The Sun.
London, England, 1865-10-06 00:00:00

AMERICA.

(From the Times' Correspcmdent)
NEW YORK, Sept. 23.
The question whether or not the negro shall be
admitted to the suffrage and placed on a footing of
political equality with the white race is rapidly
becoming one of pressing importance, and the
course of events will prevent it going the way of
many public questions in this country, which excite
the warmest interest to-day and to-morrow are for-
gotten. The negro difficulty cannot be so treated.
It must be decided, and decided very soon. Every
section of political parties perceives the danger of
allowing it to remain as a mainspring of confusion
and mischief. In one way or the other the issue
must be brought to a fair test and determined,
or a train will be laid for future troubles scarcely
less threatening and perilous than those which
grew up around the institution of slavery. At
present the policy which is in contemplation to-
wards the negro is purely a tentative one, as, in-
deed, it was all through the war. President Lin-
coln felt his way very cautiously in all his dealings
with reference to the slaves, and only a few weeks
before his Emancipation Proclamation was issued
he told a deputation of New Englanders, who were
urging him to adopt the measure, that it " would
be of no more use than the Pope's bull against the
comet." The great impediment to any present action
with regard to the negro consists in the fact that no
definitive principle of treating him which should be
recognised as fair and just has ever yet been laid
down. Each State in the Union has its own opinions
about the black race, and each State can do as it
pleases about admitting them to the franchise ; but
the Southern States mayprobably not be re-admitted
into the Union until they have been compelled to
acknowledge the equality of the black man. Presi-
dent Johnson is very decided in refusing to impose
any condition upon them in this respect. The final
decision rests with Congress ; it may refuse to allow
the delegates of Southern States to sit unless they
first recognise the political claims of their former
slaves, and hence it is an interesting inquiry to as-
certain, if possible, in which direction public opinion
is turning. It will be well in the first place to go
back a little into the history of the subject.
The war had not made much progress before it
became evident that the negroes, whom each State
had hitherto managed in its own way, were to
become a serious responsibility to the general Go-
vernment. The slaves felt sure then, as they do
now, that the " Yankees" would do something
more for them than to declare them free, or else
their liberty was a gift which would embarrass the
great mass of them, by depriving them of their
regular means of support. Mr. Lincoln had over
and over again said, in every variety of form, that
his " paramount object" was to save the Union,
and in his well-known letter to Horace Greeley he
distinctly affirmed that " if he could save the Unio
without freeing any slave" he would do it. Expe-
diency was no less his chief study after he had come
to the conclusion that he could not save the Union
without freeing the slave. He saw that the negro
was still, and would long remain a source of diffi-
culty, division, and danger to the country, and his
aim was to dispose of him in any way that he
judged the best for the mass of the white people,
the negro's own individual welfare being counted
of a secondary moment. Among many circum-
s':anccs which might be cited in proof of this is the
reception which Mr. Lincoln gave to a deputation
of free negroes who waited upon him at the White
House on the 14th of August, 1862. He told these
persons that a sum of money had been placed at his
disposal by CongltSS for forming a colony suitable
to the African race, where they might live apart
from the whites. " You and we," he said to them,
" are different races. We have between us a broader
difference than exists between almost any other two
races. . . . It is better for us both therefore to be
separated." He further told them :—" There is an
unwillingness on the part of our people, harsh as it
may be, for you free coloured people to remain
with us." He therefore invited them to persuade
their countrymen to emigrate to a colony which he
intended to establish in New Granada, Central
America. But it was afterwards found that the
Government of New Granada objected to receive
tile blacks, and the project was consequently aban-
doned. In April, 1863, it was revived, and the
Government made an agreement with certain agents
to transport such negroes as desired to emigrate
to a province in Hayti. This also proved a failure,
and the negroes were obliged to be brought
back in consequence of the land allotted to them
being hopelessly barren. There the schemes of colo
nisation ended, and President Lincoln soon after,

wards found employment for the free negroes by
enrolling them in the army.
This last step only deferred a settlement of the
question, and made its solution more difficult than
ever. For the negroes thus enlisted as soldiers
fought well and proved faithful, and they thus in-
creased their claim to the franchise. It is now asked
with some force why an intelligent and loyal black
soldier is not as worthy of having a vote as a dis-
loyal white. The very freedom of the negro is held
not to be secure until he has a voice in the govern-
ment of the State in which he lives, and, through
the delegates of his State, his share of the control-
ling power in the government of the country. There
is now, what there never was before, a feeling of
hostility towards the black man in the South. Here-
tofore he was looked upon as a chattel, and was too
insignificant to provoke hatred. Sometimes he was
even respected as a good servant. Now that the gulf
between him and the white is so abridged, and seems
likely to close altogether, the dominant race think
him not unworthy of their open enmity. President
Johnson's policy is to withdraw the regular troops
from all the States, and leave them to keep order
with the aid of their own militia. This may satisfy
those " constitutionalists" who cry out for the
speedy restoration of civil rights as the first and one
thing needful ; but it does not satisfy those who
wish to see accomplished the full emancipation of
the negro. What is to prevent any man holding
slaves in the interior of the Southern State at this
moment? lam not aware of any power competent
to do so. In Tennessee, if a negro is arrested for
vagrancy and there are plenty of vagrants just
now—he may be sold to the highest bidder to raise
money to pay the gaol fees. The Provost's-office,
attached to the Freedmen's bureau, where a negro
may lodge complaints on account of ill-treatment,
is very likely 50 miles away from his abode. He is
obliged to submit to any ill-usage, for the means of
redress are out of his reach. The other day a man
was brought before one of the Provost's officers in
Virginia for ill-using a negro, and convicted. The

_—
offender became very angry, and said, " If this war
ain't done let us know it, and we can begin over."
This is the way in which ill-feeling on both sides
will constantly be provoked until it bursts in a
tempest which will be less threatening to the peace
of the country than the last only because of the
weakness of tho South.
If once the Government formally recognises the
right of the negro to exercise a voice in the affairs
of the country all quarrels as to his position might
stand a chance of coming to an end. Mr. Chase's
proposal of " universal suffrage" is preposterous ;
but the question is, whether the Government can
with any consistency whatever refuse to recognise
as a principle that a loyal and intelligent black
has as good a right to a vote as a loyal and in-
telligent white. If he was worth shedding these
rivers of blood fur, is he not worth a vote'
iVhy should he not have it ? It is too late in
the day to say that his black skin is a fatal
objection to him. The moderate section of that
party which uniformly fights for negro suffrage_
among whom Mr. Horace Greeley deserves to be
included during certain lucid intervals which occur
to hini—do not ask for a sweeping admission of the
negroes to the franchise. Mr. Greeley wrote a day
or two ago, " We will gladly agree that none shall
vote but those who can read, or read and write, or
who pay taxes, or who follow some useful vocation,
-or to any other touchstone calculated to confine the
right of suffrage to the capable and worthy." In
this State of New York a negro is allowed to vote
provided that he has lived in the State three years,
that he possesses freehold property to the value of
$230 annually, and that he has paid taxes for one
year previous to the period of election. I am hi-