Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1884-04-05
AT THE NATIONS CAPITAL
MIR. BAYARD OPPOSES THE
BLAIR EDUCATIONAL BILL.

UncOnstitutiOnaIity Hurled Against It
Mr.. Morgan Also Opposes the Meas
ure-The Senate and House Commit
tees of Different Minds on the Expe-
diency of Postal TeIegraphy.
WASHINGTON, April An the Senate
today Mr.. Cameron, of Wisconsin, from
the Committee on Public Buildings and
Grounds, reported favorably the bill for
the erection of public building at Fort
ress Monroe, Va. The report was placed
on the calendar.
Mr.. Jonas submitted Joint resolution,
which was referred to the Committee on
the improvement of the Mississippi, max
ing an appropriation Of 100000 for the
protection of the existing levees ON the
lover Mississippi.
The regular order was dispensed with
and the educational bill taken up, and
Mr.. Bayard took the floor. 1t had been
his intention, Mr.. Bayard said, to cast a
silent vote on this measure, but the de-
bate had more and more shown the inter-
est and Importance of il. Just in the pro-
portiOn as It's Importance and necessity
had grown upon him so had his desire to
| md justification for it, but he thought
that it was seldom that a measure could
be brought before Congress that would
ernment as the bill now before the Senate
1t was a proposition to tax the people of
the nIted States to support the education
OF the respective States.
A CONDITIONAL PROPOSITION.
1t was proposition accompanied with
a condition, that condition being that in
| proportion to the ignorance existing in
the States the money was to be expended
Under tnat condition money was to be
expended by the general government act
| ing as representative men executing a
| great trust of public power under the
| limitations OF a written charter, not
| only under civil obligations, but under
those OF religion. He added that it is the
| duty of men to look carefully to their
| votes in this body. Mr.. Bayard read
from newspaper, with which he said the
Senator from Rhode Island, Mr.. Anthony,
was connected, in which,. speaking of the
Blair bill, an editorial said that the pass
| age OF 1t would be an ultra constitutional,
though necessary, authority as a logical
consequence of the enfranchisement of the
negro, and that State schools would have
| to conform to the views of the general
| government. Mr.. Bayard assented to
those views so far as concerned the ultra
cOnstitutiOnality of the bill. Never be-
fore, he said had conflict between duty
and inclination been so great with him as
| now.
HOW THE REPUBLICANS wRoNGED THE
SOUTH.
The earnestness and straightforward
ness of Mr.. Blair in regard to the bill had
gained Mr. Bayard's regard, and he be-
lieved him to be animated wholly by
sense of high patriotic duty. The ad-
| dresses that had been made in the Senate
| by the different Senators had so impressed
| him that he felt obliged carefully to re-
view his opinion. He knew the South, he
| said. lie had given thought to the con-
| dItiOn of its people, and had observed
| their struggles after the war. He had OBJ.
| served the flower of their manhood slain,
their strong men and warriors crippled,
the desolation of their homes, the up
heaval of their social SYSTEM but there
was one cause more devastating than all
others, and that was that after the plow-
share of desolatiOn had done its work and
at the moment when every self-gOYerning
agency that the law could supply was
coming into operation, the party in control
of the general government adopted the
unhappy policy OF interdicting every YES
| tige of selfgOvernment in the South until
If was absolutely annihilated. Mr. Bay-
ard did not cite this for the purpose of
reproach or recriminatiOn, but
merely as part of history. Mr..
Bayard had come into public life, he said,
since the war, and his main object IN
doing so had been to do what might be in
ms power to bind up the wounds of the
civil war in his country, to assist in the
restoration of all the States to their proDer
position of equality in the Union. and to
that end he had opposed every measure
which he had deemed unequal or unjust.
He had been in this chamber when not a
single true representative of the inter-
| ests and sympathies of the Southern
people was found in it, and when such
representation as existed was in truth a
scandalous misrepresentation.
THE SOUTH OF TO-DAY.
How different a condition existed to-
day! The people of the South were now
represented according to their will, and
the courageous and large-hearted public
opinion of the country had risen too high
to permit again such an overthrow of
liberty as had taken place a few years
ago. Mr.. Bayard was grateful to God
that this had come, but this could not
affect his theory of the Union. That was
unchanged. II was union ofequal States
what Madison had called ''the COM
pound republic of America" Phis bill,
in Mr.. Bayard's opinion, invaded the
harmony of our political system.
He then entered on an elaborate
argument, supporting it by copious read
ings from the Federalist and other early
authorities to show the unconstitution-
congress
had DO power to tax the people at large
to educate the people of any one State.
Congress had no fund from which to pay
the expenses contemplated. Taxes would
have to be levied in order to meet them,
and if the bill before the Senate was to
be passed then logically and necessarily
Congress can, according to the will of
mere majority, occupy the entire
field covered by State func-
tons and local self government
would die in apathy. 1t would shrink up
from disuse of its faculties and the spring
of our liberties would become dry at its
very source.
GENERALIZATION RUN MAD.
This bill, Mr.. Bayard contended, was
Capitalization run mad. Unnatural order
bodily nOUrishment came before mental
nourishment and was a more indispen-
sable necessity. Would anybody say that
Congress could appropriate money to be
drawn from taxation to support the citi-
Zens of the Southern States? 1t seemed
to him quite as fatal to stab our
form of government in one vital
part as another, and the hand that
inflicted the wound should not be
his. No State had ever divested itself of
power, nor could it before God diyest
itself of the duty of providing for the ele-
vation of It's own Ignorance and poverty.
The concession to Congress of the power
asSumedln this seducatlonalmeaSure would
be to start the country on course which
| must end in the withering of the States.
Mr.. Gibson followed in an argument
upholding the constitutionality of the bill.
MR.. MORGAN OPPOSES.
Mr.. Morgan spoke against the bill. He
characterized 1t as the most magnificent
in its proportions that had ever been
| brought before the Senate. 1t was a bill
not for the government, but for charita-
BILE purpose or the purpose of public cul-
tivation, having for its end the bettering
of the condition of private citizens, a
mere unit atom in our body
polite. The Legislatures of none of
the States had instructed any
Of their Senators or Representatives in
Congress to aid in the Appropriation of
any money for public education. In the
Senate the bill had been received with
rather cold welcome, especially by some
of the older members. They were afraid
| that they did not possess the constitution
| al power to do things which this bill re-
/ quired of them. AS between the two sides
| of the chamber Mr.. Morgan thought that
there was about an equal division of
opinion as to the cOnstitutionality of the
| bill. AS the subject was a new one and the
| scheme a grand and far-reaching one, he
| thought it would be better to
| defer final action until the people
| should have been consulted: but mas
much as there were still unactedupon by
the House of Representatives about 147
| OF the 100 bills which the Senate had pass
| ed at this session, he didn't see much
prospect of the measure getting through
/ the nrpSpnf (On amendments