New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1873-01-16
PREVENTING EVIL.

| According to the Ndtl0n tne interference
| of the federal authorities in Louisiana Is
a political error that should be terminated
at once except to restore peace where 1t
has been violated. That is to say. the
Nation is not willing the government shall
| arrest an incipient riot. but is only Wlll'
ing that it shall stop riot that has al
ready declared itself. No ounce of pre-
| vention, but full pound of force to cure
| the evil is the advice the Nation gives to
the President in regard to what his pro
| ceedings shall be in the settlement OF
| troubles that axe hard of management
| even 1v these who understand them.
J And it has the temerity 20 illustrate
| its suggestion BY referring to the &C
ton of President johnson in the ease
! Of the disturbances that occurred al
New Orleans in 1896. when o body
! Of gentlemen presumed to meet in Me-
| chanics' Institute, and were assaulted and
! shot in the most savage and dndiscriml-
nate mannet by the very parties who are
SO hard TO hold an peaceful stbjectios to
the laws at present. The difficulty with
the Nation and with many Of its Northern
contemporaries is jusS this, that they do
not understand the condition of the CONS
munity they propose to NEEDLE %lth.
General Sheridan did noe understand it in
1866, or he would have made preparation
to preserve the peace: and those men who
think that the affairs Of Louisiana can
be left to themselves III 1873 are as
far wrong as the United States com.
mander was six years ago. The Plea
y,,,oe properly states the ease when 10
says that if the federal bayonets were
removed from preserving the peace In
Louisiana, the questions at issue would
be decided in short order by the sudden
assault upon and immediate fight of the
carpet-laggers to their Northern dens.
This suggestion conveys the idea that the
Nation must comprehend before it can
discuss the affairs of this State, that there
is mob in existence in New Orleans
which constantly menaces the peace of
the community. We are not situated as
the people of New York or any other
Northern community are, where the will
of the majority is respected as the arbiter
of public position. We live in society
where the local government is obnoxious
because it sprung from the national au-
thority. The condition of resistance
to the federal authorities still exists,
and whatever exists by virtue of the
national disposition is accepted as
alien and inimicaf to the element that
rose SO suddenly and SO inhumanly 20
butcher the men who assembled at Me-
chanics' Institute in 1866, and which
would have butchered the Legislature in
1872 if it had not been that the soldiers
overawed the incipient riot. The true
is this, that withou: the inter
ference of fe deral soldiers, the crowd that
on Lafayette square last Mon
day, being strong and well armed, would
have assaulted and dispersed the gathering
at Mechanics Institute, without any regard
to the rights or the legitimacy Of the lat
ter as the bona .fde government. Is the
Nation prepared to see State government
in this way: Is any man pre-
pared to say that the Kellogg regime. as
last Monday, should have
been submitted to the tender mercieS of |
the same sort of mob that vented its wrath |
upon peaceful gathering in that vicinity |
six years ago?
When the Nation comprehends the stu
alton in Louisiana, that the actual govern |
ment, equal in all respects to any rival
is threatened of its life by a
party that pretends to have been success
full in the last contest, and that tie only
obstacle to the execution of this threat is
the presence of the United States soldiers,
it will certainly modify its opinion suffi-
GENTLY to admit that the troops are doing
4 peaceful duty, and that people whose
propensities require such
are never outraged when they
ire subjected to proper observation.