Daily Kennebec journal., 1876-10-10

done TO property by the military forces oi
the United States during the war OF the
rebeliion-a war OF four years and over
half the United States-and the imagina-
lion NAV well be appalled, at the thought
of the amounts that might be allowed by
Congress in sympathy with the claim
ants. The example Of a single State
will show that this is no bugbear Of the
| imagination.
| In 1874. Missouri elected for the first
time a Confederate State govel nmeAt'
The Governor was Charles II. Hardin,
one of the hard featured, narrow minded
type of Southerner. and who was men,
Der of the legislature that fled with ClaiO
Jackson. and passed an ordinance OF Sc
cession in log court house on the Ar
kansas border-whch it speedily crossed.
Hardin did not have the courage OF his
convictions, but returned to his plantation
to study the Constitution for arguments
against the use of force. and like all such,
remained the bilterer rebel for never htv-
ing been whipped. The legislature con-
tanned a large proportion OF Confederate
Generals, Colonies and Captains, and
showed its material by not having single
vote for Mr. Schurz. to whose eNertions
more than those of any other man its
members owed their restoration to civil
rights.
AZ its first session a bill wa, passed APP
pointing Board OF Commissioners to au-
dit and file claims ostensibly against the
| State for damage done by UUited S.aieS
forces. At first some alAm was created
among the Democracy by the fear that tie
but it was soon quieted by the form of the
certificate, which reads that such claims
shall only be paid when the amount has
been allowed by the United States gov
ernment and paid into the State Treas
ury, and the gist OF the matter became
clear, that the claims took the chance of
a success Of the Democratic party in the ma
tion. The three Commissioners were,
without exception, men who had served
in the rebel army Missouri was not a
rich State in that section south of the Mis-
souri, river where the war chiefly ragged.
its chief cities like St. Louis and Kansas
City did not suffer, and the largest town.
Springfield occupied by the Federal
troops in the country held by the rebels,
had not four thousand inhabitants, and a
great portion of the debateable land con-
sisted of the flint hills of the Ozlrks and
the swamps of South Eastern Missouri,
the home to-day of the deer and the wild
cat, save where some lead or iron mine
gathers around it small village. Yet
the claims allowed by the Commission
excluding the property of such rebels as
Price and Shelby, and the rest whose ser
vices in the Confederate armies was too
notorious for any possibility Of acceptation
aud of the loyal citizens whose claims had
already been allowed and paid--has a.
ready reached the sum OF eight millions Of
dollars, and the work is still going on.
The work of the Commission has been
practically secret, no reports of its doings
have been published officially or other
wise, but it does not require Solomon to
guess the kind of claims allowed after
every loyal claim has been settled by the
aid of the Republican State government of
former years. Members of the Legisla-
| a ha 1,i,h ,hy how ..ly in, l,n
claims, and many butternut farmer WAS
tempted to jefferson City with the pros
pect of little ready money for Il claim
which never existed, or on which he knew
he was not entitled to receive ii cent.
This is what has been done in Missouri,
which of all the slave States suffered least
during the war, and which contained the
largest proportion of loyal citizens Allow
ing the same proportion to the fifteen other
slave States, of which Alabama and others
have taken similar steps, and in which
the loss by war was greater by fve-fold,
we can see what is possible to result from
a Democratic victory in The Union In
the words of Mr.. Blaine, it would bank
rupt nation of Rothschilds. 1t is idle to
say that these claims would not be present
ed The States have already taken steps
to present them and endorsed them by
their sovereign authority We repeat the
Southern war claims are no bugbear like
the Confederate debt or compensation for
emancipated slaves, which are shut out by
provision of the Constitution, but real,
a tangible and great danger.
| The Indiana PoW-WoW.