Year: 1863

In the Assembly. on the 10Th, Mr.. Sander.
son, of Ell Dorado, rose to question Of priv.
ilege, and spoke as follows:


Mr.. Speaker: / rise toa question of privi
lege. l hold in my hand two newspapers
published in the city of Placerville Ell Dora.
do county. One of them is called the Noun
tain Democrat, paper which has become
notorious for its reasonable proclivities, and
which, on account Of them, was q short time
ago excluded from the United States mails,
The other paper is called the FL Dorado Times
Ia paper, sir, which has al the reasonable
proclivities Of the Democrat, with the sin of
hypocrisy added, because it seeks to cover up
its treason beneath the spacious cloak of
Union Democracy. Each of these papers,
sir, contains long article devoted to the
perversion and misrepresentation Of the sen.
timents which had the honor to submit to
this House when the Presidents proclama.
ticn was under consideration. One of these
articles is entitled Sanderson VS.. The Con.
stitution, and the other is styled g Radical
Abolition Triumphant-The Constitution Re-
pudiated.r Each of these articles represents
me as declaring on this floor that the Consti-
tuition of the United States no longer exists.
Sir, / made no such declaration. On the
contrary, sir, believe that the Constitution
does exist and will continue to exist, as it has
in the-past, monument to the wisdom of its
trainers for future Governments. What l
did say was this That the Presidents So
called emancipation proclamation raised no
questions of constitutional law that if it vio-
lated any law it was not the Constitution. nor
the law of the land, but the law of nations,
or the jus ge1tium that all the questions
which arose between the Federal Govern
ment and the Southern Confederacy, which
we nave recognized as belligerent power,
were referable to and were to be determined
by the laws of war, and the laws of nations;
that the Constitution of the United States was
made for the purpose of furnishing rules for
the government of the civil affairs of the ma
tion-but that it does not prescribe any mode
or rule for the conduct and management of
war against public enemy that the Pres
ident of the United States. although be de
Commander-in Chiet, could find in that Con.
stitution no guide for the manner in VIII ich to
carry on the war, but that he must look else
where for that guide; that he must look for
it to the laws of nations, and whatever they
may authorize he may perform. would ask
these sage editors, these profound logicians.



to refer me to the Article of the Constitution
which prcscribes the manner in which the
Government shall wage war against public
enemy Nowhere i'll that instrument is i;
prescribed that we shall not scalp the enemy;
nowhere is it said that we shall not burn our
prisoners Of war at the stake, nor that We
shall do this and do that; but, sir. it leaves
these questions to be determined by the laws
of nations, because they are questions be
tween nations, and over which no one nation
can have sole jurisdiction. Such are the sen
timents which | expressed, and which they
have here misrepresented and perverted for
purposes of local political effect. All have
to say in regard to these newspaper articles
is that they are as full of perversion, mis-
representation and bad logic as the hearts o.
their writer's are of treason against thu
American Government, and the only meri
they contain is this-that they are an apt il
lustration of that great truth expressed BY
the poet Pollock:


Fertile is earth in many things


Not least in FOOLS