The New Orleans daily Democrat. [volume] (New Orleans, La.) 1877-1880, 1877-08-16
PRICE, FIVE CENTS.
NEW ORLEANS, THURSDAY, AUGUST 16, 1877.

which prompted them to prefer honor to in
terest, political leaders might have led her
into q position as equivocal as that occupied
by some of the other border States. Every
people among whom this pride of State or
nationality exists in great strength we al
ways find manfesting the highest civic and
heroic virtues when the crises of the times
eall for their exercise. wish that the people
of every State would cultivate this peculiar
arity of the Virginians / wish especially |
that the people Of Louisiana would become
Louisinnians as the Virginians are Virginians.
LOUISIANA.
But Virginia, [ am answered, has a past
to be proud of, while Louisiana has none.
True, the whole history of Virginia has been
a grand drama; but the history Of no peo-
pie is illustrated by nobler or more per-
sistent devotion to the principles OF constitu~
tional liberty than that of Louisiana during
the past nine years. When every other State,
as if paralyzed by defeat, quietly submitted
to the shame and bondage Of reconstruction,
the people of Louisiana lifted up the banner
of the constitution over her waste places and
their ruined homes, and they never lowered it.
They began the fight in 1868 and never in any
canvass did the swarm Of adventurers, thieves
and negroes carry general election in Lou
isiana. Other States, with immense white
maiorities, surrendered almost without a
| blow; but Louisiana, with her vast negro
population, organized by the ablest and most
unscrupulous of the adventurers who cursed
| the South never faltered in the struggle.
In 1868 the Louisianians carried their State
for the Democratic party, but it's vote was
| l. tx
1870 they carried the State again, and War
moth and his emissaries falsified the election
and counted in the Radicals; in 1872, undis-
mayed, the people of Louisiana again rallied
to the polls and triumphantly elected Nc
Emery, but the army and navy were called in
to overthrow the election and install the men
defeated at the ballot box by the people. Was
not this enough to disheartcn any people not
inspired by heroic devotion to their
rights? The past story Of 1874 and OF
1876 is too familiar to need recital.
Those two campaigns have filed the his
tory of Louisiana with days sacred in the
calendar of her oisn, and the proud truth is,
that, from 1863 to the triumphal installation
of Cen Nichols, the people OF Louisiana
never ceased their struggle against Radical
hour when, if Grant had removed the bayon-
cts of the army from their throats, the peo-
pie of Louisiana would not have risen up as
one man and swept Radicalism with its
crimes and infamies from the face OF the
earth In all that time there is nothing oi
which our people have to be ashamed. II
the glorious record seems in any part to bear
stain, review the facts and it will be founC
that that stain is the work Of plotting ant
short-sighted politicians whose work the
people rejected or denounced.
The world affords no grander Illustration
of the devotion Of a people to constitutions
liberty; no more heroic and unyielding oppo
sition to public crime that Louisiana has
given. She is Justly entitled to the glory O.
the shame of being designated 'the strong
hold of the BourbonS," for during that sac
and eventful eight years; subjected to plum
der humiliation and sufferings such as few
peoples have endured, she never forgot ;
single principle Of constitutional liberty, no
learned even the alphabet of that new politi
cal science which makes alliances with in
fanny, compromises with crime and counsel
the condonement of political villany. Ant
here, under the shade of these grand ole
trees, and in the shadow of these ancien
mountains, dreaming of her broad and sweep
ing rivers, her sunny skies and wildernesse!
of flowers, of her wide fields and happ.
homes, my trust is that in that brighte
future which all our hearts tell us is dawnini
upon her. she will cling with renewed tena
city to those Bourbonistic ideas which mad
!, glorious the period of her bondage and suffer
ing, and placed her first among the State
which have signalized their devotion to tn
principles Of the American constitution.
THE VIRGINIA ELECTION.
The nomination of Col. Holiday for Gov
, ernor of Virginia is generally gratifying t
the Virginians here, all of whom, believe
are hostile to any proposition that may b
construed into desire to repudiate even
dollar of the State debt. Nevertheless, ther
i. is very strong reputation or "forcible ad
iustment" party in the State, and its grea
!, power was shown in the fact that Mahon
was, until the nomination of Holiday, tn
leading candidate before the convention
Whether the "Hero Of the Crater" will bolt an
run independent, on the "forcible adjust
ment !" doctrine, I cannot Judge; it looks, how
ever as though the full strength Of the re
pudiation idea will be exerted in the electio
for members of the Legislature.