Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1871-04-11

II
tanooga Times. The exposure and re-
-buke by the Representative from Wiscon-
sin Mr. Eldridgel were 30 prompt and
blasting that spare him any further in
Fiction. a
The Representative from Pennsylvania,
fMr. Kelley from his tour through the
South in 1867, seemed to imagine that the
very soil was burning with rebellion. and
that the air was shirnmering with sitting
heat, and he concluded that Northern
men and Northern capital could not ven
ture there in safety. Capital is calcu-
lating and timid, and just such speeches
as his are depressing the outflow of the
redundant capital of the North.
Lean cay that Northern men, who were
Northern soldiers, with Northern capital,
with Republican politics, have erected
wooden mills, the dull thunder of whose
looms reverberates day and night through
the streets of my own quiet village. Our
mountain gates in East Tennessee stand
open wide. The great basin of Middle
Tennessee, with its blue mountain rim on
the east and the Tennessee river as
water belt on the west, with soil exubeis
ant in the production of all the grasses,
cereals, and staples, and West Tennessee,
alike remarkable in fertility, and washed
by the Father of Waters on the west, all
stand open 10 the influx Of honest indus
try, capital, and improvement in useful
arts. Her qusrries of marble, her beds Of
copper, of iron, and of coal, exist in
mountain masses; ay, her coal-beds are
sufficient to feed the smelling furnaces of
the nation. The renown of Lowell will
pale before her water powers, whose
roar, unheeded for ages, has been calling
to be spprenticed to the 7servitude of me.
chinery. All are welcone to come with
their capital, to be of US and affiliate with
US, but not TO make war upon us.
Iregret that am called upon to notice
the, invidious comparison of the same
Representative between the metropolitan
refinemenis of the laboriDg class Of his
constituents, whose dwellings are lighted
with gas, and who have the convenience
of hot and cold water baths, and the
Southern lsboring men, who live in hum
bic homes and are denied the conveniences
of his constituents. Co.,
Let me remind the honorable gentleman
that, while / do not represent much of the
ornamental part of society, l do represent
in the main brave, intelligent, virtuors,
and hospitable peasantry, who, in common
with the same class scattered through the
rural districts everywhere, constitute the
bone and sinew of the republic.
1t is sometimes the case that the coun-
try has TO deplOre the decay Of her men,
amid the increase of her wealth:
IN fares the land, to Fastening ills prey,
Where wealth accumulates and men decay,
Princes and lords may flourish or may fade,
breath can make ID EN-, as a breath has m ade;
When once destroyed, can never be supplied"
But cannot spare longer time in par
ing the rind from the real issue, and ]
now strike for the core.
The objections to the bill are legion,
but the greatest of them all, like the
string of The scorpion, is to be found in
its tail; go arranged, l supposed, on a
principle of art that if the head shall entt I
the tail will follow. My object will lie 10
show that this bill is part of the grand
drift of congressional Legislation TO ceE-
trslized Government.
Tha: my argument may be better open
ed up, will revert 10 few of the an
Gent theories underlying our Govern.
ment. Under the British sGovernment
the king was considered the source of
power, and from him grants were conce-
ded 10 and extorted by the people, such
as Magma Chsrts, forest charters, and
colonial charters. The theory of the
American Government began at the other
end of the line, and asserted
THAT all Governments derive their
just powers from the consent of the gov
erned.n
Hence we have three manifestations of
political power, to wit, the powers con-
ferred on the State governments, the
powers conferred on the federal govern
ment, and the powers reserved by the peo-
pie, constituting grand trinity of polit-
ical powers, intended to move in hsrmo-
NOUS combination.
Our forefathers, looking into the fu-
ture, saw
1.-The giant MASS Of things to come"
The vision was grand and panoramic.
They saw the North American continent
stretching out before them, containing
more than seven million square miles, Its
shores washed by two oceans, lying di
rectly in the path of the western march
of the Caucasian race, and, sdmonished
by the fate of cumbrous establishments
in the Old World, they saw that State
governments were indispensable to the
existence of republican liberty, in the &C.
cupation of the vast area. They saw the
nee essity of the federal government TO
stand as bulwark against foreign ag-
erosion, and, standing as guardian of the
States, TO prevent the destruction of the
republican form of government by the
usurpations of any kiDgly or monarchisl
power, at the same time to have a flexi-
bic federal constitution, whose elastic
bands might be thrown over S ate after
State, until limited by the ocean outlines.
In the Convention which formed the
Constitution, Mr.. Madison declared:
81 mean to preserve the State rights
with the same care as l would trials by
jury"
Indeed, one vast republic, grown to the
anticipated development OF free govern
ment on this continent, would be far be-
yond the governing capacity of human
intelligence. We have already thirty
seven State governments, each with its
executive, Legislative, aud judiciary de-
partments, all busy in making, expound-
ing and executing the laws, each building
up q jurisprudence Of its OVID, yet in har-
mony with the Constitution of the United
States.
If the Federal Government were to alb
sorb the State governments, it could not
push its laws and powers and remedies
into the ten thousand channels of human
rights and wants, proximate and remote,
so as to give prompt and adequate relief
Judges, msrshals, and bailiffs, would
have to be multiplied by the thousand;
tax collectors would swarm in rapaciOus
and, armed with summary pow
ers, and smitten with the lust of gain,
and feeling secure in their distance from
the eye of the central Government, they
would practice their heartless extortions
on the people, who would submit to the
wrong rather than incur the expense of
going to distant tribunal fer relief.
1t is true that they might be carved up
into provinces, and governed by procon-