The Valley Virginian. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1865-1895, 1882-06-08
1.-THE Liberties Of the People. J."

Democratic frauds as crystalized in the |
certificates of election given to the several
members of Congress from the South who |
have been elected from their seats by ma |
iority vote of that body. After stating the
Democratic view of the various points made |
by Democratic members and overruled by |
the Speaker during the recent deadlock, |
he relieves his mind in the following high |
sounding and sensational sentences: 1.-The |
struggle has been the most exciting one OF
the session. The arbitrary power assumed |
by the Speaker, confirmed by the vote of
his party friends, is one of the dangerous
symptoms of our times, which tend to show |
how the rights of the people are being SUBJ
jugated to the rule of dom inant faction,
and through it to the one-man power, so
fatal to the rule of the people,"
The rulings of the Speaker were simply
directed to the obstructive methods adopted
by the minority to defeat the action of the
majority and to perpetrate an outrage upon
the liberties of the people," in refusing
to seat the man the people had elected. The
case which especially stirs the patriotism OF
Mr.. Tucker, seems to have been that OF
Mackev against Dibble. In this instance
it was the determ nation of the minority
not to allow it to be considered upon its
merits. The preteXt of Dibble that he
wanted time to take testimony as to certain
allegations of forgery was the most trans
parent deception. The authenticity OF the
record was avouched by the witnesses who
made it, and the opposition of Dibble and
his Democratic apologists was mere pre-
text to prevent the case being tried upon
the evidence and the law. Mackey was
fairly elected by nearly ten thousand ma
jority, if the vote had been fairly counted.
He was elected by nearly one thousand
majority by the count of Democratic can
vassers, and it was only by the most glar-
ing and ndefensble frauds that the State
Canvassers found 5000 majority for his
Democrat opponent. Probably these vo-
tiers had no liberties" that it was worth
considering-whichit was not proper and
right to defraud them out of.
1t is question not difficult to determ inc
where the dangerous symptoms" come in.
! The Speaker used the power given him by
Congress to arrest filibustering so that the
business OF the country m ight be attended
to, the rights of the people of the Second
District of South Carolina asserted and
indicated and the Democratic minority
deprived Of its obstructive methods, to pre-
vent the majority from doing its duty
Wherein can here be found an assault upon
the liberties of the people," is past COM
mon apprehension. 1t would strike the
ordinary mind as a more direct onslaught
upon the liberties of the people" to pol
lutte and debauch the fouIta in-source of
their libert ies-the ballot-box-and to pros
titute the election machinery to the perpe-
tration of the most transparent frauds that
ever shocked the conscience of Just and
fair-minded citizens. The Speaker ruled so
as to compel the House to consider whether
or not the liberties of the people" had
been outraged in the usurpation of a seat
in Congress by man they had never
elected. and whether the popular will le-
gally and constitutionally expressed should
not have its representation in the Halls of
Congress. The danger to our institutions
and the dangerous symptoms of the
times'' are the persistent purpose on the
| part of the Democracy of the country to
pollute the ballot-box; to deny the major
ity their right to rule, and not in the rul-
ings of the Speaker to secure consideration
of this important and vital fact. 1t is
striking at the fundamental principle of
our institutions and undermining the whole
frame work of our Republican form OF
government; it is sporting with the lib
ert les of the people," and the rights guar
anteed by the Constitution, for men OF Mr..
fuckers ability to lend themselves to the
obstructive and revolutionary proceedings
which were only arrested by the severe
and stern ruling of the Speaker, which Mr..
| Tucker has made text for his dolorous
outgivings. 1t matters not who may be
the constituency, SO the ballots are cast by
legal voters, under legal forms, to defraud
them out of their legal effect, is as much a
crime and an assault upon the Gilbert les OF
the people, as if every one of them was
college professor or lecturer on constitu-
tional law. An assault upon the rights and
| liberties of the humblest and most inlet
tered citizen is an assault upon the funda-
mental principle of our government, and
| it is the rights thus involved which the
Speaker and the Republican members in
Congress essayed o defend.
In the case of Lynch against Chalmers,
from Miss issipp, Mr.. Tucker addressed the
House, combining his argument to the cold,
refining legal distractions presented, and
not to a consideration of the liberties Of
the people, involved. He vas aware, that
upon naked record of justice and right,
five thousand legal ballots were thrown
out which had been cast for Lynch and
that it was only by the most extraordinary
contortion of a statute or constitutional
provision ever known in the history OF jul
risprudence that the courts OF Mississippi
sustained the foul act. If his concern is for
the liberties of the people," why did he
not rise to the dignity and equity right OF
this case, eschewing the shadowy semblance
of law upon which the court hinged its de-
cision, and declare for justice to the people
and the naked purity of the ballot, as the
reflection of the principle involved in legal
| elections?
1t will require something more than Mr..
fuckers dramatic way OF putting it, to
convince the people that their liberties have
been assailed in the rulings of the Speaker,
but it will not require any great stretch OF
credulity to believe that Mr.. Tucker is only
concerned about Democratic liberties and
Democratic advantages, and that it is the
forestalling of this more than an unselfsh
devotion to the principles of free govern
ment, as we'll as free elections, which has
caused him to subm it to an interview and
give expression TO the gloomy apprehen-
sions which seem to shadow his soul. The
rulings of the Speaker aimed alright for the
people and their enforcement secured what
would have been denied had they not been
enforced, and in this there was higher con-
ception of the CELEBRITIES of the people, p" than
in sustaining the dlatory methods to keep
Mackey out of the seat to which the people
of his district had elected him.
Hon. James G. Blaine, having been solicited