Having once gotten on the right track (as they were compelled to believe it, inasmuch as it was clearly the one which conducted to immediate profit and safety) these gentlemen thought they could not go too fast. "The people were educated to loyalty," now, and it was high time to commence the punishment of those who had shown an inaptness to receive the lessons, or a distaste for the method of instruction. The dignity of Kentucky had been sacrificed by the avarice and cowardice of her own sons, who sat in her councils--this is the way in which those legislative-panders sought to assert it again. They passed an act entitled "an act to prohibit and prevent rebellion by citizens of Kentucky and others in this State." By this act it was provided that any citizen of this State, who as a soldier or officer of the Confederate army, should, as part of an armed force, enter the State to make war upon it, should be punished by confinement in the penitentiary. "Making war upon the State," doubtless meant any attack made upon the "Federal soldiers assembled" (in the State) "for the purpose of preserving the tranquillity of the State." And it was farther enacted that, "any person who shall, within the limits of this State, persuade or induce any person to enlist or take service in the army of the so-called Confederate States, and the persons so persuaded or induced does enlist or take service in the same, shall be deemed guilty of a high misdemeanor and upon conviction, shall be fined in a sum not exceeding one thousand dollars, and imprisonment not exceeding six months." Whether, in passing this act, the Legislature of Kentucky was treating a question involving belligerent rights, is a matter for lawyers to pass upon; but that it was disgracing the State is patent. Such action might have been proper and competent--against both belligerents--had Kentucky adopted it as a measure necessary to the maintenance of her neutrality. It would have been, at least, dignified, had she earnestly and unequivocally declared, from the beginning, an adherence to the Government, and a resolution to support its policy.
But under all the circumstances, and after the repeated declarations of its authors that, to resist coercion, the very measures ought to be taken (for the punishment of which this act was now passed), it is difficult to stigmatize, with appropriate emphasis, such conduct.