VOLUME 1. The American Citizen, *8 published every Wednesday In the borough of* Butler, fey THOMAS ROBIN BOX A C. K. ANDERSON on Main street, Opposite to Jack'* K(<>t**l—office up stair* in the brick onnerlv occupied by EH Yetter, as a store TKHMM :— S| 50 a year, if paid In advance, or within the hrnt nix month*; or" s'2 if not paid until aftar the expira tion of the first six months. RATB« or ADVERTISING:— -Onesquare non., (ten lines or ***,) three insertions $1 00 Sverv subsequent Insertion, per square, 25 Business cards of It) lines or less f.»r one year. Inclu ding paper. ft 00 ford of 10 lines or leas 1 year without paper 4 00 \A column for six months 7 "0 * .column for one year 12 00 column for six months I r< 00 column for one year 2ft 00 1 column for six months 2ft 00 I column for one year 00 Remarks of Hon. C. M'Candless, Senator from the Jhitlcr District, on the Bill Providing for the. Payment of In terest in Legal Tender Notes. Mr. M'CANDLESS. Mr. Speaker, in the course of this discussion, it has seem ed tome most extraordinary that Senators on the other side of the floor, instead of discussing this question fairly and proper ly, have made it the occasion for a tirade of abuse against their own Government. We have heard nothing from that side of the chamber, since this discussion com menced, but abuse of the Federal Gov ernment —anything to weaken the Feder al power and give strength to the enemy. Senators on the other side begin by foot ing up figures in reference to the national debt, and they come to the conclusion that the national debt is great! Hut, sir, if the national debt is great, do they desire that the interest on the State debt shall be made larger than it now is, by the fool ish mode of legislation that they propose. They tell us that the debt of the Federal Government is enormous. The Senator who has just spoken tells us that, in addi tion to the State, national and other debts, the amount his district would have to pay of it. would be six millions of dollars, and that their entire assessed valuation is sev en millions. Thus leaving only one mil lion unmortgaged ; and yet that Senator, and all the Senators on the othcrside.with one or two exceptions, vote against this bill. Notwithstanding that they cry out that the property of the State is mortgag ed, they desire to mortgage still further the State of Pennsylvania, and to throw upon her an additional million of dollars, front which wo have it in our power to re lieve her. The tax payers of this Com monwealth will bold us to a strict account ability for our action here. We have it in our power to pay the interest on the State debt in the legal currency of our country, made such by a power that can not be doubted—a power which has been tested in the highest legal tribunals in the land, and determined to be constitutional. Yet, when we propose to pay the State debt in this currency.*they tell us, no—the Federal debt is too great. Why, sir, that is the reason the State debt should bo less; and, instead of making it less, they arc Attempting to heap on us more than a million of dollars in the coming and every .succeeding year. Strange and fallacious argument! They do care about the debt of the National Government; their •desire is to sink Tier in a hopeless debt.— If they saw their Government robbed be fore their eyes, they would say amen to it! It has been alleged that the payment •of the interest of the State debt in the currency of the country would be noth ing short of repudiation. Now, sir, why is it repudiation'! The legislative power of the United States under the Constitution has the right to make a legal currency, and change that currency when they •choose. They have given us a legal cur rency which wc arc bound to consider as good as that which it took the place of; and yet they refuse to allow us to pay our creditors in that currency, because the Legislature of 1840 passed a resolution that the indebtedness of the Government should be paid in coin. How could the Legislature of 1840 bind the action of this Legislature here today? What pre vents us from repealing the act of the for mer legislature ? Nothing. Are there any vested rights under lliat act bcyoud which we cannot go? After this debt of the State was created, provision was made for the payment of the interest on it, and that Legislature for sonic reasons best known to themselves, declared that the in terest falling due on Pennsylvania stocks ■sfrall always be paid in-specicor its equiv alent. They also declared that the credi tors of this Commonwealth should be paid in specie or its equivalent; yet all the cred itors of this Commonwealth to-day are rightfully and justly paid in the legal cur rency of the country —the United States treasury notes. Why is it, sir, that we receive our compensation as meuibers.and all the public servants of this Common wealth receive their compensation in this currency, while these capitalists or bond holders should be preferred above all oth er creditors, and, in additiouto their oth er privileges, have their notes paid in gold ? And here I may jugtsaytfcatl believe that if the State treasurer had acted wisely and judiciously, he had the- power, under the" Federal law making United States trcasu- AMERICAN CITIZEN. ry notes a legal tender in payment of all debts, when our friends on thatsideof the chamber prevented our passing this bill into a law before the first of February last, to hand over United States treasury notes to