New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1872-06-23
TEE GREAT Law OF NBOBsgTTY,

| George II. BoVee is SUNG Governor War
moth for having suspended and removed
him from the Office of Secretary of State.
He demands fifty thousand dollars dam
ages, which is more than he could be
reasonably damaged if removed from pub
lie Office should continue in force during
the balance of his natural life. Bovee is
above thirty-fve years of age at present,
and in the course of nature he ought to
die in thirty-fve years. He is not worth
in any position more than fifteen hundred
dollars. per annum, which would put his
entire earnings from now until eighteen
hundred and ninety-nine at just what he
demands for single year. Besides, he
has not been financially injured, because
he has drawn his salary from the State
with beautiful regularity while attending
to his private business as a stationery
merchant in the parish of St. Charles.
He defends his claim to these royal dam
ages upon the ground that his removal
from office was not accompanied by that
politeness which prevails in parlor inter-
course, but was accomplished by what the
preachers call 'laying on of hands. Gen
eral Heron laid on the hands. Governor
Warmoth had nothing more to do with the
act Of violence that Mr.. Bovee complains
about than he had with the act that in
duced him to remove the Secretary.
In resisting the suit of Bovee, the Gov
ernor confesses that he suspended and re-
moved the plaintiff, but avoids by plead
ing the great law Of necessity for his act.
The Secretary of State assumed to declare
that to be a law which was not a law.
He usurped the functions Of all the de-
partments of government. This was
direct, open and palpable violation Of law.
Any citizen who sees another committing
a fragrant offense feels that the ''great law
of necessity" justifes him in arresting the
deed. This law is the normal nature Of
the human race. 1t prevails in every
honest mans conscience. 1t does not
need to be written on parchment, because
it is engraved upon the heart, and is inca
pable Of being erased or lost. The Gov
ernor of the State, moreover, is made the
guardian of the written law. He has
sworn to see that the laws are faithfully
executed. How was he to do this duty in
Bovees case effectively in any other way
than by suspending him from the power
to injure the community? Mr.. Bovee
proclaimed, under his official seal, that
mutilated and imperfect paper, which
somebody handed to him, was genuine
statute, when he knew that the original
and correct copy was in the possession of |
the Governor. This pretended law, thus
stamped with all the formalties necessary
to give it force in a court Of civil jurisdic-
ton, was an open, bare-faced fraud, dis
honest in its inception, impolitic in its pro-
visions, and injurious in its designs. Its |
was a violation of law. |
The Governor saw this wrong being
done, felt that his power was being
usurped by a subordinate in his own
Office, remembered his oath and his
duty, and Mt once removed from Office the
man who boldly avowed his guilt, and
interference with his usurpa-
ton.
If the people discover in this that the
has laid himself liable, techni-
cally, as an offender against them, not
against Mr.. Bovee, they should also dis
cover that he offended in their interest,
not in his own, for he had no other con-
Germ in the matter than to see that the
common law as between himself, the
people and George E. Bovee was not vio-
lated by the latter to their direct injury.
The great law Of necessity" which over
tops all mere -formularies in justifying the
shooting of a robber or the arrest of an in
tending murderer, without waiting for a
writ OF arrest palliates the action of the
Governor In suspending the late Secretary
Of State from an Office that he abused and
perverted, and excuses the magistrate who
stopped wrOng-doer on the threshold of
MS wicked conduct without waiting to be
precise in the manner Of his doing it.
As to the injury that Bovee has suffered,
hat he must blame himself for If he