Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1871-06-27
For the Spectator.
IOr tuc
Forced Sales.

MR. EDITOR 1t may be, my ideas on thi
subject, will cause some to open their eyes il
plous horror. 1t has been questionable O
late, to express sympathy with an oppressed
tax-rldden, debt-overwhelmed people. Thos,
who, during the war had an anchor to wind
ward, and pretending sympathy with the Con
tederacy, only aided it under constraint, decriec
when jackson and Lees soldiers suffered 70,
want of it, and when its sun went down at Ap
pomattox lnwardy exulted, have none of this
sympathy. Those again who readily united
with the class first described, in railing ou
against stay or relief-laws, and insisted thai
debts of all kinds, anti-war, during, and since
mnst be paid, and aided in creating public SEN
timent which in the first Legislature opened
the food-gates of legislation by encouraging
liens, which were rapidly secured everywhere,
have shown none. Both these classes, so ac-
tive as to do much to create public opinion,
deserve much of the responsibility for the un-
toward legislation of last winter and the pre-
ceding one. Regardless of the lost of three
fourths OF the property and values of our peo-
pie, and their oppressed, tax-ridden and debt
overwhelmed condition, all the legislation since
the war has been in the interest of the creditor,
foreign and domestic. We asked at their
hands bread, and they gave us stone. The
shrewd Yankee wiped out, expunged the in
terest accruing during the war. This pitiful
boon has been denied US. We have been
told, as the tree falls so it must lie Our So
Ions lose sight Of this most important fact
that we are in q state Of revolution, with gov
ernment forced on us at the point Of the bayo-
NET, under constitution the most damnable,
that such people as ours was ever forced to
live under, that they are the creatures of this
revolution, and the Judiciary consisting of eight
hustings, ninety-eight county, and sixteen Cir
cult Judges are the emanatons of this revolu-
ton. and respectable as most of them are, yet
it is fact patent to all intelligent men, that
neither the legislature nor their creatures, the
Judiciary, would have been dreamed of in anti
war times, for either position. Will you pre-
tend to assert, Mr.. Editor, that the delegate,
1t may be from the county Of Fauquier, who
was compelled to take his seat on the floor of
the late House of Delegates as the peer of bis
carriage-driver, who represented Gen. Wash
ington's native county, and his ingenious black
smith who represented Henry Clsy's native
county is not the creature OF revolution, and
the judiciary he together with his intelligent
co-adjutors have made, would not cause Mar
shall's bones to rattle in his coniu, at the bare
thought that such judges must sit where be
sat, and pretend to administer the law as he
administered it? And yet, our people de-
spoiled, trampled upon-yes, spit upon, must
tamely fold their hands and see themselves
sold out their wives and childen made beg
gars, and a stranger comfortably ensconced in
their paternal homes, and all, forsooth because
certain people say Reputation will damn them,
relief-laws will disgrace them, it being far bet
ter to die in the lazaretto than that the Yam
kee who has caused them to be shorn of two
thirds of what was honestly theirs, should have
it to say. they were guilty of reputation. Mr..
Editor, | am not repudiator by any means,
or its advocate, but I do not intend that, so far
as my voice and influence is concerned, there
shall be free and indiscriminate turning out
on the commons of our people to beg or to
starve, until this revolution is over and we are
again under a government of our own choice.
But what do you propose, you ask? A peaca-
BILE remedy. Nothing more nor less, than
that our people, will, under~no circumstances,
(unless perchance it may be for taxes, for the
wheels of government must ~revolve,) consent
to attend sale whether of real or personal
property, of constable, sheriff. marshal, COM
missioner, trustee or other person, where it
must be made, and will not countenance the at
tendance Of a foreign buyer. This will result
in matters going along quietly until we can see
daylight somewhere ahead. At any rate, no
one will be in any worse condition than at pres
ent. LINKENFURGUS.