New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1876-06-16
rHE oousHArrA INVESTIGATION.

THE ooUsHArrA INVESTIGATION.
We are somewhat disappointed in the
report of the subcommittee detailed to
inquire into the facts connected with the
murder Of King and mutilation Of Sena-
tor .Tvitchell. No information of the
motive or movements Of the assassin
seems to have been obtained. No state
ment from Mr.. Twitchell seems to have
been made, while the causes that led to
the commission of the crime are left in
mystery. The subcommittee seems to
agree that these causes were not of q polit-
ical character, yet we must say that the
elaborate abuses cha rged against Mr..
Twitchell were all political. He seems to
have exercised the same patronage with
other Senators, which, if wrong, would
be political wrong, and if his assassina-
ton has been attempted on account CT
such alleged abuses it has been founded
on political cause. The condemnation
of Mr.. Twitchell is very severe, and would
seem to be e1 parte, and to have gone
beyond the scope of legal inquiry.
The results of the report may be thus
summed up:
l. Mr.. Twitchell and his confederates
had been guilty of corrupt use Of the
public m oney.
2. It was impossible to locate or iden-
tify the assassin, or to obtain clue as to
who he was.
3. For nearly two years past there had
been no political excitement; no threats
or attempts at intimidation had been
heard or made, and no one was in
danger by reason of his political views
or his public or private utterance of the
same; that men could as safely express
their political views in Red River parish,
on the stump or elsewhere, as in any part
of our common country.
As ''the disguised stranger" mounted
upon q peculiar colored pony" could
neither, be located, identified nor captured,
it only remained to publish testimony
going to establish the belief that Senator
Twitchell was SO corrupt a man that it
was natural that anybody should assassin
ate him. As. however, this offense was
local. it could have only justified some
taxpayer or other patriot Of the parish.
There can be no reason to suppose that
an assassin would come from another
parish for the purpose. This renders the
difficulty of tracing this man on the ''pe-
culiar colored" pony the more singular,
since it would seem that some one in the
parish must have known the man or the
horse. 1t is not impossible the assassin
may have been hired to come from abroad.
The only cause of the crime assigned by
the subcommittee is political We see
no special quotation of the remark made
by the assassin to lady who begged him
to desist, to the effect that he had sworn
to do this act and intended to complete
it.
It is gratifying that the subcommittee
have not alluded to certain limitations of
personal immortality on the part of Mr..
Twitchell, limited at by some Of our Dem
ocratic contemporaries.
Take it all together, the report while it
fails to criminate any known offender,
leaves the impression that the Coushatta
community are peaceful people, and the |
unfortunate victim of violence the prin-
cipal criminal discovered in Coushatta.
As report on the special inquiry ordered
by Congress the report is a failure; as
document to show the corrup-
ton of the Republican party, it may be
copyrighted by the Democracy.