The Daily state journal. [volume] (Alexandria, Va.) 1868-1874, 1872-07-23

DelloCFat NOteu against ana denounced TINS
measure Of justice; and especially let it
be remembered that President johnson,
then fallen under the tutelage Of Frank p.
Blair and other like apostates from the
Republicanism they formerly professed and
who are now the noisy advocates of Horace
Greeley and have him under like t~utelage,
actively opposed and Uetoed the act. 1t
was not until February, 1869, that
the fifteenth amendment the last great
Republican principle, incorporated into
our organic law-the Constitution
secured to all citizens of the United
States personal freedom and the right of
self-goyernment. With this addition to our
organic law it might fairly be expected
that Democratic %antagonism to the ''per-
feet law of liberty" would cease, especially
as the popular verdict in November, 1865,
rebukcd r~eactionaiy Democracy in the per-
son of Seymour and Blair, and endorsed
the policy of the National Republican par
ty in the election of Grant and Colfax as
President and Vice President of this great
and free Republic. "
But events which transpired during that
campaign, in Louisiana and other Southern
States, showed that if the Republican party
had given to all the ballot, the old enemies
OF popular rights were bent on controlling
the right to cast it according to the dictates
OF free judgment, and the acts of May 81,
1870, and February 2S, 1871, known as the
enforcement acts, provided penalties against
bribery, threats, interference, or intimida-
ton of any person entitled to vote. These
measures, which simply provide for the
punishment Of offences no good citizen
would excuse, much less commend, have
been and are opposed by the Democracy
with singular vehemence and virulence,
while they have been cautiously but faith
fully executed by President Grant, with
the intent, as he himself expressed it, to
" secure a pure, ~untrammeled ballot,
where every man entitled to vote may do
so just once at each election, without fear
of molestation Or prescription on account
of his political faith, nativity, OF color"
Rut if the National Government could
enforce a free ballot at the polls, the old
leaders of opposition to human rights de-
termined to make another and more malig-
nant effort to retain their power, and from
ku-klux dens issued masked ruffianism to
wreak vengeance upon those who dared to
exercise their privilege as free men, and
terrorize those who were less manly or
valued less highly their dearly purchased
rights. Talk ola ''bloody assize" being held
in North or South Carolina by the United
States judges! 1t was an inquest orer blood
split By midnight ~assassins, and no other
blood has Toned than that of innocent Re-
p%ublicans, let out by the weapons of muir
derous ku-klux. The last Republican SEN
actment looking to public safety. known as
the ku-klux law, was designed to stay the
further shedding of innocent blood, and
bring to tardy justice, these emissaries of
villainy, who were steepd in crime and yet
gloried in the impunity given them by weak
or sympathizing courts and p%erjured witness
ses. President Grant at length laid the iron
hand of justice upon these wretches, and
now their aiders and abettors unite in a
bowling chorus of maledictions upon his
head, and denounce him as a bloodthirsty
tyrant, because he has cautiously but firmly
checked their "bloody a~ssize," which
spared neither age nor sex. But much as
the national Republican party has done for
the oppressed and lowly, its benefcient
labors have not been confined to the South
ern States.
The Homestead act, passed May, 1862,
gave to every actual settler one hundred and
sixty acres of the public lands, having been
vetoed in 1860 by Buchanan under the
pressure of the then powerful s~laye-holding
class. The eight hour law was enacted
with a view to test practically the great
labor question, whether reduced hours of
labor can be made effective for individual
and general well being. In July 1852 the
act was passed which donated large tracts
of land for the maintenance of schools for
popular education in agriculture, mining,
and mechanic arts. ~
We have not space to-day to glance at
the other beniticent measures which render
the record of the National Republican party
so brilliant, but shall recur to the subject,
and ask that our readers make q careful
note of the fact, that Democracy, which
is now striving to hide itself under the
guise of Liberal Republicanism, and has
purchased Horace Greeley as its pratt
cal tigure-head, is mainly composed of
those who have opposed every beniicent
measure of the Republican party, upheld
every iniquity which has been perpetrated
against Republicans, and vilified every
man, who in lesser degree, but with like
devotion to principle as President Grant,
has made patriotism his guide, conscience
his adviser, and christian forbearance and
forgiveness the +" lamp to his feet" in the
path of public duty.
III