The Valley Virginian. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1865-1895, 1873-08-28
"woE UNTO YOU, YE LAWYERS"

''WOE UNTO YOU, YE LAWYERS"
"And De said, Woe unto you, also, ye lawyers!
for ye lade with burdens grieyous to be
horne, and ye yourselves touch not the burde
with one of your fingers. "-LuKE C. xi '. As.
The Conservative Central Committee Of
Virginia has appointed and published two
or three hundred canvassers for this cam
paign, nearly every one of whom is lawyer.
These men will traverse every nook and cor
ner of the State and presume to teach the
people their duty! We call the attention Of
the common sense farnsers, mechanics and
laboring men to this reflection upon their in
tellgence and their manhood. Virginia has
been under the rule of lawyers from time
whereof the memory of man runneth not to
the contrary. They have piled up her pub
lie debt mountain high, until it is the largest
Of any State in the Union. 1t is now nearly
fifty million dollars, without any benefits be-
ginning to approximate the enormous expeu-
diture. They have gotten the laws so COM
plicated and confused that there is scarcely one
of them who can tell what the plain law is.
In: these m"ny years Of public control what
have they done for the people but to increase
their burdens, multiply litigation and thus
aggravate the accumulated embarrassments of
the suffering, tax-rldden masses They will
tell you of the ruin the Republican party
will bring upon the Stale if Hughes, ma
tive Virginian and large land owner, is cleo
Ted Governor, when in their hearts they do
not believe word Of it, but will they tell
the people Of the disastrous results already
realized through their miserable class legis-
lation, operating to benefit themselves and
to Cypress the wealth creating elements Of
the State? They will point you to Louisiana,
but will fail to inform you that the leading
carpet-bagger there-H. Z. Warmou!h-is
of their own party. They will piteously pre-
sent the imagined woes of South Carolina,
and warn you Of the danger of electing re-
publican Governor. This will all be done to
direct your minds from your own State. and
your own case, and from their own reckless
and ruinous legislation. Can these men teach
the people common sense Can they direct
their attention from the burdens that are
pressing them to the earth and the disastrous
legislation they have inflicted upon our own
people? We are not dealing in South Car
i Ut
thing nearer home, threatening our very Vi
tails. It is to wrench Virginia from the rule
Of the men who know nothing of the wants
of the people, who do not feel with them and
cannot understand their interests 1t is to
break down sectional prejudice, place the
State in harmony with the government, and
thus invite capital sud enterprise into our
borders, which will spread their benefits and
blessings among the farmers, the mechanics
and laboring meh. These are the real issues
of the canvass, and not whether under the
operation Of Mr.. Greeley's local law doctrine,
Louisiana and South Carolina have been we'll
or lily governed By their own people. The
point is, has Virginia been governed well III
the past, and will the triumph of sectionalism
be for her good in the future? Louisiana
and South Carolina may manage their own
affairs, and let the people Of Virginia sec to
; it that they manage theirs, regardless Of the
infammatory appeals of these cross, roads Or
ators and briefess lawyers who do not COM
prehend the true condition of the State nor
the wants and dema nds Of her substantial cit
liens. The tine has come for plain talk
These gilt-edge statesmen will denounce ev.
per as untrue to Virginia, as they did those
who refused to support Greeley. But ask
them wherein they have been Of SO much ben
fit to the Commonwealth, what have they
done to develop her resources, and to con-
tribute to the prosperity Of the laboring clas-
ses, and they ara dumb. They toll not, nei-
ther do they spin, yet Solomon in all his glo-
~ was not arraycd like one Of them, nor
half SO wise.
The terrible rebuke to this gentry comes
down to US through the ages, and falls with
whitening effect-"Woe unto you. also, ye
lawyers. tol ye lade men with burdens grie-
VOWS to be borne, and ye yourselves touch not
the burdens with one of your Gngers." These
are the men who are to champion the cause
Of the self-styied purity party of Virginia,
headed by Kemper, against the peoples can
didats, r. w. Hughes. They we're the tax
makers, but not the taxpayers, eighteen
hundred years ago, and have been faithful to
the present TIME. Will the bone and sinew
OF the country submissiveIy bow their necks
under the yoke these men propose to impose,
and refuse to act like freemen, by thinking
and acting for themselves
The conservative papers are trying to make
capital out Of the fact that Hon. J. B. Sener
haying gone to California, and Hons. j no. F.
Lewis and j. Amber Smith contemplate 60
ing, that it has political Significance, and ex-
hibits an indisposition to support the Repub-