoted for
the purpose of constructing bona fide rail
roads, and it has been expended in good
faith, and to the great advantage Of the
State"
The Senator evinces readiness to adopt
any statement to the disparagement Of Re
publican governments at the South that are
made in the public press With eagerness
he quotes from New Orleans paper state
ment that the debt Of Louisiana amounts
to 10000, 900. Had he looked little fur
ther in that same paper, he would have dis
covered the official statement of the State
Auditor that the debt was SIS 5O0, 600, and
he would also have discovered that the
Auditors arithmetic is commented upon as
follows:
''The statement prepared by the Auditor
shows an Indebtedness of $25, ,203, ,733 81,
and it took the ingenuity of an experienced
arithmetician to raise this sum above the
issued to the property banks, which form
NO part of the actual debt; outstanding
warrants, which bear no interest; an amount
due for runaway slaves, which can never
be recovered; . debt due to the United
States government for money given to
the State in 1885, and which has never been
called for in the darkest hours of the re-
public, and which never will be called for,
etc. But there his arithmetical powers
seem to have given out, and he could not
deduct the amount Of warrants paid by the
State Treasurer, the amount Of bonds
already reduced by the State; he did not
consider the assets nor the revenues of the
State, which latter, the treasurer shows.
amounted to over q million and half in
three months, and which are used to pay
contingent expenses and to take up out
standing warrants, whereof $40 50 and
81, ,22l ,349 l3 have been paid during that
short period Of time. If these deductions
are made, we find again that the actual
dollars"
have the honor to know well the official
whose arithmetic is thus criticised. An old
citizen of our State, of unquestiOned loyalty
during the rebellion, of character beyond
reproach, and withal Republican, he has,
in his very zeal to protect the State, thus ex-
aggerated her liabilities, with q view to pre-
vent the augmentation of the State debt, to
which he is opposed But the critic of that
officials figures might have advanced one
step further. He might have called atten-
tion to the fact that there are three items Of
railroad bonds, which the State is to guar
anty, that amount in the aggregate to $ll,-
81 1000, which have not yet been issued. In
the statement which the Senator has quoted
they are classed as accruing debt, that
Is to say, they are to become debts
of the State in case the railroad compa-
MES should ultimately fail to pay
when it is known that the State only
guarantees to the extent of 81, 500 per mile;
and further these bonds are to be issued as
the railroads are completed in sections of
forty miles. They are to run thirty years,
and were they all to be issued in the year
1871 the default of the railroad companies
could not occur until the year 1891, and con-
sequently the States liability does not fall
within the constitutional limit of SIS, ,OOO, 600,
expiring in 1890.
This debt of Louisiana. which the Senator
thinks SO mOnstrOus, and which is enough
in all conscience, owes its creation in part
to the votes of the Democratic members of
our Legislature. who have never failed in
single instance, l believe, to keep pace with
their Republican colleagues in recording an
affirmative vote for every scheme Of ex-
penditure, whether iudicious or extrava-
CANT.
The Democratic party in Louisiana. how
ever, differ with the Republicans in regard
to the State debt in one essential particu
lar. While the Republicans have sought to
restrict the debt within q constitutional
limit OF $25, ,0OO, 900, passing, by unanimous
vote of their party in the Legislature, an
amendment of that character to the consti
tuition, submitting 1t to popular vote, and
carrying it by triumphant majority; the
Democrats opposed such limitation. Oppo-
sitiOn to such limitation was one of the
planks of their party platform in our recent
election, and / believe they generally voted
againstlt 1t.
The Senator from Missouri relies for his