The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1871-11-30
The Pretended Rebellion.

Our Radical cotemporaries, says the Phiia'
delphia Age, call our attention to alleged COM
fessions, reported to their papers, which justify
the military Intervention of President Grant
in South Carolina, under what is commonly
called the Ku KIux law. We must be pardon
ed for some inctedulfty as to this convenient
kind of evidence furnishedto or.by those whose
political interests involved in THE extension
of. martial law all over the country. Conf:
dence is u plant Ufssfow growth, ,~s said Lord
Chatham. We know the impudcnt pretenss
that suficed in this city for the military, outs
rage, which eveii. Governor Geary denounced,
We are fresh from local canvass in which
this conveDient dodge of putting words into
mems mouths WAS freely resorted to, in defiance
of truth, probability, and common sense. The
principal Raiicaf bfgans We're always assuring
their readers that Furman Sheppard or James
S. Biddle had made some most damaging re:
mark or avowal, not ih their numerous public
speeches; but in private conversation, opportui
nelly overheard by some Radical eavesdropperl !
We doubt not, with the appliances of martial
law at their command, and with arbitrary and
unchecked poSer over every mans liberty, the
military straps and earpet-bag thieves and ty:
rants of South Carolina. will be able to obtain
confessions" to suit their purposes. They
may, perhaps, find many who, from fear to- ia
vor, will be ready, like @Fopsy; ""to fess" any
thing that may be agreeable to the party wants
ing confession We are familiar with the difficult
ty of arriving at truth, through the best means
that civil jlistice has earnedin centuries of eX:
perience III England and America, and I'VE slIalt
be slow to believe that the brutal. processes of
military despotism are indeed the short cut I'd
the administration of real justice That acts
of violence and crime. are committed in South
Carolina is true of Gdtrse; where is the land
in which they do not occur? But that any ere
bellion," as defined by the last Congress, $50
powerful and numerous rs to be able by, yiO-
ience to overthrow or set at defiance the con:
stituted authorities of such State and of the
United States;s does now exist in any South
ern State; we do not believe; for no reliable
evidence it. The statements in the Rad:
ical papers fall far short of proving this cond;;
ton, even if we credit them implicitly, and
they have been expressly and circumstantially
denied by the Charleston. Neus, by; the Grand
Jury in Chester county, and By numerous at
testations worthy of full as much credit as the
statements they impugn. There is not in the
Ku Klux law or in any other LAW, any warrant
for establishing martial law, and military desf
potism in South Carolina, on the pretexts which
the Radical press urge for so doing. After the
New Hampshire election of this year, the Rad
ical leaders deliberately resolved to reopen the
war, rs a means of obtaining a new easeaof
power, which they SAW slipping from their
hands. That is the game they are playing
now and all the Radical officials seem willing
to take hand in it, and their organs are CLANS
oring for martial law" everywhere, though
neither the word nor the thing has shadow OF
authority from the Constitution OF the laws.