The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1874-02-03
The Louisiana Casc-The Subject To
He Dropped ssfor the Sake OF tho
Party"

the legislation it led TO for the Reconstruction
of the insurrectionary States Cities that
were burned will be rebuilt; harbors that were
obstructed will be cleared out again; indus
try, activity and the natural wealth OF the
country will remedy all the material devasta-
ton; even the places OF the fallen Will be
filed again; but the mischievous laws that
were made to guarantee party supremacy
when the war was over, and which recon-
structed not the rebel States, but the federal
constitution; these have impressed the po-
ltical system, upon the integrity of which the
freedom of the people depended, with changes
from which it seems unlikely it will ever re-
cover.
By one of the provisions of this legislation
of reconstruction State elections are made
subject to federal law, and subject in certain
contingencies to the revision of the federal
authorities and in the case of Louisiana we
see exactly what this may be made to mean by
The Interpretation Of the corrupt and unscru-
puious creatures who in these times are
appointed to some federal offices. In Novem-
Der, 1872, Immediately after the election was
over, our reports from Louisiana represented
accurately the condition there the State was
carried for the McEnery party by an over
whelming majority, and there was good order
and tranquility everywhere. But the McEnery
party was allied with the coalition or Greeley
movement, and Kellogg was the regular repub-
lcan candidate, which little circumstance was
sufficient to assure to Kellogg the sympathy
and to McEnery the hostility of the federal
authorities, who by law had the power to
determine whether or no the cleo
ton had been fair one. Conse-
quently the republicans of the regular
stripe saw that though they were beaten at
the polls all hope was not lost. They saw, in
deed. that the true power, the veritable
sovereignty of the State. was not with the peo-
pie who voted, but with the tribunal that was
competent legally to give effect to the vote or
to withhold it; 80 they made their appeal to
that tribunal, and not unsuccessfully. Aft
davits were the great instrumentality. They
appear, from the evidence referred to by Sena-
tor Carpenter, to have been forged by the
thousand. all declaring that negro voters had
been driven from the polls. There were dis
crepancies between the negro vote of this and
previous elections, due probably to the spon-
taneous movement of the negroes to States
where they hoped for greater prosperity. But
these differences from the vote and the afidavits
were held sufficient to justify determination
in accordance with the toregone conclusion of
the federal authorities in the State, and the
results of the election were not merely set
aside, but reversed, the beaten party being in
stalled in Office and the important positions in
the State government being distributed in ac-
cordance with q bargain made before the de-
cision was given.
In this history we see the natural operation
of the laws that have superseded the original
provisions of the constitution. Perhaps the
fifteenth amendment and its appropriate
legislation, honestly administered, might not
thus have overshot the object of those who
procured its acceptance; but fraudulent ad-
ministration must be assumed as one of the
possibilities of the case, and as constantly i'm
minent; and. this assumed, it must become
obvious to all that no State of the Union is
to-day safe from such assaults of political viii
lany as have Frustrated the liberties of the
people of Louisiana.
But the doings of corrupt judges, the
forged afidavits, forced differences, improper
use of the national soldiery-all these may fail
Of their intended object, because upon the
claim of member for admission the whole
series of events may come up for review in
Congress- There it can scarcely be possible
that the representatives of all the States can
assent to an outrage on the liberties of any
State which may be equally committed against
any other. On this point also the Louisiana
case is instructive, for the result fore
Swallowed in the Senate is typical of what
may always be anticipated when the liberties
Of o State are in the balance against the SUI
premacy of party. 1t is the present purpose
to smother the Louisiana case by the pressure
of party vote, and the simple reason for this
is that though the whole business is so bad as
to threaten scandal and ruin to the party
he disclosures that remedy would pro-
woke are even greater, because a more
certain and more immediate danger. The
scandal likely to ensue from the application
of remedy for the Louisiana trouble appears
to have relation to the diversion of four mil
lions of dollars, and to the implication of dis
tinguished politicians who are supposed to
have shared in the misappropriated money.
1t is case therefore of danger to the republi-
can party on one hand, by the exposure of a
peculiarly revolving piece of corruption; and
of danger to the same party on the other hand,
by the demonstration that it is the enemy of
freedom, and that under cover of protecting
negro voters it has destroyed, for the first time
in the history of this country, the political
vitality of State; that it has displaced candi-
dates against whom fraudulent practices were
charged but not proved, and has established
in power persons having no other claim than
number of votes than their opponents. Evil