Knoxville daily chronicle. [volume] (Knoxville, Tenn.) 1870-1882, 1879-06-01
DISCUSSING STATE RIGHTS.

The Nashville american is re.
joiced that the State Rights princi
pie has at last come up in such a
way that it may be discussed as
a political question alone. Here
tofOre, it says, it was coupled, first
with notification and then with
slavery. 1t adds;
1t is at last square question be-
tween a federal system Of equal States,
which have formed for perpetual
maintenance a central government to
exercise powers aud care for interests
common to all and general, and GEN.
trail, irresponsible power, sustained by
military force, as the ever imminent
last resort OF a ruling party to mains
tain power against the people, to stifie
the majority.
Now, if the American wishes to
fairly present this question, why
does its editor write such para
graphs as that ? He knows very
we'll that those who believe in the
supremacy of the National Govern
ment do not mean a government to
be sustained by military force"
Such statements are the statements
of a partisan and are made for
partisan effect-nothing else.
There is no more reason for say
ing that the National Government
must be sustained by military pow
er, than for saying so about State
government. But if there is such
interference with the powers and
prerogatives of the National Gov
eminent that it cannot sustain it
self, as was the case in 1861, then
must the Nation be deprived of the
power to call into requisition enough
force to remove the distractions ?
And to come right down to ques-
tons which have recently been dis
cussed in the National Congress, is
not the election of members of
Congress a matter of interest to all?
We insist that it is, and that being
so, we insist further that the exer-
else of national authority to pre-
vent fraud in Congressional cleo
ions is entirely legitimate, and
comes within the provisions of the
National Constitution.
The american appears greatly
rejoiced at the prospect of fair
discussion of State Rights principles,
but proceeds to make very unfair
and partisan statement of the issues.
Of course those who take the side
of national supremacy do not in
tend that the other side shall state
their case for them, Gen. Garfield
eloquently put the doctrine of
national supremacy in speech de-
livered in Cincinnati the other even
ing when he said:
81 have often, i'm my own mind,
llkened our Union and our States to
the solar system which God links in
the universe. Each orb has it's own
laws. The earth has her laws terres-
trial, under which all things upon the
earth subsist; but what is the earth
without the system to which she be-
longs? The central sun, holding all
these planets in its grasp, each in its
appointed round preserving its unity
and glory, illuminates il with its light.
So each State has its own laws, its own
rights, and its own individuality, but
above the State and beyond the State
the central sun of the Union shines
with its equal light, equal laws, equal
liberty, upon all the States and the in
habitsnts OF all the States. And you
can no more pluck the State out of its
orb with the Federal Union than you
can snatch Jupiter from his mighty
oIb.n
In their platform adopted last
Wednesday, the Ohio Republicans
voice the sentiments of the Repub-
can party of this whole country and
touch the keystone of the next
Presidential canvass when they
pledged themselves to the ''unity of
the nation and the supremacy of
the National Government in all
matters placed by the Constitution
under its control" Republicans
ask only what the nation is entitled
to under the Constitution.
OUR snail-Iike Governor has stuck