The New Orleans bulletin. [volume] (New Orleans [La.]) 1874-1876, 1874-12-10

been addressed out Of Office by the "bayonet
Legislature The Metropolitan police, body
supported by the taxpayers of New Orleans,
were mustered in as State militia armed with
the most deadly weapons Of modern warfare,
and sent into the country parishes to enforce
obedience to the authority of the 'usurper,
and to slaughter the citizens Of those parishes
in case they attempted to resist.
By 1.-The despotsm OF force and the ODE
dience of fear" and .by pretorian guards or
janissaries. the masses of the people were
held in the abject bondage Of unreasoning
dread" The gunboat Ozark was also fitted
out to assist the land forces::if necessary. all
this was done in direct and plain violation of
the 10th section of the Constitution of the
United States, which provides that no
State shall keep troops, or ships Of war in
time of peace"
The people were disarmed, the courts were
prostituted to base purposes and became SYM
bols of wrong and judicial degradation, taxes
amounting to coniscation were levied, and
even the press, the great bulwark of liberty,
was not spared. Outrage upon outrage was
perpetrated until despotism worse than that
of Russia was established in State under the
folds of the American flag.
Robbed almost Of their ALL denied justice
in the courts, and their lives and property at
the mercy Of ''pretorian guards, who were
better armed" was it any wonder that COM
binations were formed to resist this anarchy
of principle and reign OF force in Louisi-
ana?" Assuredly not. 'Self preservation is
the first law of nature" and combinations
were formed for protection Of all those rights
which freemen hold near and dear, and not
for the purpose Of overawing any lawful Off
GERS" or Of depriying any one Of any natural
or legitimate right. Their attitude was strictly
defensive one.
On the 18th Of September, goaded to mad
ness by continued outrages taunts and insults,
the people Of Louisiana, obeying their in
stincts and inlpulses-aui instinct and i'm
pulse are often the true,t wisdor-rose in
their majesty and might and hurled the
usurper from place and power. although he
had vauntingly asserted that the people OF
Louisiana had .acquiesced in his govern
ment. and that he was able to maintain his
authority without the assistance of United
States troops. And while the reasoning
minds of some might not approve Of what
was done, it touched q chord in the heart OF
the American freemen, the descendants OF
those who fell at Lexington, Bunker Hill and
Monmouth, for it was human grandly human,
and the spontaneous uprising of men, who, in
the days of the republics purity. had been
taught the grea: lessons Of freedom, and that
resistance to tyrants was obedience to God
"The Executive and the Returning Board
stand powerless $50 protected by the power
of the Federal Government" How illogical
and what a confession OF weakness! The
real truth is, the so-called Executive and the
Returning Board are powerless for wrong,
even with the aid OF the Federal Government,
because the people Of the United States have
proclaimed at the ballot box in no uncertain
voice. that the grand principles OF liberty as
asserted by their foretathers must be re-esiab
hshcd in their pristine purity that wrong
and despotism in any State Of the Union,
North or South, must cease, and that ''those
who sanction it are not tit depositarles OF
political power"