Year: 1866

| " Jul OA1AECAlc. WI


Shellabarger's appearance in the hall wa


greeted by hearty demonstrations of az


plause Mr.. S. spoke as follows:


FELLOW CITIZENS What l shall tall


about tonight is. why the Government


of the United States ought not now to b


surrendered into the hands of those VIII,


have just been defeated in a war wage,


to destroy it.


If we are not startled at contemplating


such question as this, it is not becaus
this is not the exact issue we shall decid


in our next election, but because in tn,


last few years the American mind has be


come Injured TO the contemplation of the


most appalling dangers.


Here at the outset, say to you, tha


from all our country and from the mos


intelligent of our people there comes tc


US the warning, that the resumption by


the leaders of the rebellion of a control


ling power in this Government can nov


be prevented by one OF the other of two


ways, either by such an overwhelming


display OF the frmness and strength O.


the loyal people as shall deter the leader:
OF the rebellion and their allies from at


tempting the revolution they mediate
or else by another civil war Haeed in re-
sistance of their forcible and revolution
ary accessions to power which is already
arranged.


No longer at the north or south do the
leaders or the journal of the Northern OF
Southern Democrats" disguise their SET
purpose by revolution and war, if that
shall be necessary-to force back into the
next Congress, the very men who in the
Thirty-sixth Congress perfected the plans
for their traitorous war, and who from
thence sent out its signals to begin the
devastation and murder. And the same
men and organs which for the last eight
months have pressed the President to
dissolve by the sword the Congress, de-
manded that its successor shall never be
permitted to make laws unless itshall in
clude in its body the representatives of
States and constituencies which I shall
show you are as intensely rebel as they
were during the darkest hours of the re-
bellion and which representatives, aided
by their Northern allies, they thus ex-
pect to make controlling proportion of
the next Congress. They base their de-
msnd that the present Congress shall he
ulssoIpeu 10y Jne sword, and that its sue
cessor shall not be permitted to make
laws unless organized as they demand,
upon the fact that it is incapable of
making laws.


They allege that however intense and
universal the treason of any State and
constituency may be, still it has right
to elect the rulers of the nation, and that
TO exclude from Congress those whom
the organized rebellion elect, DESTROYS
the constitutional power of Congress to
make any laws.


arrogance of rebellion. l will not insult
your intelligence by arguing much about
it. l shall not try to demonstrate sxioms
by showing that if an overwhelming dis
loyal people whom rebellion had deprived
OF all civil government, and which had
no legislation except one sworn to sup
port the rebellion, could not elect Sena-
tors or President of the United States
owing to the war, neither can they now
if equally disloyal and disorganized. 1
shall not try to prove that if, to exclude
such q constituency from now electing
our rulers, renders the Congress from
which they are excluded incapable of
making laws, then so would the exclu-
sion of the same constituencies destroy
the Congress during the rebellion!


| shall not attempt to show that if be-
ing in rebellion enables rebellious mi
nority of popular government to de-
priYe the loyal majority Of the power to
create legal Congress or to make laws,
then the being in rebellion adds to the
governing powers of the minority, and
there is literally an end to all popular
c1ot,11 L. f1,,,,1
in rebellion. f---


What do want to do is 10 ask atten-
ton to the audacity of the claim that the
oyal constituencies of country have no
power to govern it. want to ask what
hat people is whom we are told by these
rebels are incspacitated by reason of their
treason from electing any President or
Congress? 1t Is the Congress of that en-
lire people who elected that man Vice
President who declares now that they
could not elect Congress. 1t is the Con-
yress of that entire people who have
pledged the nations faith, the debt whose
proceeds saved the nation. 1t is the same
Congress and people which have given
those who came back from the war limb
less and SCARED, and to the widows and
children of those who. CAME not back
again, all which the nation hath to pledge
TO these-its honor gratitude and sup
port. .-.r -.--... = $50. ..s


Is it the Congress of that entire peo-
pie who gave to the Republic for his sec.
ond Inauguration Abraham Lincoln, for
whose fame the good of earth met to
weave the chaplet, and whose ashes are
treasured and guarded by the affections
oil m - =
Of that entire people who sustained, by a
irmness and patriotism beyond the best
examples of history, the burdens of the
war, amountingin one year, in taxes alone
to near five hundred millions of dollars.
1t is the Congress of that entire people
who have just delivered the Republic from
q rebellion the most stupendous and god
less in history. 1t is the Congress of that
people which changed the Constitution
by proposing amendments from being
slave to FREE, and which presented the
new nation-thus transformed-to God
and civilization, more beautiful than a
bride adorned for her husband. It is
that same people who sent to the armies
of the Union three millions of men. 1t
is the Congress of that people who have,
asleep, now, in soldiers graves, near five
thousand other children. There
these are yet out where,


"0n Fame's eternal camping ground


These silent tents are spread.


AnoSsIory guards with solemn sound


The bivousc of the dead"


1t is tbis people and this the Congress
whom these leaders, organs and instru-
ments of buffeted and infuriate rebel
lion are to-day, both at the North and
at the South, demanding shall be dissol-
we'd by the President in blood, or if he
viii not dissolve it thus, then that he
shall inject by military force into its sue
cessor, now to be elected, such number
Of the representatives of traitor constitu-
enciesas shall have a controlling power
in the Government.


Such, gentlemen, is merest glance at
one of the portents of the immediate fu
ture. Whether these dangers can be
aVerted at all, and if so, how, are ques-