The New Orleans bulletin. [volume] (New Orleans [La.]) 1874-1876, 1874-09-18
CONSTITUTIONAL LIBERTY.


The publication of the telegram announc
ing the result of the late cabinet consultation
over Louisiana affairs has taken nobody b,
surprise, and the announcement that Presi
dent Grant will not permit his subordinate
to recognize, what he is pleased to call thu
"insurgent government "until further or
ders, " was just what we might have expected
from an executive who has sunk to be the
mere tool Of Attorney General Williams.
Perfect peace reigns throughout the State
and everybody, save and except the thieves
who held illegal possession Of the Offices Of
honest men fairly elected by the people,
cheerfully recognizes the legitimate officers
who have just been reinstated by one Of the
tons Of the popular will ever seen in this
country. The day when telegraphic orders
from Washington, or even the mere appear
ance upon the scene Of a squad of United
States soldiers, was considered sufficient
cause for surrender, is, we hope, gone
| The farce of instantaneous submission to al.
legged superior force where there is really nc
force nor shadow OF a right to use it if il,
really did exist, will, we trust, not be repeated
and if President Grant after being placed in
full possession of all the facts Of the case, still
persists in the uhase commanding the lawful and
constitutionally elected authority Of this State
| to ''disperse" because his partisan and corrupt
Attorney General says they must do so, he
will have to carry out tie job by
the employment of a force adequate to do the
dispensing" and after accomplishing that
to keep standing army in Louisiana for the
purpose of upholding the gang of thieves and
towards who were SO easily overthrown on Mon
day last. The United States have the phusi
cal po,cer to accomplish this great outrage on
Republicanism and the American doctrine of
selfgovernment
If we are to have military government, as
the N. 0. Times predicts, and evidently prays
for, in the name Of God let it only come after
the exhibition by the Federal Government of
something more substantial than the mere
shadow of force.
We deprecate any collision with the United
States Government, and will do all that can
Lonorably be done to avoid it. but as free
citizens of free Republic, we have rights
that the General Government dare not disre-
gard.
We simply claim the right to elect our own
officers, and to be governed by them. We will
not submit to usurpation. We were not
raised in school that taught us to stand
quietly by while every right dear to freemen is
trampled ru,hessly underfoot, and Gen. Grant
cannot quarter upon Louisiana soil sufficient
number of troops to make the people bow
their necks in abiect submission to despot-
ism more degrading than slavery, or recog-
nize in William Pitt Kellogg their legitimate |
or rightful Governor.
He may make barracks of every house |
within the limits of the State and quarter a
vast army upon the people, but they will re-
main irrevocably opposed to the vile usurpa-
ton which he seems determined to rivet upon |
them, and prepared at the first opportunity to
reassert, by the divine right of revolution,
their heritage of freedom. If the people of
the North and West stand by, with folded
tremendous wrong is consummated !
upon a sister State, if they
are so dead to the cry of people struggling
to be free, then indeed is their fate sealed as
surely as our oon We are fighting to-day
upon the soil of Louisiana the great battle OF
liberty. and if we 60 down
before the bayonets of the Federal Govern
ment, then there will be the bitter consolation
Of knowing that the whole fabric Of the Re-
public goes down with us, and that not Lou
siana alone, but the Commonwealth is
whelmed in ruin.