The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1880-06-05
synopsis Of Judge Pearre's Address
Last Saturday at Antietam.
From the sunday American.

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From the Sunday American.
Judge Pearre spoke first of the fact
that they had not come there to
mourn, as we sorrow for the dead
who pass away from our midst in
the ordinary course of nature. They
were there not to grieve, but to re-
joice not to mourn, but to do honor
to rejoice that such a noble army of
patriots were on this bloody field to
save the Union of these States and
preserve the liberties of the people
to do honor to the great principles
which implied the heroes who slept
around item to leave their parents
and homes their wives and children,
and All their comforts to submit to
the fatigues and dangers of a soldiers
life, and finally to lay down their
lives to preserve to us and to our
posterity, and theirs. those liberties
and those rights which we this day
enjoy. He urged that the decoration
be not a mere naked ceremony, nor
the occasion picnic of pleasure.
They must come there, and teach
their children to come, with the feel
ing of the prophet of old, to whom
the angel of the Lord spoke out of
the burning bush, saying; Pull off
the shoes from off thy feet, for the
place wherein thou standest is holy
ground" AS. the Mohammedan jour-
news to Mecca to be strengthened in
his religious faith, as the Christians
make their pilgrimage to jerusalem
to draw renewed inspiration from the
places where the favor of God was
shown in remarkable manner to
His chosen people, and that their love
to the Redeemer of mankind may be
increased by Gethsemane and Cal
vary, and their faith confirmed so
the American people will do well to
pay their annual visits to these ma
tional cemeteries to do honor to the
buried heroes who repose within
them, to contemplate the patriotic
motives which induced them to take
up arms, to teach to their children the
wlckedness Of rebellion, which caus-
ed shedding of so much blood and
the expenditure of so much treasure,
and which converted those beautiful
hills, over which we now look, into
perfect pandemonium of slaughter
and of death to make it the occasion
CT instilling into the rising genera
ton the value of free institutions
under which we live, the absolute
necessity of the preservation of the
Union of these States, to the perpe
tuity of our liberties and happiness.
He then spoke of the occasion as
therefore being fit for an inquiry as
to what our duty as good and patri-
otto citizens is, or what it is to be
good citizen.
He intimated that one of the great
est distractions to the exercise of true
patriotism is that too MANY men in
these days permit themselves to be
strictly bound by the ties of party,
saying that ifa man permits his par
ty fealty to carry him to the support
of measures which are detrimental
to the public.interests, he does wrong.
If he supports men for Offices whom
he knows to be, for any reason, unfit
for the positions they seek, he is not
acting the part of patriotic citizen
for. however good your laws may be,
bad and corrupt men will not adj
minister them well.
The Judge gave as an illustration
in our own State of this, the manner
in which the registration laws are
executed in Baltimore. He said it is
good law and seems to be well
guarded, its intention being to Sc
cere the purity Of the ballot-box and
protect the elective franchise; and
yet, we all know that the ingenuity
of partisan registrars and judges of
election has perverted this law into
an engine of fraud.
He trusted that the efforts lately
made to redress this wrongsmay be
effective, and that the voice of the
people of Baltimore, when they next
speak through the ballot-box, may
reflect the sentiments of the people
as truly as it does in the counties.
In the second place, to be good
citizen and to act the part OF patriots
in thess days, he said, is to cultivate
and encourage love, respect and at
tachment for the Union. To do this
we must recognize as fundan entail
principle the equal rights of all the