The Columbian. [volume] (Bloomsburg, Pa.) 1866-1910, 1877-07-13
THE REIGN OF ANARCHY,

where property is not protected. When the
public authorities wink upon theft the peo-
pie are driven by stress of sheer necessity to
defend themselves the best way they can, and
that defence is apt to be aggressively violent
Justice, infuriated by popular passion, often
comes to its victims in a fearful shape. Dis
orders, therefore, there must have been, and
bloodshed and violence, and loss of life,
though they are not enumerated, or clearly
described in the reports. II is known that
bands of Regulators" traversed many parts
of the State, and the fact Is established that
seven of the storehouses used as places of re-
ceiving stolen goods were burnt to the ground
in one night. The officers of the carpet
bag government "cared for none of these
things" They saw the struggle between
larceny and Lynch law with as much indif-
ference as Gallo looked upon the controversy
between the Jewish synagogue and the
Christian church at Ephesus. This horrible
condition Of society was caused solely by
| the want Of an honest government.
But this is not nearly the worst of it, if
!
friends are worthy of any credence at all.
They testify to numerous other murders,
wanton, unprovoked, and atrocious, COM
mitted with impunty under the very eyes of
their Government. Gen. Sheridan says he
collected list of 1000 assassinatious per-
petrated within three years. Senator Sher-
man and his associates of the visiting COM
mittee swell this number greatly, and add
that "half the State was overrun with vio-
lence." No effort was made to repress these
disorders or punish the criminals. Nobody
was hung, nobody arrested. The murderers
ran at large the victims fell at the awful
average of about four every day, and the
public officers quietly assented to let "the
rife, the knife, the pistol, and the rope do
their horrid work. without interruption
Are such men fit to govern free State
gift to govern! No, not to live"
THE GENESIS OF THE RETURNING BOARD.
The wretched system of carpet-bag gov
ernment could not possibly last. From the
first it had noreal support, The native peo-
pie and the honest immigrants, who went
there for purposes of legitimate business,
held it in adherence, and the negroes were
not long in finding out that it was sham
and a snare. As early as 1870, and before
that, the handwriting was seen on the wall
which announced that large and decisive
majority of all the votes, black and white,
had determined to break up this den of
thieves. They must therefore prepare for
flight or punishment, unless they could con-
trive way of defeating the popular will
whenever and however it should be expressed.
Then the Returning Board was invented.
This was machine entirely new, with
powers never before given to any tribunal
in any State. Its object was not to return,
but to suppress, the votes of the qualified
electors, or change them to suit the occasion.
BY the terms of the law it can exclude, sup
press, annihilate all the votes of a parish
for violence, intimidation, or fraud which
it finds to have been committed and adjudges
to have materially influenced the result OF
the poll This is judicial authority so broad
that no count would consent to exercise it
inhicting the fearful penalty of disfranchise-
ment upon thousands at once, without n
hearing and without legal evidence, not for
any offence of their own, but for the suppos-
ed sin of Others over whom they confessedly
have no control. OF course it is in direct
conflict with the State Constitution which
declares that all judicial power shall be vest
| II -, "a; Iain oil nd tah IRIS
and forbds it to be used even by them ex-
cept upon trial before jury, and convic-
ton on the testimony of credible witnesses
confronted by the accused and cross-examin-
ed by counsel. II is, besides, a most insol-
ent aflront to the fundamental principles OF
all elective government, for it makes the
poll of the people mere mOckery, which
decides nothing except what the Returning
Board is pleased to approve, and elects
nobody whom the Returning Board
does not graciously favor. Its pow
er to veto a popular vote extends to all elec-
tions, for every class of officers, judicial,
legislative, ministerial, and executive, in
Guiding electors of President and Vice-Pres-
ident
HOW 1T DID ITS WORK.
The board consisted of five persons. They
were originally appointed by carpet bag
f Senate, without end of their tenure and with
power to fill vacancies, which made them a
close corporation and gave them perpetual
succession. To put on some show of fairness,
the law required that all parties should be
represented. This was at first thought to be
met by the appointment of one Democrat
but when a deed of more than common base
ness was to be done, the Democrat was got
rid of, and the other four, desiring to work in
secret, refused to fill his place. .
This suppressing board did its work thor
} oughly from the start. 1t was never known
, to falter. Since its first organization in 1870
the majority of the whole people has beer
{ decidedly against the carpet baggers at every
election. But the board always intercepted
the retnrns, and so altered them as to make
majority the other way Kellogg was {
candidate for Governor he was largely de
feated, but the board certified him elected
; The certificate was so glaIngly fals'
that carpet-baggers themselves would no
help to install him, and Democrats deter
mined to assert their rights 1t was ther
that Gen. Grant, to the unspea kable shame
of the nation, lifted him into office on thu
:, bayonets ofthe army. Afterward the outrag
: ed peoplerose in revolutionary wrath, drove
him to shelter in the Custom House, and in
q augurated the man they had lawfully elect
: ed, Again the President made war on tn,
q State, and restored the usurper to the plac'
i which did not belong to him. The Demo
. Gratis regularly elected majority of the Leg
q islature; as regularly the Returning Boar
. certified majority of their seats to carpet