The States and Union. [volume] (Ashland, Ohio) 1868-1872, 1871-05-10

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should be equally so when you require
fhsm to pay taxes TO support the Gov
ernuient which has kept them under
political disabilities during a period Of
six years after the close of the war,
and sends strangers among them as
Conquerors and tax gatherers?
Change your policy, proclaim gen,
eral amnesty, show that you are wor-
thy to be the Representatives of II
great and free people. Change your
policy, so that, in future times, the
blessings and not the reproaches of
posterity may rest upon your names.
Mr.. Speaker, if l know myself, i'll
resisting this bill l am not actuated
by partisan feeling, but. by a of
duty to the whole country. That
man does not live upon whom / would
be willing to confer the power pro
posed to be given by this bill. Were
George Washington to day in the
Presidential chair. I would oppose
placing in his hands the powers asked
for by President Grant.
liz free governments like ours, par
ties will and ought to exist /; but they
become dangerous to the liberties of
the people when party allegiance be-
comes stronger than allegiance to the
country and its institutions. We are
told by Machiavel, in his Prince, and
he appears to have been studied by
gentlemen who support this bill, that,
"When States that are newly conquered
have been accustomed to liberty and TO live
under their " laws, there are three ways
of maintaining them. The first is to ruin
them"
Sir, tbs FIRST act of the Republican
party after the war was to impress a
tax of three cents per pound on cotton,
or Sl2 per acre upon the cotton lands
ef~the South. And-from that day to
the present you have been doing all in
your power to retard the restoration of
peace and law and order within those
States. / say "you !" 1 make not the
charge against every gentleman on the
other side of the Houze, because /
know that in all parties there are ex-
treme and conservative men. But
the misfortune is-that extreme men,
men of audacity, men destitute of
principle, men fired by ambition and
unscrupulous as to the ean of graft
flying it, draw after them, into the
maelstrom which they have created,
mon of more conservative views.
Time will not permit NC to dwell
further in this connection upon the
subject before us. But in one thing /
am satisfied, that a graver bill or a
more memcntous subject never came
before any Legislature for its delibera-
ton And 1 appeal to gentlemen,
now If in fact they are Republicans.
if they are in earnest in their profess
sions Of love for liberty and free insti-
tutions, I implore them to abandon all
partisan feeling, to obey the dictates
of their consciences, and stand by the
Constitution.
Before concluding, one word to the
people of the South, through their
representatives in Congress. Your
worst enemies, no matter how few nor
how many, are those who violate your
own laws. The. great body of the
people of the No. tn desire to maintain
fraternal relations witk you, in fact to
be countrYmen and friends. But it
behooves you not to give cvil-minded
men a pretext to excite unjust preju-
dice against you. I speak plainly be-
cause times are grave. l speak plain
" because the times are grave l
speak plainly because 1 do not wish
to see new calamities brought upon
our country. BY your own State Con-
yentionE you abolished slavery, and
the world applauded you for doing so.
The fourteenth and fifteenth amend
ments to the Constitution have been
adopted and have been declared by the
courts to be parts of the fundamental
law of the land, and wisdom and pa
triotism alike demand that Us such
they should be respected.