The Wellington enterprise. [volume] (Wellington, Ohio) 1867-188?, 1879-10-02

rights question. The General Govern
ment had no authority to make it, and
in making it. it not only usurped power,
but it swamped the States and lessened
their power in the Union. What can
become of strict construction and State
rights, if the General Government on
the general ground of advancing the
public good, can do anything that ex-
pediency plainly says should be done?
The declaration of war in 1872 was not
in itself an unconstitutional act, and it
was demanded by the state of affairs;
but it necessarily led to consolidation,
and to disregard of State rights. The
declaration was the work of the Demo-
Gratis, who bore themselves as if every
thing was bound to give way to the de-
mands of the day. They were right;
but they were not State rights men.
The Federalists took up what the DEM
ocrats had abandoned, and became even
more Jeffersonian than Jefferson. The
platform of the Hartford convention
was true State rights production, and
might have been endorsed by the old
Democratic fathers, whose sons and
successors were worshiping in the in
ner temple of consolidation.
Between the close of the war with
England and the opening of the seces-
sion war, the Democratic party was en-
gagged in showing its devotion to State
rights by helping Shareholders violate
those rights, and in consolidating the
General Government. Matters came to
such a pass, at length, that the only
thing that the Democracy had in view
was the promotion of Southern inter-
ests which meant the consolidation OF
the slaveocracy at the expense of State
rights, provided those rights were
claimed by free States. States were
made hunting grounds for the seizure
of fugitive slaves, while slaveholding
States were encouraged and protected
free colored men who came into their
ports in discharge OF their regu-
lar calling. Even secession was up
held, as a reserved right of slave-hold-
ing States; and when it was resorted to,
the sympathies of Democracy were with
the seceders. During the civil war, the
Nation had to contend against two enc
mics, the Democratic party and the
Southern armies. That was the conse-
quence of upholding State rights, as
those rights were understood by Demo-
Gratis. Since the war, the Democratic
party's devotion to State rights has led
to the consolidation of the South, SO that
that section now forms something very
like q Nation, which aims at the resto-
ration of the old state of things. De-
mocracy holds that the white popula-
ton of the South has the right to
"coerce'' the colored population, which
it has politically enslaved; and, further,
that the General Government cannot
lawfully protect that population in the
exercise of its rights. because to pro-
tect it would be to interfere with the
rights of the States. 1t was the most
proper thing in the world to seize rum
away slave in Massachusetts,, before
war had emancipated our State; but it
would be an abomination to uphold a
free mans right to vote in Mississippi.
This is exactly what State rights means
to-day, according to the Democratic ex-
position of those rights; and the coun-
try is expected to accept that exposition:
But let the Democracy regain posses
sion of the National Government, and
we should see its forces used against
the colored population were they to as
sert their right to act as citizens, which
right is as clearly theirs as is the right
| of any white man to vote in Boston.
| The question before the country is, not
how to maintain State rights, but how
to prevent the power of the Nation be-
ing used against the rights of some mill
ions of persons whU dwell in certain
States, and whose condition must be-
come perfectly hopeless if they should
be abandoned to their local oppressors.
This is, indeed. the only great question
before the country. Resumption is not
a question. 1t is an accomplished fact.
1t is not possible that it should enter
into the next Presidential contest. But
we must meet the question: "What is
to be the final state of the race we
emancipated through resort to the
swordP' 1t is clear that they cannot
be given up to the tyranny of the men
who once owned them, and who see in
them the most provoking evidence of
their defeat as masters. State rights OF
no State rights, the General Govern
ment must at last come in, and enforce
the rights of those men who are citi-
zens, and who were made citizens by
the action of the American people
| RoSt07a Trn3,eLLer