In the midst of a fierce conflict for the national life –
responding to calls for large reinforcements to enable our armies to
successfully combat with traitors – cheerfully meeting the payment of
extraordinary taxation to supply the Government with money to conduct the war,
the submitting to an immense increase in the prices of living, the people of
Pennsylvania have nevertheless been able for three years to maintain a
prosperity, and secure a healthy operation in all the branches of their trade,
unprecedented in the annals of any country while engaged in the prosecution of
a war. In the trials of this bloody war,
with the struggle just reaching its climax, the people of Pennsylvania suddenly
find themselves involved in a political contest invested with the highest
importance, because fraught with the most momentous issues. Ordinarily, heretofore, political contests
meant only a choice of policy as to the manner of administering the
Government. The struggle of parties was
for the possession of the powers of Government, and merely to control their
operation. How, however, our political
contests have resolved themselves into a direct and a positive issue for the
safety and the permanence of the Government; because, politically as well as
sectionally, the contest at the ballot-box and in the battle-field must decide
whether the Union shall exist or perish with the triumph or defeat of one or
the other of the contending parties.
Hence the unwonted importance with which our political campaigns are now
invested. — Parties are now divided on issued which vitally concern the
Government. They are composed of friends
and enemies of that government. To
choose between these parties equally interests the cause of loyalty and that of
treason. No man can stand neutral
between the two, and all that are not fairly for the Government will be justly
recognized as its enemy. — Admitting that such is the new importance assumed by
our political contests, we have an excuse as well as a justification for
entering on the contest fast approaching, for the amendments to the
Constitution, with all the zeal in our nature, and all the devotion that should
characterize the patriot and the lover of his country in his effort to serve
it.
It was seem that on an amendment to the Constitution
granting the soldier a right to vote there should be no division. Among a free people particularly, who are
admitted always to be the most intelligent, such a right should be so well
grounded in common and statute law as to need no action, at this late day, for
its exercise and vindication. The
soldier, in all lands, alike among civilized and barbaric nations, has ever
been admitted to the highest honors conferred by the governments beneath whose
banners he fought. His valor, his
sacrifices, and his devotion, have ever been regarded as themes for the poet, subjects
for the painter, and material for the historian; and thus the calling of arms
became one of honor – one which elicited the noble rivalries of compatriots,
and, where civilization refined for the instincts and elevated the character of
men, war has been so conducted as to force combatants to respect and honor each
other’s qualities – the victor still to treat the vanquished as a MAN. The Constitution and laws expressly declare
that no man shall be deprived of his citizenship, except for high crimes of
which he shall be chard and proven guilty.
He must be summoned to meet such a charge of criminality in the presence
of judges whose oaths bind them to do him entire justice. He must be insured a trial by a jury sworn
impartially to consider his case. If
found guilty, the sentence of his judges may result in his disfranchisement –
but disfranchisement is not aimed at as a result of his punishment. Disfranchisement as a direct punishment is
only made to follow the highest crime known against the State. Yet in the face of these facts, and in
opposition to all equity, there are those in the State who insist that disfranchisement
should follow the highest service which a man can perform for his
Government. There is a strong party
to-day in Pennsylvania, regularly organized, controlled by able leaders and
sustained by astute and learned advocates, insisting that the service of a
citizen as a soldier – the periling of life and limb in the support of the
Government, the giving up of domestic endearments, the sacrifice of business
interests, and the yielding of all
personal comforts, forfeit for those thus engaged all political right, every
franchise of a free-born or constitutionally adopted American citizen. The monstrous iniquity of such a claim is at
once apparent, however it has been maintained by our highest judicial
tribunals. Its injustice can only be
sustained by sophistries founded in the worst political prejudices, so that the
sooner the Constitution and laws are made plain and rendered explicit on this
subject, and posted where every man can read and understand them, just so soon
do we secure the strength and majesty of the Government in the confidence and
respect of the governed – just so soon do we make our good old State worthy of
the past valor of her sons, and glorious in the future. American citizenship has its virtues and
these their merits. Each virtue can only
be exalted by serving the Government under which they flourish; but if that
service is made a badge of degradation, will it not be more natural for men of
honor and spirit and true courage to resist its rendition than voluntarily to accept
its duties? The citizen-soldier feels
when he takes up arms it is to defend, not destroy, his political rights. The man who sacrifices his business
interests, and for a stipulated time surrenders his personal liberty, cannot
understand why he should be deprived of his political rights. The service of arms does not blunt the judgment
or blur the ability of a citizen to exercise the elective franchise. It rather gives him a new title to the
enjoyment of such a right, and fits him for the highest privileges of a free
Government. Unlike the masses of Europe,
the great body of the American people are intelligent, possessed of educations
affording the heights knowledge. While
war for a time may change the habits of such people, it cannot affect their
sense of justice, their appreciation of power, and their love of
Government. It cannot lessen their ability for self-government. If it could, the war in which we are now
engaged for the defence of the Government and the safety of the public weal had
better be stopped immediately.
The Democratic leaders now oppose the enfranchisement of the
soldier. In the olden time of the
Democratic leaders, such as Jefferson, Jackson, Snyder and Shultze insisted
that the elective franchise followed the flag under which a soldier
fought. If that flag was potent, on the
sea and the land, to protect a man in war, why should it not possess the other
virtues of continuing his political franchises?
