The Republican journal. [volume] (Belfast, Me.) 1829-current, 1875-05-13
Mookerv Of Government in Louisiana.

Of Government in Louisiana.
The New York Herald is doing excel
lent service in the cause of Justice and de-
cent government through its special cor
Mr.. Charles Nordhotf, who is
now in the southwest, He has ust fur
nlshed a letter which sheds flood of light |
upon the oppression and misgovernment
Of Louisiana.
He says that the Louisiana state consti-
tuition OF 1868 seems at the first view to
provide constitutional machinery similar
to that which other states of the Union
enjoy. 1t pretends to limit the powers Of
the legislature and of the Governor, and
makes the judges and the subordinate
state officers elective; but actually the
people are deprived OF all power in the
choice Of both classes of officials, and local
selt-government has been unknown in
many parts of the state for years. The
popular features of the government are
more than unbalanced by other provisions
which give the Governor actual and direct
control of the whole machinery of election
and the absolute and exclusive power of
appointing and removing all tax collectors
Officers who have also an important part
in the assessments. Indirectly he has the
appointment of almost all the local or par
ish officers of the state and the Judiciary.
Under an apparently harmless clause.
which empowers him to ill all vacancies
in office throughout the state, the local
administration in ali parts of the state is
placed under his control. it having been
left in the power Of the legislature to ere
ate vacancies as often as the interest Of
the party in power seem to require it. To
the metropolis, New Orleans. which is
largely conservative, very little Of mu-
nicipal self-government has been reserved.
The Governor is not only COMMANDMENTS
chief of the state militia, with the power
Of appointing and commissioning all oili-
GERS, but he has at his command an ex-
traordinary force, called the metropolitan
police 1t is metropolitan in so far as the
city of New Orleans is compel ell to pay
for it, but we see from the description
which Nh Nordhotf furnishes that it is
neither a police force nor a municipal in
stitution, but actually small standing
army for internal purposes. The Gov
ernor controls it, appoints the officers,
and may send it into any part OF the state
to make arrests, and n steamer is provided
for that purpose Moreover, the Governor
may, whenever he deems it necessary,
appoint for any parish of the state an eX-
traordinary force consisting OF a chief con-
stable and any desired number of deputies
These have power to make summary ar
rests.
The radical rulers have for years man.
aged, with the aid of the ignorant negroes
and the worst element Of the VIII tie popu-
lation, to make up legislatures rs they
desired to have them. What election
frauds failed to do, the arbitrary decisions
of the returning boards effected. The
legislatures We're made up of adventures
and such negroes as had wit enough to
demand q share of the spoils-ot repre-
sentatiyes who represented nobody. One
Of these bodies, the Legislature of 1869,
sat sixty days, at a cost TO the state for
per diem, mileage and contingentS, of
5000, 900. Each member is said to have
received $1,000 Tor the session, and it is
related that q single committee of the
house had eighty-seven clerks, who were
paid $40 a day each The evils of special
and corrupt legislation are sufficiently
known in our part of the country, but
compared with the abuses Of the law
making power in Louisiana, the very
worst that has been done elsewhere looks
almost dccently reasonable and moderate
Whatever they pleased to do, they did,
regarding no right. unimpeded<by the
state judges who were either their tools,
or if honest were legislated out OF place
Officers We're multiplied to an cNtlaor-
binary degree, and at every new creation
the Governor had the appointment of Il
tavorite. New parishes were formed by
the division of old ones, judicial districts
rearranged and new ones formed, and in
every ease the Governor appointed the
officers The concentration of power in
the hands of u few has been marvellous
Mr.. Nordhotf thinks that more thorough
ly centralized government did not exist
in France under either empire. From his
statements it may be seen how well the
Kellogg people have learned the lessons
given in Washington; how successfully
they have initiated the example of the
chief boss of their party. One Green,
of Lincoln parish, appeared before the
congressional committee, and, il answer
to questions. admitted that he was state
senator one of his sons was collector
another was parish judge, and third
was supervisor Of registration. What
kind of courts the state has, may be in
ferred from the fact that Ihe chief Justice
of the supreme court Of Louisiana, named
John L. IIudelmg, has been declared, in
a decision of the United States supreme
court, delivered last winter, to be guilty
OF fraud and breach of trust. The COM
plant is universal that justice is not only
denied, but openly sold, and in many
cases the people have, after vain remon-
strances, taken the law into their own
hands. Mr.. Nordhotf relates a story of a
district attorney, appointed by the Gov
ernor, who sold out case for as little as
$40. While the radicals were proved be- /
fore the congressional committee to have
made 5000 false registrations in New Or
leans alone in 1874, no one was punished
Tor this. These men have made free GOV
eminent a farce, retaining its forms but |
taking from it the substance, defrauding