those capitalists, and thus have saved the taxpayers of thisCommonwealth about 1600,000. It was also said by another Senator on that side of the floor that it was an inva sion of constitutional rights for the State of Pennsylvania to make this currency a legal tender. The Legislature of Penn sylvania does not make this a legal tender. The legislative power of the United States has made it the legal currency of thu country, and we do nothing but adopt the legalized currency of the United States when we propose to pay the interest of our State debt in it. If they believe that the faith and credit of the State could be pledged by the Legislatureof 1840—hav ing some most supereminent qualities pos sessed by no Legislature since—why do they not inaugurate some financial system by which these bonds will be redeemed, and create a new loan on an original ba sis, with a contract to pay the interest as it accrues in the legal currency of the country ? Why, sir, because they wish to find fault with the State and National Government. If they can find fault,that is all the part they desire to take in this great struggle. Since the commence ment of the war, until the present time, they have supinely folded their arms and allowed the Republican party to bear the brunt of this struggle; and all they have found to do has been to carp at the acts of the Federal Government, and keep an account of what the war costs, and since the State Government has got entirely in to the hands of the Republican party. to find fault with their acts. This appears to boMie peculiar sphere of Senators on the side oi the floor, and the party tKey represent All the denunciations which should have been hurled against ( the rebels and traitoi's, are reserved for Salmon P. Chase and Abraham Lincoln, I and those on whose shoulders the Govern- | mailt of the United States has devolved at this fearful crisis. Now, the question is merely, will the State of Pennsylvania pay their creditors in the legal currdicy of this country ' — And I say that if the Legislature does nr t pass this law. and pay her creditors in le gal currency, involving a saving of more than a million of.dollars annually, the peo ple will hold them to an accountability, and the party in power will be hurled j from their position. That great party | which in 1861, under the leadership of their great commander, James,Buchanan handed to us two governments instead of one—tho rebel Government and the Gov ernment of the United States—wants to get back into power again. They desire to crush us finally, in order that their breth ren in the South may succeed. Senators have made threats that they will bring us j back to Constitution and laws. We refer them to the 4th of April, 1861, and ask | them in what condition they left their j country when they handed it over to Mr. j Lincoln and the present administration.— J Buchanan came into power with peace and : plenty all over the land, and through his imbecility handed over to his successor two governments with a fearful revolution inaugurated. They said that they had no power to coerce seceded States, and to-day when this Administration has taken a vig orous hold of the reins of Government, and is crushing out this vile rebel confed eracy which was the creation of theirpar ty, they sit down and wail over it, and count the cost. When a man of honor sees his house consumed and his family dishonored, docs he sit down and count the cost of punishing the fiend who ho s thus violated his peaceful hearthstone ? Yet these gentlemen, leaving the Repub lican party to carry on the war, sit down and count how many dollars and cents.it is going to take in order that this Govern ment may be successful in crushing out the rebellion. If it only costs them six ty-six dollars, to a man, I suppose, they will agree to have the rebellion crushed ; but if it should cost seventy dollars, they will all allow the rebellion to succeed and our great and glorious Government to be de stroyed? 1 think, sir, when the life of the nation is at stake, when the question lies between liberty and slavery, for our selves and our posterity, it is too nice a calculation —too nice a question for the calculation as to how much it will cost to maintain the glorious liberties of oureoun try. It is too close a calculation, sir, and I think it insults manhood to make it.— Every loyal heart says to the Federal Gov ernment, " If it mortgages every acre we have, we will give all our acres, all our houses, all our lands ; yea, all our lives, to hand down to our posterity a free Govern ment; and our posterity will thank God that they had such nobie ancestors."— Bat if they had an ancestry that wold "Let us have Faith that Right makes Migtrt; and in that Faith let us, to to do our duty as we understand it"-A. Lwcour BUTLER, BUTLER COUNTY, PA., WEDNESDAY, MAY 18, 1864. sit down and figure up that it would cost eventy dollars for freedom and only sixty six dollars for slavery, and then choose slavery because it costs the least money, would curse their mean and penurious an cestry. I say, sir, that this matter in re lation to the policy of the National Gov ernment is only dragged into this ques tion. It is only an attempt, on the part of these Senators, to. assail their Govern ment, that protects their firesides and their families, and will guarantee for them and their posterity freedom now and forever. Now, sir, the only question here is, it is the policy of this State to pay her public servants