Perrysburg journal. (Perrysburg, Wood Co., O. [Ohio]) 186?-1965, 1871-05-12
The Ku.Klux Law.

THE primary object of government Is
to afford protection to person and property
without resort to violence. No govern
ment is entitled to the allegiance of its
citizens which does not recognize and act
upon this first principle of political science.
Upon this point all political economists
and statesmen agree. This protection is
the compensation for taxes and the liabili
ty to be compelled to render military SER
vice. In saying this we but state politi-
cal axiom about which there is no contro-
versy and never has been.
The act TO enforce the provisions of the
Fourteenth Amendment and the Civil
Rights law which was perfected yesterday,
is based upon this primal law of political as
sociation, neither more nor less. ANY gov
ernment that should refuse, in case of need,
to do as much to protect its citizens as this
statute contemplates, would forfeit its right.
full hold upon the loyalty of its citizens. If
the Ku Klux outrages had never occurred,
and profound tranquility were now pre-
vailing throughout the entire country, it
would still be an eminently proper thing
to place such an act upon the statute books
OF the nation. 1t should never be re-
pealed. The immediate occasion for it
will soon pass away, we may hope, and it
may be long before another emergency of
the kind will arise; but the national gov.
ernment should always be prepared to deal
with such an evil in its incipiency. Had
the Executive and Judiciary branches of
the government been clothed with the
authority conferred by the law enacted
yesterday, Ku-Kluxism would have been
suppressed long ago, and never have at
talned 70 its present gigantic proportions.
1t will be noticed that the law is so
worded as to be general in all its features
There is no specific mention OF the Ku-
klux, of the Sonth, or of any other tenn
porary or local feature of the case. 1t is
rather couched in such language and makes
such provisions as make it applicable at
any time or place. The law has Just
now specific and sole application in the
South, but wholly for the reason that the
state of things described in the act exists
there, and only there.
1t may be said that the right to suspend
the writ OF hdbedS corpus, under certain
specl1ed circumstances, is liable to abuse.
We admit it All power is subject to the
same liability. The execution or every
act of Congress is vested in the President
and tthe Federal courts, precisely as the
enforcement of this law is, and there is
not one among them all that may not be
abused, in one way or another. There is
no dlilerence in this particular between
the last act of Congress and all previous
acts of Congress.
The Democrats, both in Congress and
through the press, have denounced this
measure. The Republican party accepts
the issue thus joined. Every other con.
sideration is secondary. We have no
doubt of the popular verdict The Re-
publican party has now reached the fifth
stage of its existence. 1t said slavery
shall go no farther; the Union shall be
preserved; slavery shall die and never be
resurrected; the Southern States shall be
restored to State rights upon the basis of
equal political rights; the principle of po-
litical economy underlying the reconstruc-
ton acts should be incorporated in the
organic law of the nation and made uni.
versal in its application. And now it
says, as the grand elimination of all, that
every citizen shall be guaranteed the full
enjoyment of all his rights by the authority
comforting them and which is alone able
to make good Its guaranty against all
enemies, domestic or foreign. The people
have been with us so far they WILL we are
confident, continue to sustain their repre-.
sentatives in now putting the key stone in
the arch of our liberties ChicagO
Journal.