LOUISIANA. 



445 



the lawful General Assembly of the State, can omit 

 without abdicating its claim to be BO considered and 

 recognized. In afi lawful procedure looking only to 

 the assertion of their legal existence with a view to 

 their future recognition by the Congress of the United 

 States, when the controversy now at issue shall be 

 determined, they should receive, and it is reasonable 

 to suppose they will receive, the moral support, not 

 only ot the citizens of the State, but of every right- 

 minded citizen of the United States wherever be 

 may reside. In view, therefore, of the approaching 

 meeting of the General Assembly, now about to take 

 place 



Ik it resolved. That we recommend to the people 

 of this city and State to extend to the Legislature 

 of the State of Louisiana, now about to assemble, 

 their moral support and earnest sympathy, and such 

 material aid as may enable them to assert and main- 

 tain by legal means the rights of the people of this 

 State to local self-government. 



As an offset to this report, an Executive 

 address signed by Acting-Governor P. B. S. 

 Pincliback (colored, Republican), was issued 

 on the 3d of January. After reviewing the 

 political situation and the circumstances at- 

 tending the counting of votes, it proceeds to 

 saj: 



Not content with all these outrages against Ameri- 

 can citizenship, these foiled and defeated leaders of 

 a minority, when thwarted bv the majesty of the 

 law as construed and enforced by an honest and in- 

 dependent judiciary, State and Federal, now propose } 

 through a man pretending to be Governor-elect, ana 

 a Legislature pretending to be elected, to organize 

 and operate a government in direct conflict with and 

 in violation of the dignity and peace of the existing 

 government of the State of Louisiana and of the Uni- 

 ted States. We recognize the right of free discussion 

 and of free assemblage of the people. They may 

 lawfully meet, not only to memorialize the authori- 

 ties to redress wrongs, to perpetuate rights ; not only 

 to criticise and censure their servants, wherein they 

 may deem them derelict, but even to denounce them 

 for wrongSj real or imaginary; but when any class 

 of men, with an undetermined and unascertained 

 official status propose to meet and organize a law- 

 making department and inaugurate an executive and 

 exercise governmental functions in the presence of 

 and in conflict with the existing established authori- 

 ties, such parties are revolutionists, and guilty of 

 treason against the State, and are disturbers of the 

 public peace, and most be dealt with as such. 



I am prepared, ns the acting Executive of Louisiana, 

 to permit, without let or hinderancc. a faction of her 

 citizens to indulge themselves as fully as the largest 

 personal liberty may require, nnd the financial em- 

 barrassment and social disquiet incident thereto 

 must belong to them; but when their action be- 

 comes organized and suggests and prompts viola- 

 tions of the law, and obstructions and antagonisms 

 to the authority of the State in the exercise of its 

 l'".'i'imatc functions, it cannot for a moment becither 

 ignored or overlooked, but must be met and sup- 

 pressed. It is my duty as Executive not only to 

 quell mobs and insurrectionSj but to prevent, by the 

 prompt and vigorous execution of the law, the in- 

 ception of such riotous and disturbed conditions. I 

 do not propose that such a state of things shall be 

 inaugurated in the State of Louisiana as will make it 

 necessary for the national authorities to declare mar- 

 tial law therein and take possession thereof, however 

 much this deplorable issue may be sought and de- 

 sired by the few ill-advised, short-sighted, and self- 

 scoking men who are laboring to that end. 



The Governor-elect, as returned by the Legislature 

 in session at the State-House, willj on the day pro- 

 vided for in the constitution, be inauguraton, and 

 the Legislature recognized by the President will meet 



and perform its legitimate functions, but no pre- 

 tended Governor shall be inaugurated and no pre- 

 tended General Assembly shall convene nnd disturb 

 the public peace. Parties participating in either case 

 are public wrong-doers, and shall be promptlv dealt 

 with as such. The whole force of the State shall be 

 used for this purpose, and all necessary national aid 

 will be invoked to cooperate with and sustain the 

 same. I have every confidence tliat the General As- 

 sembly now in session, sustained and aided by the 

 suggestions and the moral influence of the commu- 

 nity, will make wise and adequate laws ; and 1 shall 

 cheerfully cooperate with tliem in furthering the 

 public weal, but no good end can be accomplished by 

 disorder and revolution, while the commercial, finan- 

 cial, and industrial interests of the State will be se- 

 riously affected thereby. No good citizen will sanc- 

 tion them, and under the obligation of my oath of 

 office I am determind they shall not prevail. 



On January Vth, the day appointed for the 

 assembling of the Legislature, the rival bodies 

 wore each inaugurated. There was a general 

 closing up of places of business, and the entire 

 population assisted at the inauguration of the 

 McEnery Legislature. By command of Gen- 

 eral Emory, the United States troops were 

 stationed in readiness to preserve order. The 

 general determination expressed was that, if 

 the meeting of the Legislature was interfered 

 with as menaced in the proclamation of Act- 

 ing-Governor Pinchbeck, the citizens would 

 form and defend their representatives against 

 any force except the military of the United 

 States. No effort having been made to carry 

 the proclamation into effect, after the adjourn- 

 ment of the Legislature, the crowd dispersed. 



On the 10th of January a number of Sena- 

 tors transferred themselves from the Pinch- 

 back or Kellogg(as it was subsequently known) 

 to the McEnery Legislature. At the same time 

 they issued the following address to the peo- 

 ple of Louisiana : 



We deem it our duty in the present anomalous 

 condition of affairs to place, before our constituents 

 and the country, the reasons that actuate us in the 

 course of conduct we have determined to pursue. 

 "We are Republicans, and believe in a republican 

 form of government. *We have acted with the na- 

 tional Republican party, but we cannot sanction the 

 course that has been pursued in this State bv the 

 custom-house portion of our party, and by the Pinch- 

 back government ; and we believe that no right- 

 thinking person or class, no matter of what political 

 shade or conviction, can sustain them in the gross 

 violation of the rights of the people, and their reek- 

 less and intolerant course. 



The organization of the Senate and House we con- 

 sider as revolutionary. Senators notoriously elected 

 have been displaced, and those whom they defeated 

 put in their places. Members of the Legislature re- 

 turned bv both hoards have been ignored, and their 

 places filled by defeated candidates. * * * The 

 question, "Who constitute the legislative board?" 

 is subordinate to the question, "What are the re- 

 turns?" Returning officers may count in or count 

 out persons, with or without returns, but the returns 

 will show for themselves. * * * The Senate hav- 

 ing been illegally organized by the revolutionary 

 and violent usurpations of P. B. S. Pinchback, who 

 was not the President of the Senate or a member of it, 

 and who called up and swore in as Senators persons 

 who were notoriously defeated, against and in con- 

 tempt of the protests of a large majority of the Sena- 

 tors holding over, and who aloue had the right to 



