Belief 7 - Reading 8 of 13, The Reconstruction Convention

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Belief 7 - Reading 8 of 13

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RECONSTRUCTION

Harper's Weekly, August 12, 1865, page 499 (Domestic Intelligence)

We make some remarks elsewhere in regard to the Richmond election. The result of the election is unfavorable not only as regards the officers elected but as regards the spirit with which it was conducted. A direct issue was made between Union men and men known as committed to secession, and the latter triumphed. It was on this account chiefly that General Turner annulled the election by an order issued July 29. The grounds for this order may be specified as follows:

1. The exclusion of voters on the ground of having lost their residence by absence in the Union armies, when no such ground was taken as against citizens absent in rebel armies.

2. With few exceptions all of the officers elected have been prominent rebels.

3. The issue was direct as between rebels and Unionists.

The Richmond Republic had before the election warned the people of their danger. It urged them to bring forward no candidates that had held either Confederate or State offices, because that by doing so they would lay themselves open to charges of dissatisfaction, if not of disloyalty. The sole object of the people ought to be to prove that they were loyal to the Union, now that they have thrown down their arms, and that they make no mental reservation in taking the oath of allegiance. It adds:

"If a thoroughly Union ticket succeeds, pardons may be expected for our property holders, civil government will be restored, and general prosperity may attend our efforts to rebuild the city. If, on the contrary, gentlemen are elected in whom the military authorities have no confidence, they may be prevented from taking their office, military rule may be continued, and a general confiscation of property may result."

The Richmond Times, on the other hand, treated the whole subject with characteristic levity. The people of Richmond must show that they were not to be scared into voting for this man or that man; and, to show that they were not, why not vote for rebels, if they chose to express their defiance in that way?

The Richmond Bulletin frankly discloses its rebel proclivities. It discourses upon the election in the following strain:

"Here, at the termination of a war unparalleled in its violence and magnitude, at a period when the relations of the State to the General Government can scarcely be called re-established, the people, in their sovereign and untrammeled power, give expression to their views and feelings in a manner which leaves no doubt or room for doubt. The election of yesterday simply means that the people of Virginia, so far at least as Richmond can be taken as a representative of the people, turn not with the spirit of the craven and the renegade from opinions which their kith and kin have died for. While no open platform of political creed was placed before the people, it is clear that the protestations of a pseudo-Unionism on the one hand, met by a political reticence on the other, gave the voters the true issue upon which they were called upon to decide; and all whose pride and love of State cling to the Old Dominion will rejoice to-day that the decision has been made in favor of good men and true."

Harper's Weekly, August 12, 1865, page 499 (Domestic Intelligence)

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