Wilmington journal., 1873-07-04
ruTE NoitT.z CAROLINA HOyDs.

The North Carolina Bonds question
is still attracting attention out of the
State rs well as i'll it. The following
article, taken from the Richmond
DiSi1atch, shows how the question is
regarded IN Virginia. Our readers,
II Jwever, will remember that the eX-
tract SO warmly approved by the Dis
patch WAS taken from the Journal Of
last Wednesday and not from the
Raleigh .S,ntincl
The Dispatch says: The proposal
OF Messrs. Reverdy Johnson and Caleb
Gushing 20 compel North Carolina to
not owe has aroused a good deal of in
dignation IN that State. The Raleigh
Sentinel thinks that even after the
issuing of the n2a1sNan7us the bond
holders will have to wait long time
before they VIII get their money.
That paper says:
"Wo have very much mistaken the
complexion of the Legislature OF North
oGfOllIid IL blltC Slliill tllo" itHtIi
to be swerved from the line Of duty
by the prosecution OF any such suits
as those now threatened.
''The money that these bondholders
are now SO greedy after is no longer
in the treasury. 1t has been long ago
expended for other purposes, by order
of the Legislature, and it would seem
difficult, even if process should be
issued, to compel the treasurer to ap-
ply the money properly, to get any
thing by it unless the Legislature
shall choose to make good the detclen-
cy by levying a new tax. This the
Legislature of North Carolina will
never do.
eff there be any authority or any
machinery by which a Federal Court
can levy and collect taxes in the State
of North Carolina without the inter-
vention of the Legislature and other
State officers, it is time the fact were
known, and III this view of the case we
do not object to the vigorous prosecu-
ton of the suits now threatened.
eve are opposed to the payment of
these fraudulent State bonds, so called,
until we shall be forced to make it at
the point of the bayonet. If they be
obligations, they were contracted by
authority imposed upon us at the
point OF the bayonet, and it is nothing
but right and proper that they shall be
discharged only at the point OF the
bayonet.
"When there shall be an order of the
Federal Court that the State OF North
Carolina shall take up and discharge
those bonds, and President Grant or
his successor shall send Federal troops
to execute that order, they will be
paid, but not until then"
The Sentinel speaks in the right
tone. All the States are interested in
the decision of this question. If the
Federal Courts can entertain suits
against the several States, and compel
the payment of any debt of any kind,
whether honestly owed or not, then the
States are not such bodies polite as
the founders of the Republic supposed
them to be. If North Carolina can be
made to pay her unlawfully-issued
bonds, Mississippi can be made to pay
hers, although these last are so old that
the State ought to be allowed to plead
the statute of limitations AS against
them. What fine pickings there will be
in this latter case. The bonds have be-
come so nearly worthless that, if they
have not been lost or thrown away
and we have no idea that they have
met with any such fate-the present
holders of them would probably make
nearly ninety-nine cents on every dol
lar of them, If their collection coull
be enforced in the Federal courts.