The Manitowoc pilot. [volume] (Manitowoc, Wis.) 1859-1932, 1859-07-22
The Almighty Niger.

The Almighty Niger! The beginning,
the middle, and the end of everything with
the journalist, the population, and the par
son of the United States. To the young
politician, stumbling block; to the old,
foolishness; the Juggernaut which brushes
in its career everything like an attempt to
improve the political or social, or religious
condition of "the white element in our
population y the most ahstruse, and there.
fore the most favorite, theme for note book
of Cockney tourist; the standing dish at
Westminster; the bonnie bouche for the
delicate feasts of reason at Exeter Hall.
The priests who officiate at the shrine
of the Almighty Niger number between
one and two hundred thousand. In the
south, they worship him because he plants
their tobacco, picks their cotton, raises
their rice, makes their sugar, and above
all, helps them to become the richest, the
happiest, and the most fashionably indo-
lent people on the face of the earth. In
the Almighty Niger, according to the
view of the politicians in the south, are
concentrated the rights of the south
The south has no right worth speaking of,
they say, except the right to worship the
Almighty Niger. In the north and west,
the Almighty Niger is worshipped as re-
presenting so much political capital
Without him the underground railway
stock would not be worth cent; it would
be worse even than Erie. Where would
Seward be without the Almighty Niger
Where Weed, with his five thousand dol
lars in free republican Almighty Niger?
Where Greeley, with the thousand dollar
draft in his breeches pocket or what else
could he find to preach about in Kansas?
Where, in point of fact, would the whole
republican party be without the Almighty
Niger?
He is their hope, their stay, their eter-
nal salvation, their sheet anchor. With
out him they would 90 to the bottom with
the velocity of a sixty-four FOUNDER.
Now, these worshippers of the Almigh-
ty N gger manage to control the political
affairs of the country. They are coming
together next year to make arrangements
for the election of a Chief Magistrate of
their sect, Head Worshipper or High
Priest of the Almighty Niger, who will
be ex-officio President of the United States
The only question to be settled about the
victor is, whether he is sufficiently ardent
professor of the faith. If he believes with
sufficient fervor in the Almighty Niger,
according to the views of the church, north
or south, as the case may be, the Almigh-
| ty Dollar will come out to elect him, and
the spoils of victory will be duly divided
| IL, Io ,r.l1
Niger on their side, they getthe Almigh.
ty Dollar. With both they are omnipo-
tent.
Not that the four millions of electors
who will vote for this head worshipper be.
lieve in the Almighty Niger. On the
contrary, most of them dismiss him az a
bore and a humbug. A few know him tc
be blind, and a trap put forward by men
who, being too lazy to work, and afraid to
steal, get their living as hangers on TIC
some political party. But people who are
so much involved in their personal affair:
as we are, have little time to look below
the crust of politics and dissect the strata
of humbug, charlatanism and chcanery
that underIie each other and crop out on
every side. So they walk blindIy up to
the polls and vote for the Almighty Mig
ger.
There may be time when the politi-
clans will have check, when the Almigh
ty Niger will no longer be what they call
an issue. Then, and not till then, will his
adherents drop him with surprising celer-
ity. At present the Almighty Niger is
the ruling power socially, politically, and
religiously, in this broad land.