The weekly clarion. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1863-1882, 1876-06-07

1
whom the seat had been adjudged by tbs
Senate That disorders have formerly existed
in Louisiana makes 70 difference. For tho
laws-to which the President and Congress:
are parties-recognize the complete restora
ton of her autonomy. The right of her leg
islative bodies to determine the title of theil
members is as perfect and absolute as the
right of the Assem- bly, or the Senate of New
York.
The animus of the transaction, as indl
Gated by the correspondence between Lieu
tenant-General Sheridan and the Secretary
of War, is intin tei = worse than the transac.
ton itself On the day after the event. Lieu
tenant GeneI i Sheridan sent dispatch pro
posing that class Of citizens indefinite IN
number and description, should be declared
either b. Act of Congress o. by proclamation
of the President, to be bdnditti; and then
indicates his purpose to try them and exc
cute them by military commission. On the
next day General Belknap, the Secretary OF
War, telegraphed to General Sheridan that
"the President and all of us have full conf
dence in and, thoroughly approve your course.
The nature of the Gets thus proposed by
the officer, second in command Of the army
of the United States, and thus adopted and
sanctioned by the President and his consti-
tutional advisors, Is plainly declared by the
common law.
In the recent case of the Queen VS.. Mel
san and Brand, the present Lord Chief US
tice of England, in delivering the charge to
the Grand Jury, declared that 'supposlng
that there is no jurisdiction at all, that the
whole proceeding is c0rdm nan Judtce, that
the judicial functions are exercised by per
sons who have no judicial authority or
power, and mans life is taken, that is
murder; for murder is putting a man to
death without a Justification, or without
any Of those mitigating circumstances
which reduce the crim9 of murder to one of
lower degree. Thus, Ing the case put by
Lord Coke of a lieu senaht having a COM
mission of martial law IL times of peace,
that, says Lord Coke, is murder"
Such are the established doctrines of the
jurists and courts of this country and of
England Such is the voice of common
Iaw-glorious Jurisprudence of freedom !!
birthright of every American citizen! Its
stern logic declares that such an execution
of any human being, as was proposed and
sanctioned in this correspondence ao0uGd be
murder by our ialcs and that eUery ftepctiOpdry
-ciciE or miLitdry-achO should instig0te 1t,
aid or abet 1t, or become, IN any manner, a
party to 1T before the tdtct, 1o0uld be guilty a
principal IN that crime.
The patriot statesmen who achieved our
national independence, and formed our in
five should ever fall in intestine strife, that
the ideas it would inspire in military
minds-ot characterization to the laws and
of uncivic ambition-and the habit
it would generate III the people, of
acquiescence in acts of unlawful mil
itary violence-would imperil, if not de
stroy, civil liberty. Events compelled us to
a manly choice of confronting these dangers
in a struggle to save our country from dis
memberment, and to vindicate the ust
rights of the Federal Union. Having tri-
umphed in that struggle, now forever closed,
we are made sensible of the wise foresight
of the founders of our freedom i'll their warn
ing of the opposite dangers which would at
tend our success. Those dangers come to us
in acts of illegal military violence commit
ted in times of peace--in the usurpatiOn by
the soldiery of power to decide the mem
bership of our legislative assemblies, whose
right to Judge exclusively in such cases has
ever been guarded with peculiar jealousy by
our race-in the proposal made and accepted
by our highest civil and military functional
ries, to subject our citizens to tribunals in
which a military officer will decide, without
appeal, what persons, happening to be found
in the locality, shall be sent to them for
trial-will appoint the members of the
court-will review and confirm or change
the Judgment and sentence-and may or
der instant executions, and in which the
accused will be tried in secret, and without
counsel for his defense. This proposition is
thus made and thus sanctioned, not
withstanding that, for similar acts, our Eng
lish ancestors sent the first Charles to the
scatfold and expelled the secord James from
the throne: and our own fOrefathers-exiled
by kindred tyrannies and planting freedom in
the wilderness-were careful to insert in our
Constitution, positive prohibitions against
the application to any but military persons
of such tribunals.
Unless such proposition, so made and so
sanctioned shall be condemned by public
reprobation which shall make it memorable
as a warning to all future officers of the
State and the army, the decay of the jeal-
Gus spirit of freedom, the loss of our ances-
trail traditions of liberty, acquired through |
ages of conflict and sacrifice, the education |
Of the present generation to servile acqui-
escence in the maxims and the practices of
tyranny, will have realized the fears of
Washington and Jay and Clinton and their |
New York, first of the commonwealth of
he American Union in population, in re-
ouroes, and in military power. should de-
lare her sentiments, on this occasion, with |
distinctness dignity, and a solemn en-
'hasis, which will command the thoughtful
ttentiOn ofCongress, of her sister States,
nd of the people of our whole country
With the same unanimity with which she
pheld the arms of the Union in the past
onfict, she should nor address herself to the
reat and most sacred daty Of re-estabhshing
iCH liberty and the personal rights Of indicid-
ais OfreSt0ring the ideas and habits Of free
ON, and Of re-GSserfing the supremacy Of the
nil 0uthOrity0geF the military p0teer through
ut the republic. SAMUEL J. TILDEN.