Year: 1865

Hon Jeremiah S. Black, chairman OF
the Committee'on Resolutions, made the
following report:


WHEREAS, 1t is the Imperative duty
and should he the exclusive desire OF ey-
cry American citizen entrusted with the
power of controlling public affairs, by
his vote or otherwise TO see that they
are administered with single eye to the
great objects which our forefathers had
in view when they laid the foundations
of this Republic namely; TO form
more perfect Union, establish justice, III
sure domestic tranquility, provide for
the common defense, promote the gen
eral welfare, and secure the blessings OF
liberty to ourselves and our posterity "
AND WHEREAS, the men and the party
administering the Federal Government
since 1861. have betrayed their trust,
violated their most sacred obligations,
disregaHded the commands of the fuuda-
mental law, corruptly squandered the
public money, denied Justice to the peo-
pie, perverted the whole Government
from its original purpose, and, thereby,
have brought untold calaluities upon the
country, therefore,


|. Be it Resolved, That We, the Demo.
carey of Pennsylvania, are now, as we
always have been, faithful TO the Union
of the States, opposing the secession OF
the South with all our influence and hav-
ing no sympathy or association whatever
with that party in the North which plot
ted against the Union and pronounced
: H. n nf with 6plfh
and an agreement with hell.


2. That if the Counsels of the Democrat
ic party had prevailed, the Union would
have been saved in all its integrity and
honor. without the slaughter, debt and
disgrace of civil war; but when the
formation of sectional parties in the
North and in the South and the advent
of one of those parties into the seats OF
Federal power made war fact which VIC
could not control, we sustained the Fed
eral authorities in good faith, asking
nothing at their hands except decent
respect for our legal rights aud show u
common honesty in the management Of
our financial affairs; but in both those
particulars we were disappointed and
betrayed


3 That tie Constitution established
by our revolutionary fathers is entitled
to our unqualified respect and obedience;
the oath to support it is binding, relig
iously, morally and legally, at all times,
under all circumstances and i'll every
part OF the country, upon all public Off
GERS from the highest to the lowest, as
well as upon private citizens, it is only
by strict observance of its provisions
and a rigid enforcement of its obliga-
tions in all the States that we can hope
for Union, Liberty or Peace; he who
wilfully violates it, or counsels its viola
tion by others, is a public enemy and
dishonest man.


a. That among the rights guaranteed
to us by the plainest words of the Con
stilution are these-free speech, a free
press, freedom from arbitrary arrests and
illegal imprisonment, trial by jury, the
writ of hdbeds corpus, the perfect immu-
nity of all persons not in the army or ma
w from any species of punishment for
crime or pretended crime which is not
the legal consequence of a regular con-
viction by an impartial jury-the abso-
lutte subordination of all military pow
er to the civil authority, and the'privil-
ege of white citizens to vote at State
elections according to the laws of the
State.


5. That we fully concur with Presi-
dent Johnson in the conviction express
ed by him in 1860, and repeated several
times since, that the Federal Govern
ment is sovereign within its proper
sphere; that it acts not through or upon
the States but directly upon individuals;
that the States could not absolve the
people from their federal obligations
that the State ordinances Of secession
were nullities and, therefore, when the
attempted revolution came to an end by
the submission of the insurgents, the
States were as much part of the Union
as they had been before, their people
were bound to the same duties and
clothed with the same rights, excepting,
of course, such rights as individuals
among them had legally forfeited by
their own acts in the meantime And
we hereby declare that, so far as we can
prevent it, the resumption of their prop
er places in the Union by those States,
some of whose citizens were lately in
rebellion, shall not be impeded or delay
ed by the unlawful interference of that
faction at the North which always was
hostile to the Union. which now pro-
nounces it legally dissolved, and which is
still Indignantly labOring to prevent its
restoration. - a.


G That the effort now making by GER
tain persons to use the power of the Gen
eral Government with n view 10 force
negro suffrage on the States against the
will of the people and contrary to exist
ing laws, is not only high crime against
the Constitution, but deliberate and
wicked attempt to put the States of this
Union Gall of them more OF less andso
of them entirely under the domination
of negroes, to africaniZe large portion
of the country and degrade the white
race morally and socially as well as po-
litically to the level of the black. We


will not acknowledge the incapacity OF
our own race to govern itself, nor suuen-
der the destinies of the country into the


hands of negroes, nor put ourselves under


their guardianship, nor give up TO them


the political privileges which we inherit


ed from our fathers, and we exhort our


brethren in ether States TO take up the
same attitude and maintain 1t firmly.
That v-e will support President