New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1874-01-25
IFor the New Orleans Sunday kepuphcsn''
ROMANCE Of POLITICS IN THE BACKWO00S
LIE in North Louisiana Since the War
ar W. 3AsSEB nLACKBURS, EDITOR or THE
HOMER ILIAUs


EbiynIry-Fiendish Efforts and Dying
Tbroes of the Ancient Regime-Perils
nud Triumphs Of the Friends of Lib.
erty-The DeyOtees Of Slavery Sa'iate
Themselves with AssassinatlOn over
It's Loss-Murder of Hon. w. X. Meade
sws-His Blood still UnnvcnSed.
Che loyal people of the South deserve
snore praise and consideration for the work
Of what is termed a reconstruction OF the
government than they ever have or ever
Hill receive, simply because the North has
sfaimed and received, and will continue to
Slain and receive, the main praise and
credit for this great work. This is unjust,
but perhaps it is in one sense fair. 1T is but
one of the common freaks of the judgment
Of men. and among the thousands OF in
stances of the ingratitude Of republics; or
perhaps it might more properly be said it is
only history repeating itself, which con-
stantIy happens in the affairs Of men upon
this fuctuating earth. But of course the
North, in this great work, is not without
great CREDITS quite within the pale of the
gratitude of civilization-she having sOwed
Che seed which produced this great fruit of
sivil triumph over the rule OF the bayonet,
bringing the mild reign of law and order
over the chaos of military havoc. Even
more than the grand imagination OF the
great Webster had ever conceived has thus
been realized. He thought that this mag
efficiently great government, once severed,
could never again be readjusted. In all his
great scope and magnitude of intellectual
reach and research he had never conceived
the possibility Of the ways of peace
and the arts of peace" again taking the
place of military power and domination in
this country after a protracted internecine
war had been gone through for the sever
ance of the Union on the one side, and for
its preservation on the other. But this has
happened in this country; and while the
North sowed the seed of this great and
grand work, the South furnished the soil in
which to plant and the hands to cultivate
this luscious, golden fruit. That soil was
the hearts of the Southern white loyalists,
and the poor, dOwn-trOdden black man, and
those hands were their hands. But not alto
gether was this the case. There were in the
South, to help in this great and difficult
work, number of noble-hearted Northern
men, who had come down and settled here
since the war-that class who have been
and still are CONTEMPORARY called carpet
baggers" by those whom they found it nee
essary to whip in the late warfare of
freedom against slavery-they bore a
manly and most important part in the
work of reconstruction, and are still per-
forming paramount and most cOmmenda
bic duty, in aiding to hold this great work
together, until all the joints and seams, and
fittings, are 80 cemented and welded, that
all the Vaccinations of lingering and con-
tentious, strife breeding treason shall not
prevail against it. This will soon be finally
and eternally accomplished, with the CON
tinued appreciation and aid of the great
free North, which planted this redeeming
seed of the reconstruction of civil rule over
the rule of the sword and the bayonet in
this Southern soil of loyal hearts. just
little more time, with the patient torbear-
ance and assistance of our Northern allies.
and all shall be we'll with freedom and the
friends of freedom, in this beautiful, but
treason blighted Southern land-the cline
of the sun-where all of nature is lovely,
and only the perverted heart of man is
vile; and where only his misdirected atfec-
tons lead to ruin and woe.
And there were few others in the South
who aided in this great and wonderful
work Of reconstruction, who were not in
the true sense Southern loyalists, nor yet
carpetbaggers. They belonged not properly
to either of these classes of citizens, and
yet they rendered great and most important
and effective aid in this great work. They
were in one sense the nOblest Romans of
them all, because called to exercise, and did |
exercise, more perhaps of true and genuine |
moral nerve and courage than all-at that |
particular point at least. mean those who |
had been secessiOnists, or who had in some |
palpable way aided secession and the war;
who had owned slaves, and who had been |
thoroughly and Enthusiastically identified
with the side of the South-with the side
of rebellion-but who, after the war
CLOSED, and the rebellion had been
whipped, honorably and bravely and hero
ically acknowledged the same, and came
out in favor of the legitimate
fruits of the war, and put their brave and
manly shoulders to the wheel and worked
for the reconstruction of the gov
eminent upon a more just and equitable.
and therefore more endurable basis than
ever before. This class of men, say. de-
serve much and even extra praise in this
great work; for the attitude they thus as
sumed proved them as brave in peace as
they had proven themselves brave in war
proved them moral heroes as well as heroes
in arms-and therefore worthy the respect
and admiration Of all whose respect and
admiration wosld not be a reproach to the
good and great" And first among this
most commendable class in all North Louis
throughout all the Southern
laud-stood Colonel John Langdon Lewis,
like Saul among the prophets. a head and
shoulders above his peers.
Colonel Lewis was among the very finest
specimens of manhood ever saw, whether
intellectually or socially con-
sidered. He was native OF Georgia, we'll
educated, and polished and refined in all
his manners; and was withal q fair and
commanding type of the true Southern gen.
tleman. He was both by nature and educa-
ton q true gentlemen. He was brave and
magnanimous-traits which always go to-
gether when genuine. To those below him
he was as tender as the melting mother to
her pleading child. He was brought up as
a STAKEHOLDER, but he never contracted or
imbibed a particle of the brutality of