her now the case of a man who for nearly
two years had the chief control in a neighbor-
ing city; and who ruled it with a sway as
despotic as ever a Sultan ruled in the Bast.
I remember the authority be arrogated to
himself, from the highest functions of the
State down to the most trifling matters that
a chambermaid would overlook, 1 remem-
ber well how grey-headed men of my own
county, men who have helped make the State,
men who have lived long and useful lives.
and had been going to Baltimore city from
their boyhood, have been put to the trouble
of waiting by the score in his ante-chamber,
for his mightiness to grant them the privilege
of carrying out a few pounds of sugar, and
could then only obtain it after be had tested
their loyalty ley administering the loyal oath.
I remember how foolish women were treated
for pinning a piece of red and white ribbon in
their bosom, or dressing their children in the
forbidden colors of the rebellion. I remem-
ber how women, equally foolish, were pun-
ished for attempting to fret some underling
officer by playing secession music in their
hearing. What would Robert Ely, or the
dead McPherson have said about that if they
had been in the satrap's place? They would
have passed it by. They would not have
'heard the music or seen the ribbon. But this
gentleman was so intensely loyal that he in-
troduced in the State a policy of degradation
such as was never witnessed in any civilized
country embraced within the limits of peace-
ful rule.
What was the upshot of this loyalty?
These people were not loyal enough for him,
and they could not be allowed to stay in
Maryland; but the upshot was that while
exercising his stern loyalty in administering
tests to poor weak people he bad his arms up
to the armpits in the public treasury. And
now Mr. Colonel Fish, as the reward of his
villanies practiced under the guise of loyalty,
is serving out his sentence in a penitentiary
in the North.
That, sir, is a sample of the loyalty that
requires test oaths—that abuses good citizens
who perform their duties, and are we to blush
because we are not loyal enough to come up
to that same high standard. He is not alone.
Col. Fish is not the only one who, by virtue
of his political associations can offend with
impunity.
[The half-hour having expired, the ham-
mer fell.]
Mr. EDELEN. I do not rise for the purpose
of discussing this question at length. I de-
sire merely to call the attention of the house
to the course that has been pursued upon
this question in the different States of this
Union in corroboration of the points just
made by my friend from Prince George's
(Mr. Belt;) that the universal practice, at
least so far as my investigation has gone, in
the States of this Union has been to make |
these oaths of office as simple and concise as
possible; that in no instance to which my
investigations have directed me have 1 found
a single instance where the oath was retro-
spective iu its operation, retroactive, looking
back to the past history of the man to enter
the office and whom the oath is supposed to
purge.
I will not consume the time of the conven-
tion by reading from the book of the "con-
stitutions " these oaths. I have here the
oath of New Jersey, which will he found on
page 157, of Connecticut, page 136, Rhode
Island, page 125, and Maine, on page 43. I
will simply turn to the constitution cof Con-
necticut and read the oath of office there. It
is almost exactly the same in these different
States:
''You do solemnly swear, (or affirm as
the case may be,) that you will support the
constitution of the United States, and the
constitution of the State of Connecticut, so
long as you continue a citizen thereof, and
that you will faithfully discharge, according
to law, the duties of the office of — to
the best of your abilities. So help you God,"
There the oath stops. The sole purpose of
the oath is to put the party under the solemn
obligation of the sanctity of an oath, that
he will during the term of his incumbency
discharge the duties of the office upon which
he is about to enter in honesty and to the
best of his ability. That is all. I submit
to my learned friend from Baltimore city
(Mr. Stirling,) as a lawyer, that I believe in
my soul that all these separate clauses of the
oath which be proposes to incorporate into
the constitution of Maryland would, on a
proper case being made before the supreme
court, be declared null and void, as in con-
flict with the provision of the federal consti-
tution. which is in these words :
"No State shall enter into any treaty, al-
liance, or confederation; grant letters of
marque and reprisal; coin money; emit
bills of credit; make anything but gold and
silver coin a tender in payment of debts; pass
any bill of attainder, ex post facto law, or
law impairing the obligation of contracts ;
or grant any title of nobility."—Art. 1, sec-
tion 10.
That term " ex post facto law " has a
wider signification than some gentlemen as-
sign to it. It means any retrospective law,
any law having a retroacting operation, pun-
ishing as a crime to-day that which was yes-
terday committed. The gentlemen will say
we do not intend to do that. But I beg gen-
tlemen of the convention to look at it in this
light. I say it is precisely the thing you are
attempting to do, and which will be the le-
gitimate consequence of your work. You are
doing just this thing—just as if you were to
say here to-night—"Be it enacted by this
convention in solemn convention assembled,
that every man who has ever in his life directly |
