Year: 1876

sixty mllllOns, IL is pIOROseu 10 naNe uieu-
nial in lieu of annual legislative sessions,
as at present Under constitutional pro
visions, the Legislature is restricted to
session of ninety days, though by a two
third vote of that body 1t may be pro.racted
an additional thirty days, the per diem
being Sc. Under the biennial arrange
ment they further propose to vote them
selves salary instead of per diem. Why
this latter changer The answer, to those
who know Virginia Democrats, is patent.
Six dollars day for ninety days, and that
once in two years. is no pay for Virginia
statesman of the Democratic persuasion,
and the salary business simply means that
the cost to the State will be quite as much as
under the annual and per diem arrange
ment, only this and nothing more. The
economy of the matter, therefore, is some
what like stealing the $4O0, 900 belonging
to the literary fund, followed by the propo-
sition to tax the voters So each to make it
up, this last illustration of Democratic
economy being only paralleled by Tilden's
avoiding the payment of his personal obli-
cations 10 the Government and then crying
reform" The unvarnished truth is that
this biennial economy" is designed as
make weight a piece of bunkum, with
which to tickle the palate, so that the truly
economical may swallow the wo-dollar
pill, in the shape of the poll tax, which
must be passed in order to disfranchise
many, if not most, of the colored Republi-
cans. The coating of the pill is entirely too
thin to deceive any one not blind to the
ways that are dark and tricks that are
vain" of which Virginia Democracy is so
bright an exemplar. If they would only
cause the sessions of such Legislatures as
they have had Of late years to happen once
IN fifty years the State would be benefited
thereby.


Next in order is proposed amendment
with the following significant heading:
"On enlarging the powers of the Legisla-
ture." 1t is as follows: 1.-The Legislature
shall have power to provide for the gov
eminent of cities and towns and to estab-
lish such courts therein as may be neces-
sary for the administration of justice"
This looks innocent enough on the surface,
but is really designed to allow of such
cities and towns as cortumaciously persist
il adhering to the Republican party, to be
dealt with by Democratic Legislature
in enactments that will cure this species of
persistent obstinacy. At present the Legis-
lature can only ratify or reject such gov
ernmental laws as may be passed by the
people of the cities and towns themselves.
Efforts have time and again been made by
the Democracy of some of these RepublI-
can towns to have their charter so amended
as to destroy the ascepdancy of the Repub-
icans, but, as it required the assent of
majority of the people or their legally
chosen representatives before the Legisla-
ture dared act, they failed. Pass this
contemplated iniqulty and the unfortunate
Republicans of the cities and towns indi-
Gated would be as much at the mercy of a
Democratic Legislature as the most e1-
acting ex-Confederate could possibly
desire. The Legislature of last winter,
that submitted these amendments to
the people, acted with the usual shrewd-
ness of Democratic managers in refusing to
allow them to be voted on separately,
Notwithstanding the clamors of portion
of the party press, fearing that this Item
enlarging the powers of the Legislature
and the poll tax would be defeated Hence
they have been submitted as whole, and
as whole should be voted down in No
vember. A party that would change the
organic law of their State to compass mere
party ends, without compensating advan-
tages in other respects, is not only unwor-
thy in ITSELF but is demoralizing and ruin
GUS in its tendencies, and in this effort of
the Democratic Legislature of Virginia to
override all sense of right and justice to-
wards their political opponents they have
exhibited an aptitude at political trickery
and personal meanness that entities them
to the execration of humanity. In view,
therefore, of the foregoing and other facts
that might be adduced, it is of the first i'm
portance to the people of the debt-ridden
State of Virginia that they vote down these
proposed amendments, one and all. Re-
publicans doubtless know their duty in the
premises, and will act accordingly, but it
as well becomes the old Wings Of the State
10 ponder the matter well before they con-
sent to have their hands so tied that when
they do elect to shake off the Democratic
yoke it will he of no avail in Kidding the
State of the fixture of Democratic misrule
which these contemplated amendments are
designed to fasten upon an already op-
pressed people.