The New Orleans Democrat. (New Orleans, La.) 1875-1876, 1876-04-08

future there is but one desire-one enjoyment
paramount to all others-that we may pc per,
mitted to attend the funeral OF Honest lohn-
Selah
THE "TRUE INWARDNESS or THE
FUNDING BOARD.
The Supreme Court Of Louisiana, or
majority of its members, being known
beforehand to favor the proposed
scheme Zone Of them, in point Of fact,
directly interested in its success, being
holder Of fraudulent bonds,) the next
necessary ingredient in it was to confer
upon the executive officers OF the gov
ernmcnt powers of execution independ-
ent Of the legislative bodies which were
to succeed that Of 1874. The funding
act, therefore, provided that the Board
Of LIQUIDATION or the Funding
Board" should be composed Of five
members of the State Administration,
viz, the Governor, Lieutenant Governor,
the Auditor, the Treasurer and the Sec
rotary Of State, and associated with
them was the Speaker of the House OF
Representatives and the Fiscal Agent OF
the State, to be by them elected. But
the schemers had foreseen that O board
so composed might not, and, indeed.
was not, likely to possess the entire
confidence of the creditors OF the State
holding unquestionably valid bonds.
They knew that these officers were
not entitled to that confidence, and
that it would be necessary to
strengthen the board by adding to
it one or more prominent citizens Of re-
spectability, entirely disconnected from
politics, men engaged in mercantile
pursuits. standing high in commercial
circles and in bank parlors; who should
represent the interest Of those bankers
and brokers here and elsewhere who
had given credit upon State obligations,
valid and invalid, or who actually
owned them, and lend to the funding
scheme the benefit Of their names. A
subsequent act was therefore passed by
the Legislature (act No. II of May II,
1879 authorizing this addition to the
board, and seats therein, with power to
vote, were accordingly rendered to and
were accepted by the President Of the
New Orleans Cotton Exchange and the
President of the New Orleans Board Of
Trade, If such latter board was estab
lished.
The scheme was now supposed to be
complete, and in such working order as
to justify some hope of success. But one
difficulty remained to be overcome, and
that was to induce the creditors Of
the State holding ante-bellum bonds
and other unquestionable obligations to
accept the terms and conditions Of the
} funding act, and to surrender their old
bonds in exchange for the new consols.
These creditors, who lived chiefly in
Europe, had paid full prices for their
bonds, and were protected by that great
and valuable prohibition of the Federal
Constitution which restraints the States
Of the Union from passing any law i'm
}! pairing the obligation of contracts. To
overcome their objections was the great
difficulty Of the scheme. Unless they
could be made to believe it was their in
terest to consent to this compromise, Of
course, the plan would be q failure.
Therefore the great efforts which Kel-
logg has made to convince these credit
ors that it would be to their advantage to
accept the offer of the State, and to make
the exchange proposed by it.
In none Of his letters or argu-
ments in favor Of the act did he
disclose the real motive-the true object
of the authors of the plan. That would
have killed it. Nor are these foreign
creditors Of Louisiana to this day aware
that they have been used by the Kellogg
ring to give value to bonds and other
obligations which had no value to give
value to bonds which had been pur-
F.chased at all rates Of discount, from 80
to 80 cents on the dollar, or even less,
because they were tainted by fraud, or
were mere forgeries. The arguments of
Kellogg, addressed to these. foreign
creditors holding bonds of bona fide
and unquestionable character, carefully
avoided any reference to bonds and
other. obligations, which were well
known in Louisiana to be per-
fectly worthless, and which it was
his purpose to validate under the
new arrangement. The result has
been that the holders of bona fide and
indisputably valid bonds, to the extent
that they have funded these, have been
made use Of by Kellogg and his ring
to make good that which was thorough
ly bad, to make straight that which was
crooked, to give value to that which had
no value, by process Of conversion
and exchange. In other words, these
creditors have been made use of to help
Kellogg and company to rob the people
Of Louisiana. That is the long and the
short Of it, as we shall presently demon
strate.
We now come to brief review of the
funding act and the so-called constitu-
tional amendment, which, by some fool
ish persons, is supposed to have made the
act irrepealable by the General Assem-
| bly,. A mere careless reading Of these
! by one accustomed to the drafting of
| legislative bills, or the critical examina-
ton Of laws, will satisfy him that the
author Of these laws had not an honest
object in view. Like all cunning ras-
Gals who set about the accomplishment
Of dishonest purpose, by apparently