If it made the deck of a vessel above which it waved the soil of the
country represented by it, regardless of the sea or clime in which it floated,
so also does it carry with it for the soldier who fights beneath its folds any
political rights which these heroes enjoyed before they were mustered into the
service; and on this soundly democratic argument the soldiers who fought in
Mexico were able to exercise a freeman’s right in the wilds of the chapparel,
the heats of the seashore, the din of conflict, and in the shadow of
battlemented castles, the same as if they had been at home in their respective
wards and precincts. If men fighting
thousands of miles from home – cut off from all communication – scarcely informed
at the time on the issues of the political campaign, were able and entitled to
exercise the right of the franchise, is it not fair to suppose that citizens of
a like intelligence, engaged in the same service of the Government within the
limits of its authority, distant only a few miles from home, conversant with
all the issues involved in the political contest, in daily communication with
their friends, and in perusal also of journals discussing the questions at
stake – is it not fair to suppose that such men are entitled to the exercise of
all their political rights? Only those
who act from perverted policy on this subject, will seek to evade the
responsibility of such a question. This is
proven by the judicial history already attached to this question. When it was deemed expedient, as it was
undoubtedly considered by the democratic leaders then, the elective franchise
was extended to the absent soldiers in Mexico; but in the midst of a war waged
by the upholders of an institution from which the Democratic leaders thrive all
their strength, George W. Woodward, a Justice of the Supreme Court, and lately
the candidate of the Democratic party for Governor, judicially denied the
soldiers the exercise of the elective franchise; denied our brave defenders the
right almost in the same breath in which he declared the right of the States of
the South to rebel and secede from the Union!
Fair men can see no difference in an American soldier voting in Mexico,
while fighting beneath the flag of his country, and the same soldier citizen
under the same circumstances voting in a rebellious State. Time nor place, within the limits of a free
government, or in the service thereof, cannot influence, should not be
permitted to affect the rights of a freeman.
The government which is not able to insure him these inherent rights is
unworthy his support. The authority of a
free government, which seeks to degrade a freeman while periling his life in
its defence, is a despotism more fearful than that which denies all right to
the governed. It is not possible that
such a government can last. At some period
in its history, if the rights of its defenders be disregarded as the Democratic
leaders now deny the right of the franchise to the soldiers, it will need arms
to protect it both from foreign and domestic foes, and perish eventually, an
object to mean for defence.
In advocating the soldier’s right to vote, the loyal men of
Pennsylvania are sustained by a faith in the fact that his service is such as
to secure him not merely all the rights he enjoyed before he entered the army,
but increased dignity and power at the hands of the Republic. The enemies of this great principle oppose it
only for reasons of expediency. There
was a time when the Democratic leaders claimed that the army was largely and
even almost wholly composed of their partisan followers. When they were most clamorous in insisting
upon the recognition of such a claim, the supporters of the principle, opposed
politically to these leaders were most earnest and even persistent in its
advocacy. To them it was a principle of
justice too sacred to be disregarded – too noble to be rejected – too important
in its relations to the very genius and vitality of the Republic to be denied
to all the people thereof, alike shoes who risk the perils of battle in its defence
and those who run no danger of life, limb or property in the service of
Government, and who still claim its highest immunities and most sacred
privileges. On the second day of August
ensuing this question will come practically before the People of
Pennsylvania. We do not doubt the result
of the election as to the acceptance of rejection of the soldier’s right to
vote. But we would be false to the party
which we represent, and recreant to the creed which we adore, if we failed to
avow in advance our approval of granting this great right to our brave defenders. Pennsylvania has many thousands of her
citizens now in the army. – They have all gone forth inspired by a sublime
faith in the strength of a free Government to crush a wicked conspiracy, and
does it become us, while enjoying the halcyon blessings of peace at home, while
the limbs of our soldiers are wet with their own blood, and their weapons are
dripping with the gore of traitors, to say to them, “You have forfeited your citizenship; you are no longer worthy of
participating in the control of a free Government; your positions must be with
the slaves of the South among the disgraced and degraded of God’s children?” We cannot believe that the people of
Pennsylvania are prepared to send such a message to their fellow-citizens in
the armies of the republic. We cannot
believe that so foul a disgrace awaits our war-warn but still intrepid
heroes. The hearts of the great majority
of the people at home are too full of gratitude for a return of great service
by galling neglect. Our faith in the
justice of the people renders us confident in the establishment and vindication
of the political rights of the soldier.
But that fault must be accompanied by works. Hence it becomes the duty of the State
Central Committee to urge on the friends of the soldier actively to labor for
the triumph of this effort in his behalf.
Let it be said of our fellow-citizens now absent as soldiers, that as
our victorious armies planted their banners in the capital of treason, it was
beneath their folds in Richmond each hero of the Keystone State exercised the
freeman’s right of the elective franchise for a president to administer the
Government to a reunited Union, to States once more loyal, to a people again at
peach and blessed with prosperity.
SIMON CAMERON, Chairman.
A. W. BENEDICT,
WIEN FORNEY,
Secretaries.
— Published in The
Jeffersonian, Stroudsburg,
Pennsylvania,Thursday, July 14, 1864, p. 2
