"He has denied to the people the right to bear arms for their own defense"

A Terrible Indictment!

[Keep in mind that this comes from a state still loyal to the Union]

   There was a tremendous Mass Peace Convention at Bucyrus, on Saturday last. In an able address the crimes of Abraham Lincoln against the lives, liberty, and property of the American people, are specifically pointed out. Read:

   He has denied to sovereign States their constitutional rights.

   He has destroyed the nation in order to establish a military despotism upon the ruins of constitutional liberty.

   He has stricken down the freedom of speech and of the press.

   He has deprived American citizens of their liberty without due process of law.

   He has held persons to answer for capital, and infamous crimes without presentment or indictment of a grand jury.

   He has denied the right of trial by jury.

   He has punished individuals and the press for condemning his lawless acts.

   He has disregarded the right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures.

   He has arrested citizens contrary to law, and punished them without conviction.

   He has suppressed the ballot by military violence, and dictated election at the point of tbe bayonet.

   He has suspended the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus.

   He has divided a sovereign State without it consent.

   He has seized by force and imprisoned a Legislature elected by the people

   He has proposed to allow less than one tenth of the people of a State to govern and control more than nine-tenths of the people of the same State.

   He has assumed the right to command the militia not in the actual service of the United States.

   He has denied to the people the right to bear arms for their own defense.

   He has surrounded himself with officers, who have plundered the treasury and burdened the people with taxes.

   He has destroyed the freedom of religion.

   He has annulled every constitutional guarantee for the protection of the citizen, and subjected him to theirrepressible tyranny of military violence.

   He has rendered the military superior to the civil power.

   Is it any wonder that the people are organizing everywhere for the purpose of changing such an Administration?

Is not such an Administration calculated to beget the most violent opposition from a freedom-loving people?

- Dayton Daily Empire, Dayton, Ohio, Thursday, August 4, 1864. Vol. I. No. 272. Pg. 2.

Gee, that sounds much like what we are seeing today, doesn't it?