The Daily state register. [volume] (Carson City, Nev.) 1870-1872, 1871-04-04
0FFICE-Rail'> Brick Building, Second
street, opposite the Capitol.
AN OLD REPUBLICAN, SPEAKS.

The New York Evening Post.
William Cullen Bryant's paper, has
an article on Gen. B. T. Butler
anti ku- klux bill. NJ. Bryant is
too we'll known as a poet, scholar
and an eminent journalist, for more
- be said than that lie is also a Re
publican. OF Buffers bill he says:
The laws Of Draco. it Will be seen,
never approached this in atrocitv.
for even Draco never proposed to kill
any person not guilty of any oifense.
or to make constructive guilt ont Of
circumstances which might easily be
consistent with innocence. Many of
the crimes set down in this bill
would be the natural consequences
of 4 peaccable citizens effort to
keep the peace, and to protect him
self and his neighbOrs from trouble.
The attempt to enforce such a law as
this would make a Mexico of our
country At once.
But the fundamental objection to
the bill is independent Of the cruelty
of its penalties, of its loose and dis,
criminate definitions of crime. and
of the boIndless and irresistible
power Of persecution it puts into the
hands Of Il few hundreds Of men,
and is more decisive against it even
than these. The bill would repeal
the Constitution OF the United
States. and revolutionize our whole
system of government.
In the first placa. it is piece of
special legislation, subjecting eleven
States to a system of criminal juris-
diction entirely different from any
that exists or would be tolerated in
the other States. It makes that a
crime in South Carolina which is no
crime in New York. 1t makes GER
tain offenses punishable by differ
ent tribunal, and 18th incomparably
greater severity in Louisiana than in
Massachusetts,. Congress has no
more power to DO this than it has to
make different sets of customs or
tax laws for different States.
But again, the whole subject is
one over which Congress has no iur
isdiction. There is not line in tie
Constitution to authOrise the general
government to maintain civil order
in the States. The State authorities
NAV. indeed, call on the President to
aid themin suppressing insurrecti0n.
But when he gives this aid, he acts
simply as auxiliary to the municipal
executive, and in support OF the mum
icipal laws. The Supreme Court of
the United States has maintained
this limit of national authority from
the beginning. 1t says: "All those
powers which relate TO merely mum
icipal legislation, or which may
properly be called internal police,
are not surrendered tby the States
or restrained. and consequently in
relation to these the authority of a
State is complete, unqualified and
exclusive" II. Peters Reports,
lU2.)
If such an act were passed, tend
ing to interfere with civil order, to dis
turb the authorities Of the peace, cs-
tablishing commissioners" in every
county to wrest his prisoners from
the sheriff and stop his process,
what would be the duty of the State
officers? Plainly to resist such men
at all hazards. Were it attempted
in New York or Massachusetts,. the
army and navy of the United States
could not enforce such a bill for an
hour. The law-abiding mind and
conscience of every free citizen
would sustain the Constitution and
the principles of free government
against the usurpation; and this new
rebellion against the Union, though
expressed in an act OF Congress and
sustained by an administration at
Washington would be put down as
resolutely as was the last.