Mineral Point tribune. (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1869-1938, 1880-01-01

town officers, and how he entirely avoids stat
ing that equally minute directions are pre-
scribed by the same Iaw-making power for the
! Governor and Council. Had these directions
! been followed the technical defects in every
return would nave been cured. But the Gov
ernor and Council chose to disobey them, and
went SO far as TO usurp the functions Of the
! Judiciary in declaring them unconstitutional.
A few days ago Lyman Trumbull
championed the cause Of Garcelon,
claiming to have investigated the
law, and vouching for the legality of
the proceeding. We challenge him
to meet the case as above presented.
The great Senator takes the plotters
upon their own ground and leaves
hardly shred of the excuse with
which they attempt to hide their
shame.
Mr.. Blaine states that while the
present Council found thirty-seven
fatally defective returns, only six
| teen had been found in all the pre-
vious fifty-nine years Of the State
| Government, and all OF them in Re
publican districts. The letter makes
two other points which can best be
presented In the writer's own words :
/ Town government Is the bulwark Of NewEn-
! glands strength and it is the sauctity Of town
| government that las been outraged, the rights
( of town government that have been destroyed.
/ Thirty seven members of theLegslature, fairly
and in3isputably elected, have been counted
ont, and In not single instance did the Gov
! ernof andCouncil offer hearing 10 the peoples
| elect, whom they bad determined to sacrifice.
! The dark deed was appropriately done in Sc
Cresy and in stealth. Four or tive who were
| threatened with Acknowledgement, did, by ur-
gent solicitation, secure the privilege ofappeai-
| ing before the starchamber council, but they
| felt and knew they were talking to men who
| had prcjudged their cause--men who had no
ear for reason and no eye for light Never be
| fore in the history OF Maine was party in in
terest refused full hearing before The Govern
or and Council and full opportunity to eX.
anime The election returns.
Let il be specially remembered thatGovernor
| Garcelon and his Council do not claim that
they have knowledge of single Illegal vote OI
any one of the numerous towns whose returns
they rejected. They do not claim TO show that
any vote was cast without being counted, or
counted without being cast, or that peOp,e
anywhere voted differently from the returns
I
are defective on technical points, narrow and
immGtcrial in themselves, and easily corrected
under the laws of the State And then they
proclaim the right TO set aside and disObey
those laws, They hold towns accountable for
not complying with the stretest letter and last
eXaction of one statute, and then detanty pro-
claim their right to nullify other statutes IN
the same book on The same subject. In other
words they claim that the statute regulating
the duties of town officers shall be fulfilled to
the uttcrmost and minutest point, while the
statute prescribing the duty OF the Governor
and Council may he set aside by sort of plen-
AIRY power OF diepenSatIon extended to them
alone.
1t seems almost impossible that
such gross imposition and illegality
should be attempted in any Northern
State, especially in New England.
That it can be consummated and
perpetuated seems highly improba-
bic. its success would be the sever
est blow to self-government which
could be struck under color Of Law,