The Wheeling daily register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1864-1878, 1871-09-13
1856 MARYLAND avenue.
Senator Thurman on the New DE.
nRrfure-The Way To Say IL.

ny ~ Soy
Senator Thurman addressed the De-
mocracy Of Ohio on the Both ult, at
and spoke as follows of the
position of the Democratic party in
reference TO what some are inclined to
call the new departure"
Now, my friends, it has been common
for the Republican party OF this county
to say the Democrats have taken a New
Departure and that New Departure
they alIege consists in saying that we
have been wrong, and the Republicans
have been right. l say there has never
been any such confession as that. We
are as much opposed to what has been
done as when we gave our votes against
it. Why, if l should see a man strike
another in an awful and brutal manner
in the street, throttle him and knock
him down, and trespass upon his
rights, and | should see his wounds
and bruises, and see him bleeding, |
should be compelled to say that he was
down and bleeding. But who would
call that a confession that the villain
who had outraged him had done what
was proper? Laughter. So when
these men throttled the Constitution and
ruined the peace of the country-when
they made the South almost as ruinous
as in the midst OF war-we remonstra-
ted and opposed them, and now, be-
cause we cannot deny that the thing
has been plished-because we
are compelled to admit the fact that
the reconstruction laws have been exc
cuted and the amendments to the Con-
stitution fastened upon us-we are told,
forsooth, that we admit that the Radi-
Gals were right and we were wrong.
That's logic for you.
The fourteenth amendment to the Con.
stitution was passed. We opposed it,
Why did we oppose it2 Because it
provided that all people in the United
States should be equal before the law !?
There is not one Democrat from the
Ohio river to Canada, not one in the
United States opposed it on any such
grounds. That has always been the
law in Ohio; that has always been the
law in the North. The Democrats, he
said, were opposed to the fourteenth
amendment, first, because it disfran-
chised the men OF influence, OF intellect
ofeducation, whose aid was most neces-
sary to restore peace to the South +;
secondly, because the language was am
biguous, and was such as would enable
an ambitious President and Congress to
usurp the powers that belong to the
individual States, and to overthrow
every one Of the reserved rights of the
people Of the States. And were we not
right for it is under the ambiguous and
loose language of that amendment that
the infamous Ku-Klux bill was passed,
under a pretense of authority derived
from that loose and ambiguous Ian
guage. If this Interpretation were
correct, the President would have power
in the State OF Ohio to displace the
Governor, dethrone the Legislature,
turn out of office our Judges, and estab-
lish martial law from one end Of the
State to the other, whenever he thinks
or pretends to think it is necessary
for him to take martial possession OF
Ohio.
In order to protect the rights Of indi-
viduals we were right then in opposing
that amendment thus framed and thus
phrased the fifteenth amendment. We
opposed it because it was fraud upon
the people in the way the thing was
prepared and carried out, and direct
violation of the solemn pledges OF the
dominant party made in the platform
at Chicago. We opposed it for stronger
reasons than that. We said it was per.
fectly monstrous that we should turn
over at least one-half of the Southern
States to the control Of a race not one
in ten OF whom could read, much less
write, and Of whom not one in thou
sand had the least idea Of the govern
ment under which he lived, and under
which they were now to discharge the
duties OF lawmakers. If the time
should come when they should be edu-
Gated to a proper standard to enable
them to exercise this right, with
and to the welfare OF
the country, we said it would
be right. Now what has been
the effect of this in the reconstructed
States down South? With their pre-
Of negro voters the result
has been that they are the worst gov
erned part of God globe to-day. Those
States have been delivered over to the
tender mercies of the carpet-baggers
and adventures of the North, and OF
the meaner men, the scalawags, OF the
South, and with negroes in combination
with them they govern almost every
one of those States. And how do they
govern them2 When the war ended
those States were Frustrated to a degree
we can hardly realize, ravaged by their
own army as we'll as ours, the people
were Frustrated their currency was
worth nothing, thousands and tens Of
of their farms lay desolate