and all her creditors in the legal currency of the country, or to pay gold instead of that legal currency to a ki id of aristocracy holding the State debt? I think, when the constituency of those gen tlemen examine this question, they will tell them that they consider themselves misrepresented on this floor. When we hate a clear right to do it, it is certainly the policy of the State to pay one dollar instead of paying something like one dol lar and sixty-four cents. I say, sir, that it would be madness—it would be folly— for us to fail to pass a law which gives the right to pay this interest in the legal cur rency of the country. If the Senators are in earnest, and willget upsome finan cial scheme by which these bonds might be redeemed in legal currency, and new contracts made, I will suggest to them a scheme by which it maybe done at a low er rate of interest than that which they pay in gold to-day—one that would relieve them from the necessity of what they call repudiation. We can change the system if our conscience smites us; we can re deem the bonds in the ljjgal currency of the United States, issuing new bonds bearing, perhaps, a lower rate of interest. Believing, sir, that the party in power will not foolishly and recklessly lay an additional amount of debt of over a mil lion of dollars upon the taxpayers, toplease the bond holders, or any one else, I know, that the bill before the Senate '-v ill and ought to pass ; and we can say to Senators on the other side, when we meet them again at the polls, if you had the power in 1804, on the floor of the Legislature, you would have put an additional debt of one million of dollars annually upon the peo ple of this Commonwealth : but you fail ed because you had pot the power. 81-TLEK'S NARROW ESCAPE. — A Washington letter to the New York Time «, dated Monday, contains the fol lowing item of interest. "A bearer of dispatches from Maj. Gen. Butler to the President arriv ed this afternoon, and he subsequent ly made a statement in presence of the Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War and the Senate Military Committee. lie stated that on Sat urday last, Beauregard, with 7,000 men, made a surprise attack upon Gen. Butler about ten miles from Richmond. So . sudden and unex pected was the encounter that Gen. Butler himself narrowly escaped cap ture. Indeed his own orderly was cap tured within sixty yards of him. The command being in readiness, it quick ly passed t froni thejdefensive to the of fensive position, and the enemy were most signally defeated. The bear er of dispatches gives it as opinion that Gen. Butler having already cut off" Beauregard, will be in Richmond at an early day, and before either Lee or Grant can reach here. ANECDOTE OF GEN. MCCLELLAN. — Col Metcalfe, of Kentucky, made a radical Union speech at a public meet ing a few days since, .at which he re lated an anecdote of Gen. McClel lan, showing how he regarded the reb el leaders. He says: I got my eyes opened on that young Napoleon in the spring of 1861. i went to see Gen. McClellan, and in the course of the conversation I said to him that Jeff. Davis was a scoundrel and repudiator. He (Mc- Clellan) straightened himself up quickly and said: "I do assure you, sir, that you are mistaken. Jeff. Davis is a perfict gentleman, and will not do anything unbecoming a gentleman." Well, if a traitor, con spirator, thief, repudiator, and .civ il devil, who is instigating all this murder is his beau ideal of a per fect gentleman, I hope our coun try may never be cursed with his standard of morality and virtue at the head of affairs. WAR SOUVENIRS. —The famous oak tree under wihch Generals Grant and Pcmberton met and agreed upon the terms for the surrender of Vicksburg on the 3d of July last, has been cut to peices by sol diers who wish to obtain souvenirs of the memorable event. Not satis-fied with ap propriating the trunk and branches, they have burrowed into the earth and seised every root which could he secured, as rel ics. Persons who have in their possession even a small piece of this wood priie it highly. A FACT— next month is June For the Citizen. PASSING AWAY. We're pawing rapidly away ! B<-hold, that beauteous rose, — Tho' " Queen of flow'in," seems to say, " My life is near Its close." It lifts its boks beyond tho tomb, — A glorious Immortality Dispels the sullen gloom. fl. M. ~WIT AUD WIBDOM. Gratitude —the memory of the heart. GREAT opportunities are generally the wise improvement of stfcill ones. PROMISING MEN. —Those who promise and forgets to pay. DR. FRANKLIN used to say that rich widows are the only pieces of second-hand goods that sell at prime cost. IT is not difficult to account for the courage of the rebels. Being reduced to skin and bone, they can shrink at nothing. " MY Lord," said the foreman of a Welsh jury, when givi-ng in their verdict, "we find the man that stole the marc not guil ty." "1 think I now see a new /ee-ture in this case," as the lawyer said when his client informed him that he had plenty of money. GEN. GEO. W. BICKLEY claims in his diary to have been the father of the re bellion. We hear nothing about its moth er. In truth it never was worth a dam.— Prentice. A PATLANDER, angling in the rain, was observed to keep bis line under the arch of a bridge. Upon being asked the reason, lie replied,—" Buro an' won't the fishes be crowdin' to keep out uv the wet?" AN impudent anonymous correspond ent, signing himself "Nod Bucket," ex presses the wish that we were dead. Very well—let him show himself in person, and we pledge ourselves to " kick the Bucket." ARTFUI, DODGER. —There is a lady in Cincinnati who amuses herself, when so inclined, by throwing tumblers, tea-cups, shovel and tongs, and the boot-jack at her husband's head. The husband has become a proficient dodger, and he doesn't mind it much. A IIIBERtNIAN sergeant was drillingan awkward squad of volunteers, and spite of his efforts failed to bri.ig them into n straight line. At last, outof all patience, he cried out, — "Oh, what a bent row! Just come out. lads, and look at yourselves!" " Woi J.nyou like to look at the moon?" asked a " professor" who had stationed his spy-glass at the street corner, of an Emcralder. "To the divil wid ye ; would I be af tlier givin' ye a dime to look at the moon wid one eye, whin I kin see it wid my two and not costin' me a sint ? ON one occasion of a magic-lantern exhi bition the scene of the children of Israel crossing the Bed Sea was given, and the small children were asked if they could tell what it represented. One little fel low immediately sang out, " Burnside crossing the Bappahannock!" AN old Yankee, who, when he was told by and English tourist in this country that the celebration of the 4th of July would soon become extinct, quickly an swered : " See here, stranger, dtfn't talk tliat way. I tell you, when the Besnrrection Day -comes round, the first thing done in the morning will be to read the Declara tion of Independence." A SOLDIER gaining his knowledge of military phrases entirely from his own ex perience, gives the following definition of pickets:— " Pickets —These are chaps that are cent out to bony terbacker of the enema, and to see if the rebels has got a pas." Too SUBLIME. —Written io tke visi tor's book at Niagra: Next to tba joyc of Moiag fiarab I lt lt leelng tfi-a-fa reb National Convention. The crowded conditiou of our columns yesterday morning prevented us from giv ing to our readers the following call for a convention of dissatisfied members of the Union party, to be held at Cleveland on Tuesday, the 31st of May next: TO THE PEOPLE OF THE UNITED STATES. After having labored ineffectually to defer as far as was in our power the criti cal moment when the attention of ths people must inevitably be fixed upon the election of a candidate for the chief magistracy of the country; after having interrogated our conscience and consul ted our duty as citizens, obeying at once the sentiment of a mature conviction and a profound affection for the common country, we feel ourselves impelled on our own responsibility, to declare to the peo ple that the time has come for all indepen dent men, jealous of their liberties and of the national greatness, to confer together and unite to resist the swelling invasion of an open, shameless, and unrestrained pa tronage which threatens to engulf under its destructive wave the rights of the peo ple, the liberty and dignity of the na tion. Deeply impressed with the conviction that in a.time of revolution, when the public attention is turned exclusively to tile success of armies, and is consequent- Jy less vigilant of the public liberties, the patronage derived from the organization of a million of men, and an administration of affairs which seeks to control the remotest parts of the country in favor of its su preme chief, constitute a danger seriously threatening to the stability of republican institutions, we declare that the principle of one term, which has now acquired near ly tho force of law by the consecration of time, ought to bo inflexibly adhered to in the approaching election. We further declare that we do not recognize in the Baltimore Convention the essential con ditions of a truly national convention.— Its proximity to tho center of all the in terested influences of administration, its distance jjom the center of tho country, its mode of convocation, the corrupting practice to which it has bee'n and inevita bly will be subjected, do not permit tho people to assemble there with any expec tation of being able to deliberate at full liberty. Convinced, as we are, that in presence of the critical circumstances in which the nation is placed, it is only in the energy and good sense of the people that tho general safety can be found— satisfied that the only way to consult as to indicate a central position to which every one may go without too much expenditure Of means and time, and where the assembled people, far from all admin istative influence may consult freely and deliberate peaceably with the pres ence of the greatest possible number of men whose known principle guarantee their sincere and enlightened devotion to the rights of the people and to the pre servation of the true basis of republican government—we earnestly invite our fel low citizens to unite at Cleveland, Ohio, on Tuesday the 31st of May next, for con sultation and concert.of action in respect to the approaohing Presidential election. ; Frederick Kapp, N. Y. {Charles E. M'»ss, Mo. | K. ii. Parker, Me. > Ernest I'ruessing, 111. iWui. I> Bobinsin, Me. ! John 8. Savery, N. Y. ! E. Cluseret. jEmil Pretorions, Mo. |Nath. P. Sawyer, Pa. , Ernest Schmidt, 111. | James Hedpath, Mam. u .iii. t ii Bhnpa. (itn", i Wm. 11. Smith, Me. IP. W. Kenyon, N.Y. I James Taussig, Mo. j Ph. Stopplebein, N. Y. Wm. 11. Dwindle, N. Y. 'Samuel Taylor. James S.Thotuaft, Mo. F. Munch, Mo. ! J. Q. Westbrook, Me. |J. F. Whipple, N. V. B (Jratx Brown, Mo. Stephen 8. F